If I'm reading stuff correctly... and I'm not BimaThug by any stretch... max contracts start at: CP3 35.7M Griffin 30.6M Milsap 35.7M Ibaka 35.7 - idk if he'll max - but he will be overpaid.... cap is <100M....James is on the books for 28.3M.... EG 13M I think thats the whole allure for DM gambling on PG13 - he's on the books at 19.5M next year....
This is all correct, only thing is teams do not have as much caproom as they did last year. Don't think Millsap gets maxed out and think Serge makes less than $20 mil
So long story short... we could probably jockey some stuff to fit 1 player - assuming we jettison Ryno and maybe Lou or somebody... I dont see us fitting 2 by any stretch... unless maybe we gut everybody and go minimum contracts for the other 12 spots - which would just be ugly... which is why I say - get a PF... I prefer gambling on Blake... but would be happy with Milsap - either will be overpaid, but we're gonna kick Ryno's 20M out of town - so there's that....
That's right. But if we don't get George we could still get two stars in free agency, it would require a sign & trade to get the second unless we're ok to lose basically everyone not named Harden, Capela and a couple of young guys...
The dream scenario for us would be basically this: 1. get George with Gordon + Pat (or asset/s obtained by trading him) + rookie scale contracts (let's say both Dekker and Trez), that would leave us with something like 14/15M in cap space 2. sign Patterson to a 8/10M x year deal 3. sign Nene with the remaining cap space 4. dump Anderson, Ariza and Lou to create enough cap space for a Paul max -> or even better, if possible, sign & trade with the Clippers Anderson + Lou or Ariza (i'd keep Trevor) to get Paul, this way we go over the cap and we get the MLE. Capela/Nene/Nanu Patterson/Qi/Wiltjer/Oliver George/Ariza Harden/Williams Paul/ MLE or room exception and one/two veterans at the minimum (shouldn't be a problem with CP3 here) to get a solid/decent bench player
Undervalued diamonds (guys like Beverley) aren't going to win you championships. They are ASSETS for Morey to cash in for stars. I said it elsewhere. Morey doesn't believe in role players moving the needle. His goal is getting as many star players as he can. Role players are just chips for him to shuffle in order to increase asset values, and he is very good at that. I don't disagree with his strategy. I think it is a smart strategy given the state of the NBA. But I can't say I like it, because I value having players I love to root for, even more than winning. I hate revolving door rosters. I know a lot of fans here love the offseason excitement. To me, it's anxiety rather than excitement. Who's the next good guy Morey is going to get rid of?
I hear what yer saying and if we were turning these assets into stars - then mission accomplished.... Martin, Lamb, etc for Harden.... success... turning a poo poo platter of guys into PG13 would be realizing his goal... although I aint sold on acquiring a guy that doesnt want to be here... but what I'm saying is we are constantly jettisoning guys for nothing (or paying someone to take them) so we can lineup to try to pay retail prices for guys on the free agent market.... Bosh, Melo, Dwight, ... Beasley, KJ, Lin, Brewer, Ennis, Josh, TWill, any draft pick (Parsons, DMo, TJones, etc...) ... how often are we actually getting any return on these guys he finds? We get the benefit of them playing for us on typically cheap contracts (so thats good) but we're not parlaying them into stars.... We didn't trade our poo poo platter for Dwight - we paid for him... (sidenote dont mistake this as me saying Ennis was about anything or that I was sorry to see him go - lol) Maybe we do a SnT for someone like Griffin.... . I fully agree with the value of players we love to root for - like Bev... and hey, if we trade him as part of a package for a star - i wont entirely like it - but I understand... but if we're just dumping guys to be able to pay retail... is it really working?
I dont think its leverage to get a bigger contract, I think its leverage to get other things he wants. Like "trade DeAndre or I sign with Houston".or "Dont bring back Blake or I sign with Houston" or his old favorite, "keep Doc as the coach, or I sign with......" Wouldnt be the first time hes done this.
I think Millsap should be our #1 target. He fits our biggest need. Then we need to upgrade the 3. If we can get those two slots upgraded while possibly still keeping Gordon and Williams I believe we could have the best chance of upsetting the Warriors of any team in the league. P.G. Harden S.G. Gordon / Williams S.F. George P.F. Millsap ..C. Capela It would probably take a package of Ariza, Dekker and Beverley to get George. Gotta move out Anderson to get Millsap. That lineup with some solid vets would give me a lot of confidence. Seems near impossible though.
TBH what I think is going to happen is this. 1st- We will trade Anderson, Dekker, and a future 1st to NY for Melo. 2nd- We will trade Patrick Beverly to a team with enough cap to absorb his salary while we get nothing in return but a future 1st, someone like SAC or MIN. This opens up salary to sign another superstar. 3rd- Once PB has been dealt we sign CP3 w/the remaining money we have. Our starting 5 would be: CP3/Lou Harden/Gordon Ariza/Troy Williams Melo/Harrell/Cameron Oliver(Can make team) Capela/Nene/Chinanu
I could get down with this. Sucks to lose Bev but at least we keep a majority of the core intact. Would need to beef up on the wings, one or two of Swaggy P/Afflalo/Thabo etc.
IMHO it's not that role players don't move the needle, it's that stars are more undervalued compared to role players. For example you have role player A with talent 10 and contract 5, that's an added value of 2. OTH you have superstar 1 with talent 100 and contract 20, that's an added of value of 5 which is 2x more than a role player. The concept of this is since there is an artificial salary cap superstars are actually underpaid, for example in a league with no salary cap maybe Lebron gets as much as 50M in salary but since there is a cap at 30M you get a discount of 20M when you get Lebron. There is also the artificial limitation of only 5 roster spots at one time, so even if you have more overall value than the opponent if the opponent has 5 guys with majority of the value you will probably lose the game. This is a big reason why GSW is so overpowered compared to the rest of the league, their entire cap is spent on 5 superstars and minimum guys so their allocation is optimized ON TOP of Iguadala, Curry and Draymond Green being underpaid superstars (double the savings from a normal superstar). Undervalued diamonds like Bev are the same thing, Morey likes looking for these players but he trades them away not because he doesn't believe they move the needle, but rather because once you pay them their market value then they cease to be underpaid, hence his quote about how successful teams find the Parsons but don't pay the Parsons (or something like that). That's why I hope they DON'T trade Beverly, because he is a loyal guy who signed for less than market value and will probably resign for less than market value again. It would be a mistake to trade a guy like that because once you fill the roster with superstars you still need to have role players on the squad. If you have Bev as a role player instead of a random scrub then obviously you will still have a lot of value on the court even if your superstars are resting. I mean look at Westbrick one of the best players in the league and a legit superstar, Beverly was able to neutralize him when Bev is only making 1/5 of WB's salary. That's value and we need more guys like that ON TOP to having superstars. Just making it a superstar vs superstar game is dumb because we can only afford 3 superstars max. How many does GSW have? So if you have a team of Harden, CP3 and Griffin vs Iggy/KD/Curry/Thompson/Green, you lose every time because 5>3. You need wildcards like Bev to be the X factor and give your team a shot rather than 100% chance of losing lik what happened to the Cavs.
Max salaries for Griffin and CP3 if they return to LAC: BG: 5/172M CP3: 5/201M Max if they sign elsewhere: BG: 4/128M CP3: 4/149M