It certainly makes it challenging for Morey to be able to plan effectively if Tilman waffles in and out of player moves and the LT.
32 year's old throwing up bricks from Pasadena really gonna look good in year. Should of looked into getting a run and gun outside center, and maybe another defensive small forward during the off season. =(
The Rockets didn’t sign him with cap space. They were able to extend him even though they were over the cap at the time. They couldn’t have used the money on an outside FA. The Gordon extension was about trading him as much as it was about keeping him. I expect EG to be moved in this upcoming offseason or the next one. I would be shocked if he ends his contract with the Rockets.
I'm shocked once again that we someone ducked under the LTS!!! I need to talk to Morey to ask him why we make trades every year to get under the LTS. I gave him order to go over the LTS and money isn't an issue when I am all about winning- Signed Tilman
Morey almost always stays under the tax regardless of who the owner is. It’s one of the things that makes him a good GM. What do you think would happen if he went to the owner every year and said “Whoopsies, we went over the tax line and have to pay millions in taxes again this year. My bad, but you’re a billionaire so it’s whatever, right?”
if they signed him to trade him, the should've made the contract more... tradable. they will have to attach assets to move him just to get under the reduced LT next year. if we move him we will need to replace his scoring/playmaking. we can't rely on 2 guys to do everything on offense. you need a 3rd, 4th and even 5th playmaker. how many guys on the warriors could create offense for themselves or others? at their peak they had about 6-7. harden and rus are great but they need more guys who can dribble and pass. now the other factor is tucker's age and the miles on his legs from MDA playing him 57mpg. we will need another 4/5 defender added to the rotation to reduce his minutes. so the conundrum is: we need 2 pieces in replace for gordon (playmaker, small ball defensive big) and its going to cost an asset just to move him. we can probably replace him with 1 MLE player but the rest will be vet min contracts. another problem is with the reduced cap, most teams will be looking to dump salary. teams with cap space will be able to ask for more than usual. last summer large contracts of terrible players were absorbed for 1 FRP. how we're talking about a guy whose locked up long term. that's 2 picks? and most teams trying to dump salary onto VERy few teams with space? almost impossible unless you want to shed multiple picks. I think they have to bite the bullet and pay the tax next year. gordon may not be tradable. this may cost us resigning rivers and mclemore if they don't want to venture further into the tax (assumeing those guys get larger than vet min offers).
I don’t disagree with any of your points, but you have to remember that at the time of the contract we were living in a very different world. It was before the Hong Kong tweet and way before COVID. Now, the EG contract is not as tradable as it was when it was offered. I suspect that EG knew that this was as much about trading him as it was about keeping him bc he opt’d to not sign an extension until he was ineligible to be traded this year. The cap situation is very different now and they will most likely have to retain EG until next offseason. But, if he looks great in these playoffs then he might be less of a negative asset. I feel like plenty of teams in the Eastern conference would be better with Gordon (especially Philly). I’m just not ready to say that the contract is a complete negative yet. This is not the Ryno contract but it could be close. Only time will tell.
He could be good this year and suck next year, having no fun another year. This is what they signed up for IMO. Good but not great and streaky.
Pacers would be a great destination...it is home for Gordon. Indy would love to have their Mr. Basketball "back home again in Indiana"polis
Pacers would be a good place for EG but he would most likely be coming in off of the bench behind Brogdon and Oladipo. Idk if the Pacers would want to invest that much in a 6th man but they might if Gordon goes off in these playoffs. I would target TJ Warren if I were the Rockets. I don’t think they would be able to get Turner for EG and the 2022 frp and they definitely aren’t getting Sabonis with that offer. I think Warren for EG straight up could work. A little more salary would have to come back to the Rockets though.
@D-rock @DM'sVP keep in mind most teams will have moved significantly closer to the LT and most likely won't want to add salary. this limits our ability to reduce salary and avoid the LT. there are a number of teams who would not be potential trade partners based on the proximity to the LT alone. dumping ego will be very difficult due to most teams also wanting to dump salary, and very few teams with cap space to absorb his type of contract. you two raise a valid alternative: trade ego as an asset. if we acquire somewhat similar talent at a lesser salary (by an estimated $4M to avoid the LT) and keep his new team under the LT, we come away with a decent trade. in my estimation, the teams with projected cap space are out of the question for ego. they will either acquire negative contracts for multiple picks, or land FAs for large contracts since most teams can only offer MLE (or less if they want to avoid the tax). that removes these projected cap space teams: PHX, MIA, CHA, NYK, DET, ATL. Since we're projected over the LT next season due to the cap reduction, we can't take on more salary. these other teams are in the same position and likely not great trade partners to take on ego: PHI, BKN, BOS, IND, MIL. the last group of teams are those who are projected to be close to the tax (within $5M). given that we are projected to be about $4M over, a trade here would likely be the only move these teams could make all year. so, pretty unlikely. these are those teams: SAS, UTA, CLE now the other 15 teams are possibilities to take on an extra $4M. since ego's contract jumps to $16.8M next season, in any trade we'd need to get back at least 1 rotation player while taking on no less than $12.25M (the roughly calculated minimum in an ego trade) and no more than $12.8 (the roughly calculated max we can take back and still avoid the projected tax). That's a small needle to thread. but I'd love to hear your ideas given these parameters! Here's my shot at it. I don't think any rebuilding teams will consider ego and his contract an asset. he's best suited to help a playoff team, considering his age and contract. Therefor of the 15 eligible teams, I'm personally discounting: CHI, MIN, SAC, NOP. I'm also going to discount western contenders who won't make a big trade to help us: LAL, LAC, DEN, DAL, GSW. That leaves me with 6 possibilities: OKC, MEM, POR, WAS, ORL, TOR. lets explore! RAPTORS: Norman Powel + fillers (hernandez +Thomas) for ego and a pick. reason for the pick is the fillers from TOR are on rookie contracts and young players with potential. they're the only way it works cap wise. I don't mind Powel as a cheaper ego replacement. gives us the scoring off the bench, championship experience, plays decent D. Ego would be a boost for their starting lineup since VanVleet is likely gone. MAGIC: Ross for ego and 2 seconds. the picks are to compensate the salary dump. ego is a better starter, better D, better scorer. ross gives us the shooting, solid enough D, and added size (6'6 Vs ego 6'3). Added benefit of ross' contract decreasing the following season. Or Aminu+Birch for ego straight up. I like this for both sides as well. Aminu would be a great fit in a 4/5 rotation with roco and tucker. birch is an added rebounder/filler as a backup center, while ego is a good fit for Orlando who can help them on another playoff push. both good options! WIZARDS: I don't see them investing in ego behind beal, and they don't have similar sized contracts to get it done within our aforementioned parameters. next! BLAZERS: Nurkic is too good. Ariza is too bad. no other contracts work. and I don't see them putting that much money to back up McCollum. won't work. next! GRIZZLIES: Tyus Jones, and filters (guduric + allen) for ego and a pick. I like this trade a lot for the grizzlies as they don't need ty since drafting ja. they are ahead of schedule on the rebuild and could use a starting SG to help get back to the playoffs next year. they may be willing to sacrifice a couple of young prospects to do so (guduric and Allen). for the rockets, I don't hate it. we know morey has liked ty since college. he's a good fit as a playmaker/shooter/defender off the bench with a very friendly salary that reduces over the next 2 years. we also get decent young (cheap!) options who will hopefully improve (rather than decline like all the old vet minimums we sign) during their contract. guduric, Allen, and harty would be a pretty good young core who obvi won't get regular minutes next year, but maybe the year after that? and that's sort of the point, to be deep and cheap in a couple years when harden and rus' salaries go astronomical. not bad! THUNDER: Schroeder's contract is too large, unless you want to do ego+house for him, and then we are even thinner in the rotation, so no. everyone else contracts are too small. doesn't work here. overall I'm happy with the possibilities of Powell (27yo) on a $10M/3yr deal, jones (24yo) on a 8.4M/3yr deal that reduces over time, and aminu or ross. none will replace what ego is worth but if we are forced to sacrifice him to duck the tax these are all good options for 6th man. my preference between the 4 of them depends on if we can retain rivers and/or mclemore on a vet min deal. I don't think it would be hard to find a decent backup PG for the vet min, so I'm less into the jones trade. especially because I don't want to help a division rival get better. would much rather move ego to the east. I also don't think it would be hard to find a wing shooter for the vet min like mclemore or Gerald, so I'm less into ross. for me it would be between Powell as its hard to find a legit scorer, or aminu who can defend the 3-5, hit the 3 and rebound. in the end I know ujiri will definitely overcharge for powell while aminu/birch can probably be done with no picks added. its not easy to find aminu's combination of length, defense, rebounding, and shooting. I'd be very happy to add him to the rotation. roco/tucker/aminu splitting the 4/5 would be amazing for our 5-out switch everything style. we would have to rely on house, and 2 vet min guys to round out the 8 man rotation.
Ariza wouldn’t be a bad backup C, I think he can pull that off still even though he’s slowed down a lot as a wing. If we could get Ariza and literally any fringe rotation wing for Gordon and no more than a 2nd rounder, I’d be happy. Rivers, Mclemore and Gordon are too similar at our deepest position. We can live without Gordon if our interior defense improves. That’s assuming Tilman would retain Mclemore and Rivers beyond this season.
http://www.espn.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=y7moreld Go get Turner, plus Mcdermott can hit the 3 way better than tucker and gordon. I figure they could get pacers to bite with the potential of Hartenstein playing behind Sabonis, who gonna be starting. Pacers need some vets to be serious contenders, and i say gordon,tucker would boost there team big time. Rockets need a center and new coach. This to me is after the dan antonio fail season, and we get a new coach. 2021. A new Game Plan.
I like Turner but highly unlikely PJ is moved. Morey would not pull trigger on Jimmy Buckets trade when Minny insisted on adding PJ to deal remember?
I like it a lot, in the event that we have to trade ego to duck the tax. would rather keep ego and sign someone like Jerami Grant or mo Harkless with the MLE, but unfortunately tilman won't pay for that. one thing I like about this deal is that it completes the 4/5 rotation which I think is the hardest "fit" to find. not many bigs (who we can afford) can guard the wing and the post, rebound, and spread the floor. of course while our 4/5 would be great. we'd only have 2 guys who can create any offense. that's pretty thin. but then again if we kept ego, or traded him for someone like powell or ty jones we'd be pretty thin up front too so I guess it depends on what positions can come cheaper in free agency.
Good points regarding Eric. Rivers can create some offense too, even though he isn't as good as Eric. Rivers can be effective as a catch and shoot/ defense player. If Harkless agrees to sign for the MLE, I'm all for it. I seriously doubt if he or Grant will agree to it though.
This is why I keep pushing for AG. He would be perfect for our needs at 3-D switch everything forward who can also distribute.
I think they are fine in the playmaker aspect with Harden , Westbrook , Rivers .... Those guys are gonna have the ball 99% of the time anyway - the others are making hockey assists for the most part - Yeah , another would ne nice but I dont think its mandatory. Tucker just isn't replacable - I don't know of another guy in the league , aside from maybe Donkey that can do what he does. I'd be content to move EG for a solid 3/4/5. Maybe I undervalue EG ... but with his injury history and the Rockets being so guard heavy salary wise , I'd move him EG for a the right fit. The reduced cap .... man that's gonna hurt just about every team. I haven't looked at the numbers but I don't think many teams will have significant cap space to sell for those FRP's. That'll make trades exceedingly difficult .... get in early or get left out. Most deals will likely be salary matching deals. This offseason will be really interesting to watch , won't be a hell of a lot of money for the big names , I could see several taking 1 year + a player option just to be able to test the market the following year. Hopefully Morey has something up his sleeve .... like the Nene contract that Silver conveniently screwed over .... that actually works.
