According to multiple sources close to the situation, the Memphis Grizzlies will assign second overall draft pick Hasheem Thabeet to the D-League's Dakota Wizards, along with rookie guard Lester Hudson, on Friday.

Thabeet will become the highest ever draft pick assigned to the D-League, a dubious record previous held by Martell Webster, who was assigned to the Fort Worth Flyers from the Portland Blazers as the sixth overall pick in 2006.

The 7-foot-3 Thabeet was drafted a shot-blocking specialist with high hopes that he could be one of the premiere defensive big men in the NBA after a career at the University of Connecticut that saw him average 10.3 points, 8.5 rebounds and an astounding 4.2 blocks per game.   Fifty games into his NBA career, however, Thabeet has shown to be all to raw for the NBA, scoring less than three points and three rebounds while averaging 10 minutes of playing time.

The writing on the wall seems to have finally come on Tuesday, when Hamed Haddadi was moved ahead of Thabeet on Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins depth chart.  According to SBNation Grizzlies blog Straight Outta Vancouver, "Haddadi fits the system better, since his tough rebounding and excellent, albeit raw, passing skills are closer to Marc Gasol's style of play than anything Hasheem Thabeet has done all season."

The Dakota Wizards will play seven games in the next 13 days before having a week off, leaving me to assume that Thabeet would be recalled at that time.

Hey, everyone Nate Jawai is back!  The Minnesota Timberwolves assigned the second-year big man to the Sioux Falls Skyforce today, in order to play in tonight and tomorrow night's games against the Dakota Wizards.  These teams really take that regional rivalry seriously!

The comments in this Canis Hoopus fanshot are pretty positive about Jawai, noting that he mainly needs to work on his conditioning and get some playing time.  No surprise for that first one, but Jawai actually started a few Timberwolves games earlier this season and was playing decent minutes before piling up DNPs.  Jawai has improved a lot since last season - glancing at Basketball Reference, his rebounding and shooting are way up while his turnovers are way down.  And while his PER isn't great this season, it's still better than guys getting more minutes than him, including Oleksiy Pecherov, Damien Wilkins and Ryan Hollins.

Jawai has played in the D-League before, of course, having been assigned to the Idaho Stampede last year.  I wouldn't exactly call him a fan, though.  Hopefully under some different circumstances he'll have a better attitude about this assignment.  The only other thing I can say is that I hope everyone passes him the ball and takes him out for ice cream after the game (actually given his conditioning, uh, issues, maybe ice cream's a bad idea).

BUT WELCOME BACK NATHAN JAWAI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Chicago Bulls sent John Salmons to the Milwaukee Bucks and in return picked up the expiring contracts of Hakim Warrick and Joe Alexander, according to Chad Ford.  While this isn't in the realm of the other big deals that went down during today's NBA trade deadline bonanza, it was the only one that directly involved a current D-League player.

While Alexander did show glimpses of his potential while in the D-League, ultimately, it's still just that: potential.

Back on February 1st, I wrote the following in my recap of one of Alexander's games:

Speaking of Alexander, he got the start, played 20 minutes, shot 3-of-8 from the field and grabbed six boards. Essentially, Alexander showed why he was the eighth overall pick in the NBA draft just two years ago (extremely athletic, showing that with a nice looking putback early in the game), but also why he's currently in the D-League - and most likely will be for the foreseeable future: He needs to improve his basketball IQ/ability as a basketball player instead of an athlete - I'm not sure if he's trying to do too much because he's not happy with being in the D-League, but he occasionally forces shots that don't seem to be in his arsenal.

That's essentially all that I can tell you about Alexander's D-League stint.  He has the potential to still develop into a decent player, and showed flashes more than once while in the D-League, but he certainly didn't look like a world beater while in the D-League. In six games he averaged 10.5 points and 4.7 boards while shooting 40% from the field and 59% from the charity stripe.  Obviously, the shot isn't quite where it should be either, but hey, at least he's athletic!

Kevin Pittsnogle showing Reece Gaines that the defense is the backbone.

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In yesterday's news, I somehow neglected to share the most important transaction of the day : The Albuquerque Thunderbirds waived "waived Kevin Pittsnogle for personal reasons."

Pittsnogle leaves the team with season averages of 11.8 points and 5.4 rebounds per game.

Albuquerque coach John Coffino had the following to say on the move, according to the press release:

"We are all sad to see Kevin leave our organization, but we understand that his personal life is paramount being the family man that he is.

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Somebody might want to tell the Springfield Armor brass that even though they're currently in last place with a 5-22 record, tanking by trading their best players is not helping - the D-League draft order is determined at random, not via record.

Today they traded away two of the more NBA-ready players in the D-League - newly-acquired Dan Dickau, most recently with the Phoenix Suns this fall, and the D-League's leading scorer Morris Almond - for Kyle McAlarney, Noel Felix and Tony Bobbitt.  While McAlarney, Felix and Bobbitt are serviceable D-League players I think it's okay to say the Armor got worse end of the deal twice in one day.

The Armor could've boasted a starting lineup of Dan Dickau, JamesOn Curry, Morris Almond, TJ Cummings and Marcus Campbell (fairly formidable in the D-League), but are now relegated to boasting a starting lineup featuring JamesOn Curry and stuff.

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The new Waikato Pistons import is a tattooed trash-talker with a history of off-court woes who may be the league's best player in recent history.

The two-times defending NBL champions have signed former US college star Eric Devendorf to play point guard for the upcoming season.

You read that right - according to the The Nelson Mail (I don't know why they'd title their paper as The Nelson Mail, but I'll go with it), Eric Devendorf will be playing for the Waikato Pistons in New Zealand this Summer.

Cool thing is, I once wrote about one of his teammates, Alex Pledger.  Pledger is potentially the tallest sports player in all of New Zealand.

As far as Devenforf goes, he played three games in the D-League before finding out that the biggest little city in the world wasn't big enough to hang onto him as he was released just three games into his career with the Reno Bighorns.  This perplexed me, as Devendorf is obviously talented, but I've heard he rubbed the coaching staff the wrong way.

Regardless of all that, when you have a chance to declare for the NBA draft a season early, get cut after your best game in the D-League and then sign with the Waikato Pistons, you do it.

According to Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer, Charlotte Bobcats/Maine Red Claws center Alexis Ajinca needs thumb surgery and is out at least six weeks.

Losing Ajinca - a first-round draft pick who scored 25 points and grabbed 16 boards and four blocks in his last game - would typically be a huge blow to a D-League team, but I don't see this hurting the Red Claws because they just picked up former NBA players Paul Davis and Maurice Ager.

Davis is probably most famous for his charismatic-as-Scott-Schroeder appearance on Millionaire Matchmaker, but he's actually a serviceable basketball player as well, especially in the D-League.  After being released by the Washington Wizards early in the season, he made his debut for the Red Claws on Sunday, scoring 20 points, grabbing seven boards and adding five STOCKS (Steals + Blocks, last time I'm telling you) in 25 minutes of action.

Ager was a teammate of Davis at Michigan State and  the Mav's first round pick in 2006.

I'll get a bit more in-depth with the Red Claws later this week (tease!), but let's look at the talent this team currently can put on the court because they're easily the team with the most future NBA talent in the league right now.

First, I'll note that they're currently without Ajinca and J.R. Giddens, two NBA players who would more than likely be current Red Claws had they not suffered injuries with the team.  They're also missing Mario West, who was recently signed for the season by the Atlanta Hawks.

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Maurice Ager, former first round pick of the Dallas Mavericks, and Kenny Hasbrouck, leader of a few Siena Cinderella teams, apparently decided if JamesOn Curry can get called-up, so can they.  To that, I say "Good luck ... and I hope your agent has dirty pictures of Neil Olshey."

Maurice Ager, well, I don't really know much about.  He was drafted in the first round by the Dallas Mavericks in 2006, but has played more minutes in the D-League (542 in 17 games (9 starts)) than he has in the NBA (476 in 78 games (4 starts)).  According to his D-League stats, he's an inefficient ball hog, shooting 40% from the field while averaging 2.5 assists per game.

Since I've never watched him play, I decided to enlist an expert.  Unfortunately I couldn't find anyone claiming to be a Mo Ager expert and I don't speak Spanish well enough to understand why he's no longer playing with Cajasol in Spain, where he was averaging 3.3 points and shooting 28% from 2-point range and 29% from 3-point range.

Looking a bit further back, he last played in the NBA with the Nets, so I shot an e-mail over to the newest SBNBA blog (and Nets expert), NetsDaily:

Who?

Oh, that other guy that came in the Kidd trade!

Honestly, we barely saw Ager play in NJ. He scored a total of 70 points in his season-plus here, and I don't think any of them were meaningful. From what we saw, he's a pretty good athlete with a decent jumper. He seemed to be able to get to the rim, but with tunnel vision (seven assists in 185 minutes as a Net). In the D-League (or on the Warriors), those guys are probably a dime a dozen.

I don't recall if he played any defense, but if he did, he wouldn't have been the 14th man on a team coached by Lawrence Frank and ranked near the bottom of the league in defensive efficiency last season.

As far as Kenny Hasbrouck goes, he'd be the face of those Cinderella Siena teams you forgot to pick in your March Madness bracket the past couple of seasons.  Honestly, aside from his name, I don't really remember him.  He had a workout with the Thunder pre-draft, apparently worked out with the Heat in lieu of playing for the Grizzlies in the Vegas Summer League and hasn't been doing anything since. He's here now, though, and that's what matters.  If you want to welcome him, I'm under the impression he's into creepers.

Wait, what team are they on? Well, the D-League works just like your fantasy team.  Since they just came in the pool yesterday, whoever is highest on the waiver wire and puts in a claim is the team that gets them.  We'll have a better idea who's at the top once we figure out which team claimed the last batch.