Brandan Wright

Wright played for both the Memphis Grizzlies and Houston Rockets last year, but after a decade of being a very productive backup, he struggled with both his health and performance. Health problems are nothing new for Wright, who has managed only 68 games over the past three seasons, and only 428 over his 11 year career; a dodgy knee is now the main cause of his repeated absences. In the past, when healthy, he would at least be an athletic paint finisher, lob catcher, shot-blocker and occasional mid-range shooter. If the Brandan Wright of old can be found, he can still be that.

Brandan Wright
PF/C - 6’10, 210lbs - 30 years old - 11 years of experience

When healthy, Wright is a very effective reserve big man who plays within his skill set and does things an opposition cannot really take away. But Wright is never healthy. He managed only one game for the Rockets, and has played only 68 total over the last three years. Even with a decade of good production, then, he still has it all to prove with his knees; he has played only 428 games in 11 years, and is trending further the wrong way.

Brandan Wright
PF/C, 6’10, 210lbs, 29 years old, 9 years of experience

Wright got hurt, because he often gets hurt. As always, when he played, he was very effective, a shotblocker and athlete who dunks everything, runs, rolls, occasionally makes a jump shot, and is too busy bouncing around to rebound. Perhaps it is just due to my eternal problem of overly lauding the play of springy athletic wiry strong back-up big men (see also John Henson and Ed Davis) that is why I speak so fondly of him, but Wright is plenty good, and just needs to get healthy. The injuries make him unreliable, but the talents make him worth waiting on.

Player Plan: One year at $5,955,760 left. When he is healthy, this is a very good value deal, but the price does reflect the injuries. It is probably worth pursuing a trade for Wright, given the lack of other tradeable pieces and the potential of incumbent youth making him expendable.

[...] With one exception: the date becomes Jan. 15 if the player is a Larry Bird or Early Bird free agent who re-signed with his over-the-cap team and received a raise greater than 20% in the first season of his new deal in the process. This applies only to Brandan Wright, Timofey Mozgov, Tony Allen, Nikola Pekovic, Chase Budinger, J.R. Smith and Tiago Splitter.

Brandan Wright

After three years, Brandan Wright has simply been a massive bust. It's not that he's played badly; Wright has a career PER of 18.2, a career true shooting percentage of .574%, and career averages of 16.0 points, 8.7 rebounds and 2.0 blocks per 36 minutes. The problem instead is that he hasn't played much. Wright missed all of last season with a torn shoulder capsule, and played in only 39 games in his sophomore season after dislocating the same shoulder. He had played in only 38 games in his rookie season, due to a realm of DNP-CD's an insanely inconsistent minutes, and has played only 77 of a possible 246 career games.

With Anthony Randolph and Ronny Turiaf now in New York out of the way, Wright and Ekpe Udoh (not playing in summer league due to injury) should have all the backup big man minutes to themselves. Only another serious injury to Wright should mean Vladimir Radmanovic plays in his place; if both are healthy, it should never happen.

Of course, it's Don Nelson who needs convincing of this, not any of us.