{"id":120289,"date":"2025-01-27T12:58:57","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T17:58:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=120289"},"modified":"2025-01-27T17:26:45","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T22:26:45","slug":"isaiah-thomas-signing-g-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/01\/27\/isaiah-thomas-signing-g-league\/","title":{"rendered":"2-Time All-Star Looking to Return to NBA After G League Signing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s that time of year. Former NBA All-Star <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/t\/thomais02.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Isaiah Thomas<\/a> is looking to get back onto an NBA roster.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/08\/28\/isaiah-thomas-breaks-down-biggest-celtics-disappointment\/\" target=\"_self\">Isaiah Thomas&#8217; Celtics<\/a> tenure is probably what he is most remembered for, but he has had plenty of other NBA experience under his belt. Now, he is looking to get another shot at glory on the biggest basketball stage in the world. <a  href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/ShamsCharania\/status\/1883892876301791720\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Shams Charania<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">broke the news<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that Thomas is signing with the Utah Jazz&#8217;s G League team as the former star looks to get back into the NBA pipeline.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Two-time All-Star Isaiah Thomas is pursuing another NBA return, signing into the G League and rejoining the Utah Jazz&#8217;s Salt Lake City affiliate, sources tell ESPN. Last season, Thomas averaged 33 points in four G League games en route to a call up to the Suns.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShamsCharania\/status\/1883892876301791720?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">January 27, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2><strong>2-Time All-Star\u00a0Isaiah Thomas Looking to Return to NBA After G League Signing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<h3><strong>Isaiah Thomas Signs With\u00a0<\/strong>Utah&#8217;s G League Team<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The former NBA star and fan favorite may be back in the NBA before we know it. The news from Shams about Thomas&#8217; signing has NBA fans hopeful that they will be able to see their short king take the court once again. Thomas is planning to sign with the Utah Jazz G League affiliate in hopes of getting called up to the NBA once again.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thomas had a similar path to a few NBA games last season. He <\/span><a  href=\"https:\/\/stats.gleague.nba.com\/player\/202738\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">averaged 32.5 points<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in four G League games and was later called up by the Suns. He only played six games for the Suns last year, averaging 3.2 minutes per game. Still, seeing Thomas back on the court was a sight all NBA fans enjoyed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Isaiah Thomas&#8217; Celtics Tenure<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is hard to imagine that it has already been over seven years since Thomas was a Boston Celtic. Thomas\u2019 time in Boston was nothing short of magical. As one of the shortest NBA players of all time, he led the Celtics to an Eastern Conference Finals and even put himself into the MVP conversation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">During his best season with the Celtics, he averaged 28.9 points, 5.9 assists, and 2.7 rebounds per game while shooting almost 38% from deep. Unfortunately, Thomas played through a hip injury during his time in Boston, which may have <\/span><a  href=\"https:\/\/bleacherreport.com\/articles\/10004000-isaiah-thomas-says-celtics-didnt-reveal-long-term-risk-of-2017-hip-injury\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ended his career prematurely.<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Who Could Use IT Now?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is hard to say what teams could find Thomas useful for this season. The Jazz certainly would be one to look at, as they have signed him to a G League contract. Thomas\u2019 presence on a tanking Jazz roster would likely be more about veteran leadership than an on-the-court fit. The Jazz are looking to develop multiple young guards at the moment and likely wouldn\u2019t want Thomas taking precious playing time away from them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In fact, the way the NBA is now, a veteran locker room presence is probably the best thing Thomas can be. NBA offenses are too smart not to pick on Thomas\u2019 size on the defensive end. He may still be able to provide a scoring and playmaking spark for a team in need. However, his defensive shortcomings will likely keep him off the court for any title contender. Even still, any Thomas&#8217; signing would spark some excitement for whichever NBA team he might join.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s that time of year. Former NBA All-Star Isaiah Thomas is looking to get back onto an NBA roster.\u00a0Isaiah Thomas&#8217; Celtics tenure is probably what he is most remembered for, but he has had plenty of other NBA experience under his belt. Now, he is looking to get another shot at glory on the biggest [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5284,"featured_media":120300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"1","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,5,62,3,24],"tags":[171],"class_list":["post-120289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-celtics","category-nba","category-news","category-jazz","tag-isaiah-thomas"],"modified_by":"Eamon Cassels, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120289"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120289\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120353,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120289\/revisions\/120353"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}