According to Jared Zwerling of ESPNNewYork.com, 31-year old free agent veteran point guard Royal Ivey will workout for the San Antonio Spurs and Atlanta Hawks in the near future.
Royal Ivey speaking to the kids. He has workouts with the Hawks and Spurs coming up soon. http://t.co/XzMLLSkscy
— Jared Zwerling (@JaredZwerling) August 24, 2013
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Ivey stands at 6'3" and in his nine NBA seasons, has primarily played the backup point guard position. Last season with the Philadelphia 76ers, he averaged 3.2 points, shot 43% from the field, and 42% from 3-point range in 13.2 minutes per game. Ivey participated in 53 games for the 76ers. He earned $1.2 million last season with the 76ers according to Basketball-Reference.com.
With the Spurs already stacked with point guards (Tony Parker, Cory Joseph, Nando De Colo, Patty Mills) it wouldn't make a lot of sense on paper to sign Ivey unless there was a plan in the future to trade one or two of their other point guards. Aside from Parker who one would consider un-tradeable at this stage in his career, Joseph, De Colo, and Mills are all still fairly young by NBA standards and have a lot more upside in the future then Ivey would have at 31.
However, there still is a vacant 15th roster spot open in San Antonio, and after Deshaun Thomas decided to play in Europe, a player like Ivey could fill that position or perhaps a player invited to training camp, but it wouldn't be surprising to see the Spurs leave the spot open going into next season.
