What do you think Morey will do to get out of the LUXURY

Two guys I'm willing to part with are: Head and Hayes

 

I hope that Head has a good 1st half so his value goes up and we can trade him for an exception, pick, etc...

If Francis ends up providing nothing in the 1st half, trade his expiring contract for an exception.

 

I don't really think there is anything you can do. We will be over when/if Artest resigns anyway, so no point in making any drastic deals.

On the bright side, when 2010 rolls around, I think Tmac and Battier along with a few role players contracts will end. Tmac and Battier will be getting there in age, and if our team is still competitive we should get a huge hometown discount there. And I hope Morey realizes this and takes this into consideration when the decision comes up as to whether he should resign Artest or not. Because if he doesn't, Tmac, Battier might not be as willing to take a huge salary cut.

 

I think we'd sooner look to part with Francis than Hayes.

 

""As for your query regarding Bird rights, the team pays the player just as they would in any other situation. However, in this case, the team does not have to suffer the consequences of the luxury tax that it typically has to pay when it exceeds the salary cap. It’s simply a measure that was introduced to help ensure teams have the advantage when it comes to re-signing their own free agents.""

I had the same question before and this was a response via email from Jason.

 

I wish nobody will go.
we need enough people to be better,don't care of LUXURY
This is the best year to win

 

One thing I keep mentioning is regardless of whom your willing to depart form the team its more what the other team values in that player.

Head? Need I say more ATM....

Hayes? I really don't think many other teams find him as useful as we do.

Your going to have to make a deal look good. One option as I mentioned on another thread is IF, and only if, Dorsey becomes a well rounded then it makes Landry available to deal. You can add Head to the package for the TE.

Again this is as we see how well Dorsey ends up, if he is bogus then we still got Landry.

Remember its easy to say get rid of so and so but the problem is how.

 

Maybe you should donate some money then because its easy to say who cares about the LT when your not paying it.

 

Who cares! It's Les' money and Cuban pay Luxury Tax all these years.

 

Lord knows we don't want to end up like. I still stick with my story, if Dorsey does good then trade Head and Landry package deal cause no one will go for Head alone. If Dorsey doesn't do good then I believe we are stuck.

 

Does this mean that resigning Landry doesn't count towards paying the luxury tax.

 

No, Artest. Landry needs two more years.

 

It could end up being a deadline deal like last year when we got rid of Bonzi. If you asked anyone then if they would have accepted us losing Bonzi a lot of people would have been angry, but it proved to be a sustainable loss.

Right now the guys at the end of the bench are Francis Head and Hayes (oh how good it feels to know that these players haven't gotten worse, we've just gotten so much deeper). It would be very difficult to lose anyone else--Dorsey, Brooks, and the other potential rookies are not making enough to make it worth trading them, and Battier, Scola, Landry, Barry, and Rafer have important support roles and are playing at a good value for their salaries.

 

As far as the luxury tax is concerned, you can expect that Les would do everything possible to shed some contract by the end of the deadline so he can save double the amount of the contract owed.

What this also implies is that guys like Strawberry and Mike Harris, who have non guaranteed contracts, can certainly expect to see their asses gone unless they have an amazing training camp. And I mean absolutely amazing, nothing less. Harris, as much as I like him, will be redundant because of the amount of bigs we have.

Luther Head is clearly the most likely candidate to be used as a cap shedding tool. He has a contract about the amount that we're over the cap (2million). He has value- would yield us a conditional first round pick I think if we threw in some cash considerations. His role on this team is replaceable by brent barry.

To put it in simple terms, there's no one on our roster better to be traded away than luther head. However, we are kinda short on guards, especially with francis and battier's injury. So don't expect to see him gone unless Morey sees that he is satisfied with what we have remaining.

 

Its funny how the beginning of last season we were loaded with guards but short on bigs. Now, we seem to be filling up the bigs but going short on guards. However, I can see Artest or Battier playing the 2 once in a while, and putting Mike Harris at the 3.

I like Mike Harris a lot, if he can work on his shooting, he has potential to become a very useful Rocket's bench player.

 

we have the entire season to work this situation out...

at the deadline we can either:

a) dump salary

b) upgrade a position of weakness

c) both


I am leaning towards 'C'

 

I have a feeling Deke may do what he was rumored to do last year and sign for half of the season that way he gets the rest etc. mainly because he's older than our 2 rookies put together and he knows the sets for the most part... but i have a feeling that Luther might be on his way out