Bucks release Drew Gooden using amnesty clause

Drew Gooden made it through three years of his five-year contract with the Bucks. (Rocky Widner/Getty Images) The Bucks announced Tuesday that veteran forward

Drew Gooden made it through three years of his five-year contract with the Bucks. (Rocky Widner/Getty Images)

The Bucks announced Tuesday that veteran forward Drew Gooden has been released using the amnesty clause.

Gooden, 31, averaged 3.3 points and 1.9 rebounds in 16 games for the Bucks last season. He was set to earn $6.7 million in both 2013-14 and 2014-15 after agreeing to a five-year deal worth $32 million in 2010. Per the terms of the league’s amnesty provision, the Bucks will still owe Gooden that salary but it will be removed from their books for salary cap and luxury tax purposes.

The 11-year veteran was considered overpaid as soon as he signed his contract in 2010, and he never shook that perception during his three seasons in Milwaukee, which were marred by injuries and DNP-CDs. The arrival of two talented, young big men -- Larry Sanders and John Henson -- helped make Gooden fully expendable and the Bucks also agreed to sign unrestricted free agent center Zaza Pachulia this summer.

Gooden will now enter a blind bidding pool, where teams that are under the salary cap can submit offers to take on a portion of his contract. If no bids are made in the blind pool, Gooden will become an unrestricted free agent.

So far this offseason, Milwaukee has signed Pachulia, traded for Luke Ridnour, sign-and-traded J.J. Redick to the Clippers, traded Luc Richard Mbah a Moute to the Kings, inked O.J. Mayo to a three-year deal, and made a four-year offer sheet to Hawks guard Jeff Teague, which Atlanta later matched.

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