It’s not the biggest deal in the world, though I liked his shot blocking ability and I always thought he was an underrated shooter… but Greg Stiemsma’s agent says he wants to play in Minnesota.
Stiemsma agent re: on-hold discussions with Wolves: “He wants to play for Minnesota. Greg has a lot of patience.”
— Jerry Zgoda(@JerryZgoda) July 7, 2012
The kid is from a small town in Wisconsin, which oh just happens to be on the border of Minnesota (I had to look that up). So if the kid wants to go almost home to play ball… so be it.
The Celtics may have had interest in matching offers for Stiemsma, but he might have played himself out of the C’s range to do so. They extended the qualifying offer of just over $1 million to him… but…unlike most restricted free agents, the Celtics have no form of “Bird Rights” on Stiemsma. And now that Jeff Green is in the mix, the Celtics only have the bi-annual exception left as a tool to match. Larry Coon has it all explained here.
So basically, because of the rules, if Minnesota (or anyone else) offers more than $1.957 million dollars, the Celtics cannot match Stiemsma and he’s gone.
Again… not the worst thing in the world, but I liked him and I thought he could grow well alongside Kevin Garnett and others.
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