The 5 Best Value Signings in NBA Free Agency

Paul Millsap

Millsap is perhaps the most undervalued star in the league, at least financially. The last time the All-Star dipped into free agency, he came away with just a two-year deal worth $19 million with the Hawks. He's blossomed in ATL, becoming an All Star twice over while his offensive role has expanded. This time around, he got a little more interest in the form of a reported maximum contract offer from the Orlando Magic, but he instead went back to Atlanta on a shorter deal with the option to hit free agency again in two years.

While $19 million a year is a lot of cash, it's a deal that should look pretty good once the cap balloons. Millsap is worth every penny, too, especially since he'll still be in his early 30s when this contract expires, unlike the mega-deals handed to other frontcourt players like Marc Gasol and Aldridge.

In Millsap's seven years in Utah, he took a total of 113 shots from three-point range. In each of his first two seasons with the Hawks, he's nearly doubled that total, with 428 total shots from deep. While his overall field goal percentage has dropped, Millsap has knocked down better than 35 percent of his threes in each of the last two years, and in 2015 posted his highest effective field goal percentage (weighted twos and threes) since 2011.

While bringing back Millsap at this price may have cost Atlanta the ability to bring back Carroll as well, there's a lot more value in a true power forward who can do what Millsap does. He was very effective on catch-and-shoot jumpers last season, with a 54.9 effective field goal percentage on those looks, and Millsap's ability to step outside creates a ton of wide-open looks for both himself (NBA.com classified a vast majority of his three-point attempts as "open" or "wide open") and his teammates, helping turn Atlanta into a humming offensive machine.