Timberwolves forward Kyle Anderson is set to play for Team China at next month’s FIBA World Cup after becoming a naturalized Chinese citizen, per Reuters/ESPN.
Anderson represents the first American basketball player to acquire Chinese citizenship via naturalization, though plenty of other athletes in other disciplines have obtained it that way recently. He would also be able to compete for China in next year’s Olympics.
“I’m so happy to announce that I will be representing China at the World Cup,” Anderson said in a Weibo video. “Really proud and honored to wear the Team China jersey.”
There’s more out of the Northwest Division:
- New reserve Jazz center Omer Yurtseven has yet to talk the team about his role for the 2023/24 season, he tells Alex Vejar of The Salt Lake Tribune. “Not yet,” Yurtseven said. “But I met with coach [Will] Hardy and talked with [CEO] Danny Ainge as well. We haven’t talked, but we have some time during the summer. We’ll stay in contact and kind of go from there where I’ll be able to understand exactly what they want from me and execute.”
- Trail Blazers shooting guard Jeenathan Williams is likely to be released before his contract can become guaranteed on August 1, reports Sean Highkin of The Rose Garden Report (Twitter link). Williams, 24, went undrafted out of Buffalo last summer, and spent most of the 2022/23 season with the Jazz’s NBAGL affiliate, the Salt Lake City Stars. The 6’6″ wing latched on with Portland in April. In his five contests with the Trail Blazers last year, he averaged 10.6 PPG on .615/.375/.667 shooting splits, along with 3.0 RPG, 2.0 APG and 0.6 SPG.
- Lindy Waters III is a “strong candidate” to return to the Thunder on a two-way contract, opines Joe Mussatto of The Oklahoman (Twitter link). Oklahoma City converted his 2022/23 two-way deal to a standard roster contract, but declined his $1.9M team option for this season earlier this summer.
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