This is the chance Thomas needs to re-assert himself as a star point guard in the NBA.
Former All-Star point guard Isaiah Thomas is a free agent no more. After spending more than 10 days on the market, watching his counterparts get scooped up by teams left and right, Thomas signed a one-year deal at the veteran’s minimum with the Denver Nuggets, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
Thomas is coming off of one of the most disappointing seasons of his pro career, one in which he was traded by the Boston Celtics to the Cleveland Cavaliers, then flipped by the Cavaliers to the Los Angeles Lakers. The trades were a result of his struggles to rebound from a debilitating hip injury that cost him the first half of the 2017-18 season. It could not have been the year Thomas envisioned after averaging 28.9 points per game and finishing as a dark horse MVP candidate in Boston in 2017.
Thomas projects to be the backup point guard behind Jamal Murray and if healthy, he can contribute immediately to a Nuggets team that fell just short of the playoff picture in the Western Conference last season. He joins a talented team that also includes Gary Harris, Paul Millsap and Nikola Jokic, who recently inked a five-year, $158 million max contract extension.
The deal, though, is humbling for Thomas, who proclaimed he deserved a max contract in August of 2017. His veteran’s minimum contract is worth just over $2.2 million. If IT plays like the All-Star he was, though, this deal could be the stepping stone to a bigger contract next summer.