Kyle Lowry Agrees To Return To Toronto For $100 Million

Kyle Lowry has reached an agreement on a contract to return to the Toronto Raptors, reportedly for three years and $100 million, per Woj. Lowry was probably the biggest fish left in the free-agent point guard pool, but a diminishing number of potential starting spots made it increasingly likely that Lowry would be returning to the Raptors, and for something less than the veteran maximum.

The years on this are interesting: Lowry gets over the $30 million-per-year benchmark, but at 31 years old, this is almost certainly the last near-max contract he’ll sign in the NBA, and it only takes him until his age-34 season. That can probably also serve as an indicator of Masai Ujiri’s sense of the timeline of this current Raptors core.

With Lowry, Jeff Teague, and Jrue Holiday off the market, the last two big names left out there are George Hill and [gulp] Derrick Rose. Various reports have had George Hill linked to the San Antonio Spurs and the Denver Nuggets. Hill reportedly turned down a renegotiate-and-extend offer from the Jazz back in February, and the team probably has less room for his asking price and more leverage in negotiations now that they’ve traded for Ricky Rubio, who can presumably do a reasonable job of replacing Hill in the starting lineup.

Who even knows where the hell Derrick Rose will wind up. He’d been linked to the Timberwolves before the start of free agency, but their signing of Jeff Teague probably makes that unrealistic. I think we can all agree the happiest possible free agency development that can happen now is Derrick Rose and Nick Young both signing lucrative multi-year contracts with the Knicks.