Kenyon Martin Officially Becomes Unrestricted Free Agent

Welcome back Mr. Martin.

After being stuck in China for the last four-plus months, Kenyon Martin is finally free to come back to America and play in the NBA, according to ESPN’s Marc Stein:

There is a bevy of suitors interested in the 34-year-olds services. According to Yahoo! Sports Adrian Wojnarowski, at least six teams are interested including the Atlanta Hawks, Los Angeles Clippers, Miami Heat, New York Knicks, Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs.

In other words, any team that has championship aspirations and lacks depth is interested. The Denver Nuggets won’t be re-signing him, but may be able to get something out of him by pulling off a sign and trade depending on how the NBA rules on this unique situation.  

So what’s the time-table for when K-Mart can suit up for the third team in his career? Fairly quickly:

I think you can look at the curiosity in Martin and realize the ridiculous season currently being played in the NBA. Teams are already extremely banged up and desperate for depth as they are run ragged through the grueling schedule. A 34-year-old with almost 750 regular and postseason games under his belt should not be a hot commodity.

Martin has had multiple knee surgeries and is a shell of his former high-flying self. Last year’s 8.6 ppg were the lowest of his career.

But regardless, he is still capable of playing strong defense in the post against some of the league’s top power forwards and he does have almost 100 games of playoff experience including two trips to the finals.

I expect K-Mart to be logging minutes in the next 10 days for either the Hawks or Heat, two teams that can provide him with the most playing time.