Donatas Motiejunas now a restricted free agent, no qualifying offer for Terrence Jones

Offer him the rest of our capspace.

 

That's they only way he keeps him looking at our cap space.

 

So lets find out if the market has set a price yet for Donatas. I'll play the part of his agent. Let's put the closest comps on paper, and come up with an average price based on those players comps.

-Marvin Williams - 4/54.5
-D. Arthur - 3/23
-T. Booker - 2/18
-M. Teletovic - 3/30
-D. Powell - 4/37
-J. Leuer - 4/42

Yearly salary averages -
-13.625
-7.66
-9
-10
-9.25
-10.5

Average salary per year - 10.005
average year range - 3 years

So if I'm D-Mo's agent 3 years/30 mil is my salary I need to sign a deal right now with a declining scale for time. The longer he sits on the market, the more that price drops in theory.

IF the Rockets truly do want him back (and its not just lip service for a PR show), they can have him back and retain cap flexibility. They can sign him now to a 3yr/30mil and still have 5 million in cap space, or they could sign someone/s now for up to 12 million a year (accounting for holding onto D-Mo's cap hold to where you don't have to renounce him), and match an offer for Donatas (for up to 3/30), and still be under the luxury tax.

My personal preference would be to sign Sergio Llull to an offer he can't refuse (10 mil per year... would he REALLY turn that down when he's making 2.5 mil euro's per now?), and then match Donatas.

Go into training camp with this roster -

C-Capela, Motiejunas, Onuaku
PF-Anderson, Beasley, Harrell
SF-Ariza, Brewer, KJ, Dekker
SG-Harden, Gordon
PG- Beverley, Llull, Goudelock, Payton jr.

Waive either Goudelock or Payton Jr. in training camp (whoever looks the least promising) to get to the 15 player head count, and then sit tight with your players/assets for a mid-season trade.

Oh... and try like hell to trade Corey Brewer.

..............

So how would everyone feel about the roster above and resigning Donatas (and maybe Llull) to 3/30 each??

 

I'm down. Nice breakdown. I'll bet DMo's agent is looking for at least $12-$15M year, but we'll see how it goes.

 

Go over the cap for D-Mo? No..

 

Really surpsrisded Cuban hasn't offered a 30 year double max

 

I can understand his agent wanting that, but if you walk into meetings with teams rejecting the comps and creating your own price out of thin air you really are going to lose credibility around the league. Maybe you see his agent throw in the Mozgov comp, or the Harrison Barnes potential comp, but he's going to get laughed out of the room.

What D-Mo needs at this point is two teams other than the Rockets to just fall in love with D-Mo, and bid each other up. Or one crazy team to throw the max at D-Mo because they know the Rockets won't match it... which would be insane.

Needless to say, if I was a betting man, I'd bet on 3/30. However.... here's one caveat. USUALLY the longer a player sits, the lower the offers get because teams at that point are spent out.... NOT THIS YEAR. There will still be significant cap space with almost half the league weeks from now.... that's one monkey wrench that could get thrown out but again.... this would mean that some team would need to secretly be in love with D-Mo that we don't know of.

 

We will match -or not- the offer he signs with another team.
I can see Toronto, Brooklyn, Denver, Utah, Minnesota, Lakers, interested.

 

That would be kind of a waste of the available cap room. They could potentially use most of the space (minus D-Mo's caphold) to sign some bench depth, then use bird rights on D-Mo.

 

3/30mil for Dmo sounds fair. But that injury history is a bit scary. Maybe that keeps his price down. I think 12-15 per is a pipe dream.

3/30mil for Lull just doesn't seem like a good idea to me. Totally unproven as an NBA player.

 

DMo will very likely be the last player the Rockets sign, because it makes sense from a cap flexibility standpoint. They may already have an agreement on basic dollars of a contract but he will be the last to sign.

1. The Rockets currently have about ~10 million in cap space.
2. If they sign DMo to an approximately ~10 million salary for 16/17 their cap space shrinks to about ~5 million.

By waiting on signing DMo:

- If they are able to talk Llull or Gentile or some other Euro to come over for say ~7 million they will need the available cap space.
- If they decide to make a trade they can take back up to ~10 million more then they give out
- They can use all of the available ~10 million cap space and then exceed the cap to resign DMo

There are no real repercussions this season for exceeding the salary cap this season. The tax threshold is $113,287,000.00 and "IF" the Rockets exceed that they have to pay the luxury tax. It is highly unlikely that the Rockets exceed the tax threshold.

There is no benefit for the Rockets to sign DMo prior to them knowing what their final roster is going to look like heading into training camp.

 

Exactly, unless D-Mo signs an offer sheet and forces their hand (a la Parsons).

 

whats with all the talk of bringing of Llull resurfacing? did I miss something?
I thought it was confirmed he has no interest in coming to the NBA

 

10 mil per is like the new MLE type of deal. With a 5 mil buyout, and needing to exceed his 2.5 mil Euro (remember to adjust for currency), I think 10 mil per is probably what it's going to take.

Is that a gamble for Llull.. hell yeah. What other options do the Rockets have that has as much upside though? I'm not entirely sure.

The other Sergio (Rodriguez) just accepted 8 mil for a one year deal to sign with Philly. I'd think that Llull has better upside in the NBA as a more complete player, better size, & scoring ability. Not saying signing Llull isn't a risk, but I'm just wondering who the Rockets have as a better option at this point without moving significant assets in a trade??? I'm open for suggestions.

....

Back to D-Mo, if let's say 18 months ago, you told everyone here that they could get D-Mo back as a free agent at essentially a mid-level type of contract, what do you think the response would be??... My opinion is that everyone would be jumping for joy at that.

In this market the 3/30 is essentially mid level. That would be a no-brainer IMO to resign. But we will see if Les and Morey want to still keep chasing pipe dreams year after year and want to give themselves as much cap room as possible. I say screw cap space, and just retain/collect good players.

 

Marvin : Took a discount for CHARLOTTE only.
Arthur : Older no upside here.
Booker : Not combo big, older, doesn't have upside left.
Teletovic: 30 year old only pf who can't defend with blood clots history.
Powel : Flyer
Leuer : Older no upside. But better comparison.

Based on Leuer's contract, DMO must ask for 3-4 mil at least more.

But this is without seeing which teams are left with $.
I know Lakers have 20+ mil remaining but perhaps Westbrook's potential trade will put an end to any more spending?

 

Because unlike last year, now you have Dellavedova's making 10m/yr.

 

Sergio Rodriguez three days ago was asked if he would come over and said "no no no!"
And then yesterday signed with Philly for 1 year 8 million.

 

Good post. If it's 3/$30 I'd do that. I could see it being up to 3/$45 though.

However, if I'm DMo and I know my back is fine, I might let it be known that I want to take a 1 year deal and be a FA again next year. I know DaDakota has floated this idea multiple times and if DMo's back is healthy, it wouldn't shock me to see him do this. He seems like he has the personality to gamble on himself.

As for Llull, yeah, I guess why not.

 

There's no reason to do that if they can go over the cap to sign him. The only way the Rockets rush into re-signing Motiejunas is if he signs an offer sheet somewhere else and forces the Rockets to match within 72 hours. But if isn't going to sign anything, than Morey isn't going to rush the process.

 

Probably my fault sorry. I brought him up because essentially the Rockets could jump on their remaining cap space now to grab a player in that 8 to 12 mil range per year, and then resign D-Mo above the cap. Llull to me fits the profile and the need in that space in this market as a scoring guard that can play the PG spot next to Harden and can defend.

But we can talk about other players if you have better ideas. It ties back to Donatas because whoever the Rockets are going after now is ultimately going to affect what they do next with Donatas as the dominoes need to fall in order, and be the right size one after another.