South East Melbourne set to secure former Sydney Kings grand final MVP Derrick Walton Jr in huge NBL free agency bombshell
The Phoenix have shaken up NBL free agency with a huge move set to bring a former grand final MVP back to the league. Here’s how the club’s greatest player helped make it happen.
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South East Melbourne has pulled off one of the biggest coups of this year’s free agency period, former NBL grand final MVP Derrick Walton Jr set for a bombshell return to the Australian league.
Among the most aggressive teams this off-season under new basketball boss Simon Mitchell, Code Sports can exclusively reveal the American import is set to sign with the Phoenix — and star forward Mitch Creek’s stint in China paved the way for talks with the brilliant 2023 Sydney Kings’ title winner.
It’s understood Walton Jr, who was also in China with Zhejiang Lions, reached out to Creek, currently with Xinjiang Flying Tigers, and expressed an interest in an NBL comeback with South East Melbourne.
READ: ALL THE LATEST NBL FREE AGENCY NEWS, RUMOURS AND ROSTERS
The club’s greatest player alerted Phoenix brass of the opportunity to secure a talent who would instantly be among the NBL’s finest point guards and an intercontinental meeting with the Detroit-born Michigan product was quickly organised.
Despite the riches available in China, sources said Walton Jr, who was last year named grand final MVP in the Kings’ 3-2 series win over New Zealand, craved a return to Australia, relishing the intensity and competitiveness of the NBL.
South East Melbourne, among several clubs, had coveted local point guard William McDowell-White but, when the Queenslander decided his basketball future lay overseas, the Phoenix quickly pivoted and pulled the trigger on the 45-game NBA veteran, who has appeared for Miami Heat, LA Clippers and Detroit Pistons.
The 2023 All-NBL first teamer is averaging 12.6 points, 5.1 assists and 3 rebounds in just 19.6 minutes — the Chinese Basketball Association’s one-import-on-court-at-a-time rule caps opportunity.
An elite playmaker, the 29-year-old looms as the perfect conductor for an offence that pairs the league’s two highest-scoring locals, Creek and Brisbane arrival Nathan Sobey, and welcomes a pair of Walton Jr’s former Kings’ title-winning teammates in Jordan Hunter and Angus Glover.
Phoenix fans will have fond — and frightening — memories of the 183cm guard’s talents. In December 2022, he and Creek traded opposing 45-point monsters in one of the best games of NBL23, an epic 113-112 double-overtime Phoenix thriller in front of a raucous country Victorian crowd.
He ended that season second in the NBL in assists at 6.3 per game, adding 16.3 points and 3 rebounds per contest.
As NBL24 closed, chief executive Tommy Greer vowed the Phoenix would do everything in their power to atone for the expansion club’s first wooden spoon, build a contender and reward the Heartland for its support.
Walton Jr’s impending arrival, following a number of savvy moves to extract key contracted talent out of opposing clubs, is the clearest signal yet South East Melbourne is not messing around in NBL25.
Creek’s hand in Walton Jr’s arrival indicates he is locked in for a massive season in South East Melbourne after, last month, the 32-year-old quelled rumours claiming he would leave.
SOUTH EAST MELBOURNE STATE OF PLAY
Contracted: Mitch Creek, Matt Kenyon, Ben Ayre, Owen Foxwell, Nathan Sobey, Angus Glover, Jordan Hunter, Derrick Walton Jr (TBA)
Free Agents: Reuben Te Rangi, Craig Moller, Kody Stattmann, Luke Rosendale
Departed: Alan Williams, Rhys Vague, Gorjok Gak, Anzac Rissetto, Abdel Nader, Austin Rapp, Gary Browne
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Originally published as South East Melbourne set to secure former Sydney Kings grand final MVP Derrick Walton Jr in huge NBL free agency bombshell
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