<
        >

          Rudy Gobert, Isaiah Thomas, Hassan Whiteside use emojis to recruit Gordon Hayward

          • ESPN.com
          Jul 2, 2017, 08:18 PM

          Two years ago, emojis highlighted one of the wildest days in the history of NBA free agency as the LA Clippers and Dallas Mavericks each sought the services of DeAndre Jordan.

          Jordan ended up wavering back and forth before ultimately choosing the Clippers, who were eliminated by Gordon Hayward, Rudy Gobert and the Utah Jazz during this past season's playoffs.

          Hayward is now one of the biggest names on the free-agent market and is taking meetings with the Miami Heat, Boston Celtics and Jazz this weekend. Meanwhile, Gobert has decided to make emoji recruitment cool again.

          Last season's NBA leader in blocks took to Twitter to swat away any chance that Hayward signs somewhere else besides Utah.

          Gobert's tweet featured three pairs of emojis, each representing the three teams vying for Hayward.

          The trash can and palm tree can only suggest that Gobert doesn't want Hayward to sign with the Heat. The green clover coupled with poop would seem to indicate that the Celtics are not Gobert's preferred destination for his teammate. The third and final pair including a jazz saxophone and championship trophy is pretty self-explanatory.

          However, Isaiah Thomas of the Celtics and Hassan Whiteside of the Heat were not about to leave Gobert's social media pitch as the only one on the table.

          Hayward has spent his entire seven-year NBA career with the Jazz, the only team that can offer him five years and an estimated $180 million. The 27-year-old averaged 21.9 PPG, 5.4 RPG and 3.5 APG while shooting better than 47 percent from the floor and nearly 40 percent from 3-point range during his first All-Star campaign in 2016-17.

          Update (7/2/17): The emoji madness continued on Sunday as French international soccer star and Celtics fan Antoine Griezmann jumped into the fray hoping that Hayward would join the Celtics. Gobert quickly responded in the pair's native tongue.

          Gobert's message roughly translates to, "stick to your sport" as the battle for Hayward's services went international.

          -- Nick Ostiller