Andre Iguodala Says He Almost Signed With Sacramento Kings
By Bryan Rose
July 11, 2013; Oakland, CA, USA; Andre Iguodala addresses the media in a press conference after a sign-and-trade deal to become a Golden State Warriors player at the Warriors Practice Facility. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
The contractual situation with former Denver Nugget and now Golden State Warriors swingman Andre Iguodala was nothing short of weird.
The one time Arizona Wildcat spoke with Scott Howard-Cooper about his free agency recently and suggested that he was very serious about signing with the Kings, however, the imposed deadline from the front office rubbed him the wrong way.
Per Iggy, via Scott Howard-Cooper:
"“When you’re dealing with deadlines as a player, it’s not really a positive thing to say, ‘All right, they’re giving me a deadline,’ ” Igoudala said. “You don’t want to really get into deadlines. We had really good conversations and I was close. After the first day, they were in the top three teams, top two teams. I think with (new owner) Vivek (Ranadive) coming from (the Warriors) ownership group and going out on his own and getting a team, he has a really good vision of what he wants to build in Sacramento. That vision was really attractive. I was almost close to going there.“The deadline was a turnoff because I wanted to totally explore my other options. I still had two meetings to go when the deadline came. I still had to meet with Houston and I met with Dallas. I wanted to explore all my options.”"
Irritating as the deadline might have been to Iguodala, the Kings had other roster decisions to make, especially with Tyreke Evans signing an offer sheet with the New Orleans Pelicans. They simply couldn’t wait for Iguodala to take a few more days and potentially spurn them in the end.
And being spurned is most likely what would have happened had the Kings waited on Iguodala, who said he probably would have picked the Warriors in the end once they cleared the cap space to sign him:
"Igoudala now says he “probably” would have still chosen the Warriors in the end no matter what. But the Kings likely would have remained a possibility longer."