Cavaliers offer LeBron $80 million extension

Suck it Knicks (and Laker) fans.

 

what is better than playing in your home state in front of all your friends and your family?

 

He'll accept it. It's the only logical thing to do. You don't pass up $80 million guaranteed even if you don't like the team, and there's no indications of that. If things in Cleveland don't work out, then he can just opt out in five years at the age of 26.

Speaking of which, Tracy's contract runs out in 2010. Best case dream scenario for me is that he wins a couple of rings with Yao and either retires in 2010 or takes a paycut. Then in 2011, with a fistfull of capspace (as long as the front office is shrewd enough to plan our team building for that incredible free agent class), we make a run at either Lebron, Wade, Melo, or Bosh. Get one of those guys and then Yao wins a few more titles before retiring.

Oh wait, we just traded away a potential superstar or at the very least excellent role player for a role player that has no chance to be excellent. Time to quit dreaming.

 

Fat chance. I don't think a single superstar has changed teams via free agency in the event that his team tried to keep him (Dallas didn't offer Nash the max) since the new CBA. You stand to make almost $20million more if you just stick with your own team in some cases. No matter how bad your team sucks, noone is turning that down.

The only way to refurbish your roster in the modern NBA is through the draft and trades. Unfortunately noone gave Carol Dawson and Gumby that memo.

 

I wouldn't say nobody. T-mac pretty much forced his way out of Orlando using his walk year as leverage (not quite the same, but I think he would have left them high and dry if given the chance). Grant Hill was a superstar when he left Detroit. Duncan was "this" close to leaving San Antonio.

And next year you got possiblities of guys opting out of losing situations in Paul Pierce, Rashard, and Bibby.

It would take a unique situation to be sure. But Yao ready to make another run with a player just hitting his stride, could be tempting for a player who hasn't been in that situation. Of course considering that the subject is 5 years away with our front office being blind to the future, it's not really worth discussing. So I'll shut up about the topic.

 

once we get some rings by 2010, we can tank one season that has a very good player coming like greg oden (not saying we should tank this season) just like S.A. did. then yao could get more rings, and get the respect from all the media that shaq got.

 

Getting an unbelievable bonus from NIke on top of your max deal.

I'm sure he'll take it but I don't see Lebron staying in Cleveland his entire career. He's so young that he'll just be hitting his prime by the time that 5-year extension is up. The luster of taking over the Lakers after Kobe or maybe even turning around the Knicks along w/ the bonus he would get (forget how much) may be too much to turn down.

 

Damn, the time on this story if 2:21 am...did the Cavs call up Lebron's agent at 12:01 to offer this deal?

 

thats it? dude needs about 800 million for what he has done for that city.

 

i thought the max contract was only 75 million?

 

They're pojecting the salary cap to go up. Cap goes up, Max goes up.

 

right now the standard max is 5yrs for 75 million right?
if the cap goes up what about the years?

 

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=2513416

LeBron to sign five-year, $80 million extensionAssociated Press


CLEVELAND -- LeBron James won't be leaving home anytime soon.

Cleveland's All-Star forward accepted a five-year contract extension worth about $80 million from the Cavaliers on Saturday, a huge relief for the rising team and its fretting fans who worried he might be planning an escape.

James, who in three seasons as a pro has turned the Cavaliers from doormats into a playoff team, will sign the deal once the league's moratorium ends Wednesday, said his agent Leon Rose.

"I am very excited and happy to be re-signing with the Cavaliers. Staying in Cleveland ... provides me with the unique opportunity to continue to play in front of my family, friends and fans," James said in a statement released by his publicist. "I look forward to working toward bringing a championship to our great fans and the city of Cleveland."

 

Yeah...Yao can always use another 'toe injury'... ... just let the big guy take one season of vacation in Bahama to reenergize himself and then he will return to make runs for a few more titles.

 

This makes sense. LeBron already has TONS of money and he doesn't really need to go to a big market, like rumor suggested, to make an extra dozen million buckets.

If he can bring Clevland from the worse NBA team to an NBA championship team, he will be making his own legends like MJ did. That has much more value than making some extra bucks.

 

Same number of years. The 5 years 75 million was the projected max extensions off rookie deals from last year. That's what Yao and Amare signed. Although I think when the cap numbers finally came out it was more like 5 years 72.6 million or something.

This year it looks like the cap might go up a bit so Bron, Melo, Wade and Bosh are signing 5 year 80 million extensions. But that is just the projections. We won't get official numbers until the cap is set on July 12th. And it could possibly go down depending on the final numbers.

BTW. I knew Lebron reupping in Cleveland was a slam dunk. Everyone over at espn was all in a tizzy over this (Bill Simmons, Mike and Mike etc), but the CBA makes it improbably stupid for someone to turn down a max extension off a rookie deal.

You have to really hate the team that drafted you if you're willing to wait 2 years to leave for less money. Especially for a guy that came into the league at 18 years old like Lebron, since he can get his 70-80 million guaranteed max extension, and still have the choice to opt out after a few years and hit the market again in his prime at 26-27.

 

thats what i was gonna say

 

I argued last year that teams who waited for star players coming off their rookie contracts are making a mistake. The Lakers were stupid if waiting on 2007 caused them to miss out on anything last summer. LeBron was the only player from the 2002 & 2003 draft classes that I thought even had a chance of playing out 5 years and testing unrestricted free agency.

It's a good system that allows teams to keep the players they draft.

 

Don't all of his endorsement contracts double if he signs in a big market like New York? So even if he takes less money to go to another team, he could still end up making more.