NBA Free Agents 2012: Power Ranking Nicolas Batum and the Worst FA Offers

We see it every single summer. 

An NBA team with money to spend goes out and blindly chucks it at an overrated free agent who they believe will make them a contender in the coming season. 

So far, this 2012 NBA free agency period has certainly lived up to that classic summer tradition. 

Here, we power rank the worst free agent offers in 2012.

No. 5. Roy Hibbert

The Portland Trail Blazers kicked off their summer spending with a maximum offer to center Roy Hibbert, according to ESPN.com. The 7'2" big man averaged 12.8 points and 8.8 rebounds per game last season with the Indiana Pacers, but disappeared for stretches at a time during the playoffs.

The concern with this offer is that it is worth the maximum, four years, $58 million. Hibbert is young and has avoided injury so far in his career, but big men aren't always a guarantee to touch the basketball, and thus money of this magnitude should not be spent on a quality center, but rather a superstar-caliber player. 

When Hibbert is in the class of Dwight Howard and Andrew Bynum, this sort of money will make sense, but not right now. 

No. 4. Jeremy Lin

Thirty-million dollars is a lot of money, and last time I checked, restricted free agent point guard Jeremy Lin went to Harvard. The Houston Rockets have offered Lin an offer sheet for four years, $30 million, which he has agreed to sign on July 11, according to ESPN.com. 

This is a terrible offer from the Rockets, regardless of how bad they need a point guard. Lin has incredible bust potential heading into his second season as a starter, and has even proved to be injury prone already after just 25 starts in the NBA. 

No. 3. Landry Fields

Jeremy Lin's teammate Landry Fields is likely headed to a new team this summer as well, after he agreed to an offer sheet with the Toronto Raptors that would keep him in Canada for the next three seasons, and pay him roughly $20 million, according to ESPN's Marc Stein. 

Fields struggled last season with the Knicks, failing to maintain his production after an overachieving rookie campaign in 2010-11. Fields averaged less than nine points per game and shot just 25.6 percent from beyond the arc despite hitting more than 39 percent of his three pointers as a rookie. 

No. 2 Nicolas Batum

The Minnesota Timberwolves and restricted free agent Nicolas Batum have agreed to an offer sheet that would pay the 23-year-old small forward anywhere from $45-50 million over a four-year period of time, according to an ESPN.com report. 

Although the Timberwolves need to make some moves in free agency in order to compete in the loaded Western Conference, paying a player who averaged 14 points and 4.6 rebounds in 30 minutes per game last season more than $10 million per year makes little to no sense at all. 

No. 1. Omer Asik

The Houston Rockets outdid themselves in the hunt to land Jeremy Lin when they offered backup big man Omer Asik a contract worth three years and $25 million, according to ESPN's Marc Stein. Asik played less than 15 minutes per game last season with the Chicago Bulls and averaged 3.1 points and 5.3 rebounds per game. 

The fact that Houston would give away money like that is simply mind-blowing. Asik shows promise, but his production suggests that the Rockets have just thrown away a great deal of cash. 

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