2 things I have been waiting for. The cap update and a new clutchfans podcast. Glad 1 is finally here.
You forgot to mention Ariza's contract becomes trade-able December 15th. And his salary COULD become an important of a trade (and in my opinion is more likely to be traded than Kostas) going forward from there.
I didn't realize Papa was making that much. Ugh, if anything is going to sow the seeds of discontent in a locker room, it's something like that. All I can say is, the guy better get his shot going and keep it going, or that situation could get ugly behind the scenes. That said, I like the guy, he's a Euro hustler, he's hungry, and he has a good hoops IQ, so as long as he performs at a level which somewhat closely matches his salary. The other one, wow.. Terry.. didn't realize he was eating up so much either. I can totally see Bima's point about the team actually NEEDING some larger trade-able contracts, but dayum.
I didn't forget. I chose not to mention that. The point of the Terry-Papanikolaou portion was that they were acquired, in part, with an eye toward needing salary filler if a big trade came along this season. Ariza (while certainly a potential key trade piece after December 15) was brought in primarily as an ideal starting SF to play alongside Harden and Howard. My articles will never be all-inclusive of every salary cap aspect. That's an impossible task.
Can someone elaborate on this statement for me? I don't quite understand the gist of it. "As expected, Houston elected to operate over the salary cap this season, most notably because the combined value of their cap exceptions far exceeded the amount of cap room the Rockets would have had to make player acquisitions." Thanks in advance.
Reg this section: I think its best to lump Lin & Asik together in this trade-off scenario to really get the full impact of the Rockets asset swap on and off the court. Just my 2 cents: Rockets out: Lin & Asik (30 million in real salary 16.6 cap) Rockets in: -Ariza (8.57/ 4 year deal) -Terry (5.8 mil expiring) -2015 New Orleans 1st round pick swap (Rox pick going to Lakers) -Two 2nd rounders All things considering its still a decent trade from a financial, and an asset management standpoint. If you want to include Parsons in the deal then it doesn't look so hot but again... if you look at a deal like that from a financial perspective - Parsons, Lin, and Asik (44.7 million) for Ariza, Terry, pick swap and picks (14 million in 2014/15) there is still some sense to be made in the deal to swap these pieces if the Rockets were most teams in the NBA. And most are making deals like this all day long to get their finances in order.
Thanks, Bima. Always amazes me how you are on top of this stuff, and how you keep hope alive... Thank you, and keep up the good work!
In my opinion, if Kostas plays adequately defensively, then I think Ariza is one of the most likely players to be traded by the trade deadline if a major trade develops.
Bima with the excellent commentary and explanation of the real reason Dorsey was kept instead of Adrien. It's gotta suck being an NBA journeyman knowing that even if you outplay someone and your salary is at or near the minimum you can still get cut primarily for cap considerations
The Rockets have/had a $8.4M trade exception from the Lin trade, a $5.3M Non-Taxpayer Mid-Level Exception (used on Kostas Papanikolaou and Nick Johnson) and a $2.1M Bi-Annual Exception at their disposal. In order to create CAP ROOM this past summer or during this season, the Rockets would have had to waive all of those exceptions. Even if they had, the resulting cap room would have been less than the combined value of the aforementioned cap exceptions. Hope that helps. I choose to look at the Asik, Lin and Parsons subtractions independent of one another. Asik was LITERALLY traded for Ariza, the NOP pick and two contracts that (without packaging them with any other assets) were flipped for Terry and 2 second rounders. The Lin trade was an entirely different animal from the Asik trade, with different motivations by the teams involved. Lin, a first rounder and a conditional very late second rounder for a large TPE was about as well as the Rockets could have hoped to do in their situation at that time. Even if you want to look at the Asik and Lin trades together, Parsons should NOT be lumped in with them. We will not know the true trade-off for letting Parsons walk until after next summer, when the Rockets have had the opportunity to put their cap flexibility (preserved by not matching the offer sheet on Parsons) to work. You might be right, but I'm not counting on it. The Rockets NEED Ariza if they are going to seriously challenge for a title. Kostas would have to be pretty damn good if he's going to supplant Ariza as the starting SF post-trade. Also, while the rising salary cap could render Ariza's contract a relative bargain long-term, there are few teams interested in taking on a large four-year guaranteed contract for a non-star player when they could instead indulge in their own delusion that they can use available cap room to lure a star player or two.
Bima, I know I'm getting way ahead of things, but what is the projected salary cap for next summer? Also how much cap space can the rockets create assuming they keep all essential players?
Oh I totally get what your saying as far as transactions go. My point was just saying look if you look at it as a holistic swap of what the Rockets had this year vs what they traded (not literally) for, and put it into a theoretical trade, from a financial standpoint, you could totally see many NBA teams making that type of deal to get their financial situation cleaned up 9 times out of 10. The Rockets basically swapped "some" young talent to clear a boatload of salary, and got a replacement for that talent in other areas along with some draft considerations. Looking at it as one transaction this Summer sort of puts it into a different light. Most teams do a deal like that regardless. And we still don't know the full extent of what the Rockets will get back in this swap (assuming they take advantage of acquiring another player this year with the TPE (which I forgot to mention as an asset) and a trade that might include Terry). Perspective changes things when you aren't just focusing on one transaction in a vacuum. Your article does a great job of painting that perspective a little more. It gets the gears in the brain churning to think about things with that perspective in mind. Keep up the good work.
