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2025 Free Agents - Quentin Grimes

Grimes was a high-level prospect coming out of high school in 2018, even getting some top-10 pick buzz. However, he struggled during his freshman season at Kansas, and transferred to Houston. At Houston, Grimes became the AAC player of the year in 2021 and led Houston to the Final Four. He was then drafted by the Knicks in the first round, going 25th overall in the 2021 draft. Grimes looked like a solid rotation player right away for the Knicks, and was even seen as a key tipping point in the Donovan Mitchell trade discussions in 2022. He had a great year in '22-'23, starting at shooting guard for the Knicks and hitting 39% from 3. However, after the Knicks added Donte DiVincenzo, Grimes lost his starting spot and fell back in the rotation. He was traded mid-season to Detroit, who essentially didn't play him and then traded him to Dallas in the offseason. Grimes is the type of player that isn't great at any one skill, but is good at a lot of things and doesn't have any clear weaknesses. He's a solid 37% 3-point shooter and finishes at the rim at a decent rate despite not having high-level athleticism. He doesn't have much of an in-between game on offense but knows well enough to stay to his strengths and not take many midrange shots, so his overall efficiency is decent. Grimes is mostly an off-ball, spot up shooter, but he has enough playmaking skills to attack hard closeouts and make plays or make a couple moves off the dribble against a rotating defense. Defensively, Grimes does a nice job of moving his feet and staying in front of ball-handlers. He stays focused on that end and works hard to stay in position. He'll fight through screens, and knows where to be from an off-ball, helpside rotation perspective. At 6'5", he has decent size for a shooting guard and can guard multiple positions, even if you don't want him guarding the bigger elite wings in the NBA. Grimes will be 25 years old as a free agent in 2025, so certainly not old, but not a young prospect either. If he can get back to the level he was playing at during his second season in New York, he could be a solid wing that has a long NBA career.

Summary

Grimes will be a restricted free agent with a $12.9 million cap hold, $6.3 million Qualifying Offer, and full Bird Rights. I wouldn't expect Grimes' QO to come into play, but I wouldn't completely rule it out considering it may not be that much lower than his market value starting salary and the Mavericks could play hardball with him as a restricted free agent. There's also a chance that the Mavericks don't give him a QO, which would make him an unrestricted free agent. Depending on how close the Mavericks are to the luxury tax after free agency, if Grimes is brought back by the Mavericks on a multi-year contract they could benefit from frontloading his contract, as it could give them additional flexibility in the future. Other teams will have multiple ways to sign Grimes as even teams without cap space could use the Non-Taxpayer MLE or Room MLE to sign him to an offer sheet or outright as an unrestricted free agent (it's unlikely that the Taxpayer MLE or B-Annual Exception would be enough since they are below his QO amount). However, Grimes being a restricted free agent would lower his interest among teams, as they will worry that the only way to pry him away from Dallas would be to overpay him. There's also a chance that Grimes is an unrestricted free agent with only modest offers, and could be signed for the minimum.

Cap Considerations

Grayson Allen (2 years, $19 million, 2021) Miles McBride (3 years, $13 million, 2024) Donte DiVincenzo (1+1 years, $9 million, 2022)

Player/Contract Comparison

Potential Teams: Mavericks, Jazz, Nets, Hawks, Bulls

Predicted Contract: 3-year, $24 million with the Mavericks

Last updated: 10/13/2024

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