12:10 pm: The Pacers have officially signed Mathews to a standard contract and waived Robinson-Earl, according to a press release from the team.
10:52 am: Garrison Mathews‘ second 10-day contract with the Pacers expired overnight, but he won’t be going anywhere. According to Tony East of Forbes (Twitter links), Indiana is re-signing Mathews to a standard contract and will waive forward Jeremiah Robinson-Earl in order to create room on the roster.
Mathews, who first joined Indiana’s roster last month on a hardship deal, made just 2-of-13 shots and scored nine points in 46 total minutes during his first 10 days with the team and admitted he was “a little surprised” when he was brought back on a second 10-day contract.
However, the 29-year-old shooting guard was more productive over the course of that second contract, having averaged 8.5 points per game on .500/.467/.750 shooting in his past four outings (19.3 MPG).
Even if the Pacers still qualify for a hardship exception, they’d be ineligible to use it on Mathews, since a player can’t sign more than two 10-day deals with a team in a single season. So in order to hang onto him, they’ll need to sign him to a standard contract, giving him a spot on their 15-man roster.
Indiana took the same route with Robinson-Earl earlier this season after he played out a pair of 10-day hardship deals — veteran point guard Monte Morris was waived in order to allow the Pacers to retain Robinson-Earl on a standard contract. Robinson-Earl averaged just 4.6 points and 5.2 rebounds per game in 17 appearances (17.6 MPG) for Indiana but has fallen out of the team’s rotation as of late, getting DNP-CDs in Friday’s game in Chicago and Monday’s contest vs. Sacramento.
Assuming Robinson-Earl is officially cut on Thursday, the Pacers will carry a dead-money cap hit of $589,306 for him. That takes into account his two 10-day deals ($131,970 apiece) and a prorated portion of his non-guaranteed contract ($325,366).
Mathews will sign a non-guaranteed minimum-salary contract, per Dustin Dopirak of The Indianapolis Star (Twitter link), which will allow the Pacers to maintain some flexibility with their 15th roster spot prior to the league-wide salary guarantee date next month.