The Charlotte Hornets announced on Wednesday afternoon that the team had waived guard Kobi Simmons.
Simmons signed a rest-of-season contract on April 7 that was fully non-guaranteed for the upcoming year. He had spent about a week on a Two-Way prior to signing his NBA contract following Bryce McGowens’ conversion to a standard deal, and was an affiliate player with the Greensboro Swarm up until then.
With the move, Charlotte opens up an extra roster spot following the extension of PJ Washington. Since Simmons’ deal was fully non-guaranteed, the Hornets can release him with $0 in dead cap. The roster count now stands at 17 including all standard NBA contracts and Two-Way deals. It appears that R.J. Hunter has not been officially signed yet, so maybe this move is a prerequisite to Hunter signing his own non-guaranteed deal.
Simmons had been around the Hornets organization for the better part four years. Since signing an Exhibit 10 contract in 2019, he played three seasons with Greensboro before making five NBA appearances with the big club to round out the 22-23 calendar. He’s arguably been the Swarm’s most consistent and productive guard in recent years, peaking at 18.3 points, 6.1 assists and 5.1 rebounds per game in the 2020-21 G League bubble season. Simmons went undrafted out of Arizona in 2017 and has played in 38 NBA games (12 starts) across three seasons with Memphis, Cleveland and Charlotte.
Best of luck to Simmons in the future, be that overseas or with Greensboro once again.
