Caleb Martin, Kevin Love, Thomas Bryant opt out of Heat contracts, all three to enter free agency Sunday at 6 p.m.
MIAMI — The Miami Heat gained clarity Saturday with their roster ahead of Sunday’s 6 p.m. start of NBA free agency, but clarity that also presents new questions.
With each player with a 5 p.m. Saturday deadline to opt into the final season of their Heat contracts, Kevin Love, Caleb Martin and Thomas Bryant all opted out of their deals a day after Josh Richardson opted into the final season on his two-year contract.
Love, Martin and Bryant are now free to negotiate to return to the Heat or sign elsewhere.
In addition to Richardson returning, the expectation is that Love also will return, with Saturday’s opt-out possibly procedural in order to help the Heat with the team’s position hard against the NBA’s punitive luxury tax.
For now, that means players from the Heat’s season-ending roster available in free agency will be Martin, Bryant, Love, Haywood Highsmith, Delon Wright, Patty Mills, Jamal Cain, Alondes Williams and Cole Swider.
Locked into contracts for the Heat next season are Richardson, Bam Adebayo, Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, Terry Rozier, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Duncan Robinson, Nikola Jovic, Orlando Robinson and draft picks Kel’el Ware and Pelle Larsson, who are subject to the NBA’s defined rookie scale.
Teams are limited to 15 players under standard contract during the regular season, plus three more players on two-way contracts that pay half the standard-contract minimum and do not count against the salary cap.
Of those currently under contract, only Orlando Robinson does not hold a fully guaranteed contract for next season.
Teams can carry up to 20 players during the offseason, with the Heat having reached agreements for summer league with three undrafted players: Florida guard Zyon Pullin, Arizona forward Keshad Johnson and Colorado State guard Isaiah Stevens. The Heat also have extended a summer invitation to guard Bryson Warren, who last season was with the Heat G League affiliate, the Sioux Falls Skyforce.
A year after losing Max Strus and Gabe Vincent in free agency, it appears that Martin, because of the Heat’s salary position, also will depart without compensation. The same could be the case with Highsmith, depending on the market.
Martin had a $7.1 million option to return to the Heat next season, likely to receive somewhere closer to double that figure from an outside suitor.
The Heat appear poised for the loss of Martin, just as they were for last summer’s loss of Vincent and Strus.
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Bryant bypassed a $2.8 million salary for next season to enter free agency. For Bryant, it was an uneven ride with the Heat, eventually displaced in his lone Heat season at backup center by Love.
Richardson on Friday opted into his $3.1 million for next season, the second year of the contract he signed last summer to join the Heat in free agency.
While Love opted to bypass the $4 million player option for 2024-25 on the contract signed last summer with the Heat, Saturday’s move keeps the door open for a reunion that could have Love on the Heat books for a lower salary-cap figure than had he opted into that $4 million.
The Heat open training camp for summer league this coming week in San Francisco, where they will play three summer-league games at the California Classic, before moving on to the larger NBA Summer League in Las Vegas starting July 13.
As for Love, 36, he made clear in the wake of the Heat’s first-round ouster at the hands of the eventual NBA champion Boston Celtics that his desire was to return. He thrived last season as a floor-spacing 3-point threat. While the Heat selected a 7-footer in Wednesday night’s first round of the NBA draft, Ware, at 20, is viewed as more of a developmental prospect.
A five-time All-Star as well as an NBA champion with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Love averaged 8.8 points, 6.1 rebounds and 2.1 assists last season, shooting .344 on 3-pointers. With the retirement of Udonis Haslem at the close of the 2023-24 season, Love last season took on the role of veteran mentor in the locker room.
