Lindy Waters III signs two-year deal with Oklahoma City Thunder

Oklahoma City is making Lindy Waters III an official member of the team throughout the rest of this season. According to Shams Charania, the Thunder have inked Waters to a two-year deal, which would include a team option for next season. Here was his report of that news on Monday:

“The Oklahoma City Thunder are signing two-way guard Lindy Waters III to a new two-year, $3.8 million deal, with a team option for 2023-24, sources tell @TheAthletic @Stadium.”

Waters appeared in 25 games last season for the Thunder and has already appeared in 25 this season. Now, he’ll be on the roster the remainder of the year for sure and has a deal in place to return next season if the team chooses to exercise that option.

Last year, Waters averaged 8.0 points and 2.9 rebounds, but those numbers are at just 4.4 and 1.4 in the same number of appearances. Still, Waters’ biggest contribution is from the three-point line, where he’s converted 36.5% from deep on over four attempts a night in his 50 combined games with the Thunder since 2021. That bit of floor spacing and his solid defense are ultimately why the Thunder decided to keep him around. Now, he’ll get an assured chance to prove himself as a worthy investment down the stretch of this season.

Waters started out playing very sporadic minutes this season and only appeared in five games in the first two months of the season. However, since the start of the calendar year, he’s played much more frequently. He played in six of the last eight games and even eclipsed 15 minutes a few times, including his very last time out in Sunday night’s game between Oklahoma City and Sacramento. The Thunder lost, but Waters had his best game of the year, scoring 12 points while knocking down three 3s.

Obviously OKC liked what they saw and gave Lindy Waters a deal.