[ClutchFans] Houston Rockets Salary Cap Update (Updated: 3/2/2011)

Well that was smart of Morey.

 

So, here's a thought and a question.

Let's say that we can find a team that will be willing to take on Thabeet and Hill after this season by us giving them $3 million for each man. In other words, we buy cap space by trading Thabeet and $3 million to and under the cap team for nothing and we send out Hill plus another $3 million for nothing. Some other team gets the services of Hill and Thabeet for their salaries $7.9 million - $6 million that we give them to take on those salaries. This opens up additional cap room for us to go after a bigger name free agent, let's say Nene for instance, or Marc Gacol, or possibly Deandre Jordan. We take our cap space and offer and sign one of those big man to, say $9 million first season salary, whatever cap space we have left under the salary cap. My question is, all things being equal, would we still have the Battier TPE to use in trade later on? And would we still have TPEs from Thabeet and Hill's trades to use later on?

 

Morey's gonna keep all the players, and pick up on all the 2009 guys.
It's so much harder to build the salary back up, and we need all the possible salary room. Because Morey's aiming for 2012 not next season, to s&t for D.Williams plus D.Howard!

 

Great work as always, Bima. One question - couldn't we get below the luxury tax threshold with a draft day trade (of a player or players that do not have expiring contracts)? I thought the tax was assessed based upon the team salary on July 1st. If so, there will be one more opportunity left to avoid the tax. Depending on how much money Jeffries left on the table, maybe a dump of DeMarre Carroll plus cash would be all that is needed. The reason for the dump would be to be eligible for the redistribution funds, which could be several million dollars per team.

Another possibility is that certain player incentives might not be reached, that might get us under the tax? Chad Ford mentioned that recently:

"As an added bonus, today's trades also position Houston to get under the luxury tax if it can work a favorable buyout with Jared Jeffries or if some of its players miss the incentives in their contracts. More likely, the Rockets will end up slightly over, but they at least cut their exposure with the trades."

http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=201290

 

wow are guys playing with a more sense of relief after the trade or something? they're playing awesome

scola pulls a yao-like performance vs the blazers. i still remember that game 1

 

I wouldnt pick up any options for post 2012. The rockets need the money to get in the conversation. So that would mean williams,thabeet,and hill playing it out. If orlando blinks like utah and denver did, the rockets have alot of young,untapped players on the last year of contract and picks. If they get howard, getting williams would be a piece of cake.

 

Pretty slick move by Morey -- a 7.35M TPE is pretty chunky, and it will last through to next year's trade deadline, more or less. Flexibility like that was how Utah was able basically get Al Jefferson for a pair of future firsts. Granted, Utah's was much larger, but I could imagine us picking up an overpaid player duct taped with either a young talent or a high lotto pick.

For example, would you take Charlie Villanueva if he came with a top 5 pick? If you're planning on big cap space in 2012, probably not, but there could be all sorts of opportunities depending on how the cap works. Alternatively, would you have taken Michael Beasley off of Miami's hands for nothing?

 

Fun question to ask now; there wasn't many teams lining up to get him for free (one?). I think Toronto even turned down a SnT offer with Beasley involved.. baffling.

 

All that your article is useful for is limiting our imagination as fans! Do not read! Keep hope alive!


DD

 

Morey is set up to go either way, either use the TPE, or trade people away and use cap space, or just plain make trades. Dude leaves all the options open.

 

I love this line, and couldn't agree more. Mind if I use it in my sig?

Pugs

P.S. Thanks for the updated article, good read as usual.

 

I think Yao walks and does his ownership duties with Shanghai Sharks.

 

I already commented earlier, but didn't really back up my thought.

First of all, as always, good job Bima.
I agree with everything you said but would like to add a few things regarding Dragic, Lee and 'Plan 2012'.

1.) As poorly as Dragic has played this season, do you not think that it's far more likely that the team will not exercise Dragic's team option, making him a restricted free agent? If the team plans on keeping Dragic around, it would seem like a great opportunity to re-sign Dragic for a bargain this off-season.
2.) If the team indeed doesn't plan on spending any money this off-season and the CBA doesn't drastically change, woudn't it make a lot of sense to a least try to extend Courtney Lee, while he's still a backup, playing somewhat limited minutes?
I understand Morey has said he doesn't do extensions, but to me it would seem like extening Lee would not only increase Lee's trade value , but you woudn't run the risk of losing him in the 2012 free agency. It also would open up the opportunity to trade Martin, without afterwards running the risk having to re-sign Lee, while paying him starter type money. Whether or not you plan on keeping both Martin and Lee around for the long run doesn't really matter. On top of all that you'd eliminate Lee's $9.6mil 2012 caphold, which potentially could turn out to be huge.

Thoughts?

 

Good points.

I think with Dragic it's a question of how good the team thinks he can be and how certain they are that he's going to reach that level. If you think he can be a starter in this league, you'd probably try to lock him up to a long-term deal now, even if you're paying a little more next season. If you're not totally sure what he can or will be, you probably rather pick up his option, which, like you said, is more than reasonable for a quality backup PG.

Agree with everything you said regarding Lee. (You're also right about me wrongly tripling his QO).