So with the addition of Tucker, the Rockets currently have 10 players on the roster including the NGteed contacts. The salary number for the 10 players equals to roughly $108 million dollars. The minimum amount of players the Rockets need is 14. Because the Rockets used the MLE on Tucker (even if they S&T) for him. The Houston Rockets are now hard capped at the Tax Apron and will not be able to exceed it under any circumstances. Since the Tax Apron is at, give or take, $125 Million dollars this year, that leaves the Rockets with about $17 million dollars to add on to this years salary while also ensuring we have 14 players on the roster ready to go. Keep in mind that this isnt "cap space", rather space that could be traded into, or filled with the use of exceptions and vet minimums ONLY. Given that 4-5 of the players are trade assets, it is going to be very interesting to see the Rockets and Daryl Morey figure out a way to remain flexible, away from the tax apron, and put together a championship caliber/highly competitive team. I don't know about everyone else, but the deeper I look into the numbers, the more anxious I get. Waiting for the big fish of Millsap and Hayward to land so the rest of the NBA market can start to make itself clear. Look for the Rockets to be in the buyout market heavy looking for talent as the options for adding talent and getting to the 14 player rule are running out. I wish Anderson's salary was an asset. It seems to have held us back. The Rockets only have 2nd round picks to give and cannot trade their 1st round pick until 2020. Thoughts? Lets discuss.
I cannot discuss. I'm only an expert on cap stuff after I read @BimaThug 's posts. Then when something changes, I have to wait for another. Then I'm an expert again. Some might say that means I'm not an expert, but those people have inflexible definitions of the word. But I trust that I'll be an expert again soon enough.
whatever happens, just make sure 1 of the 14 players on this roster once the season starts is Carmelo Anthony
It actually hasn't been announced yet whether we are using the MLE. We are just assuming that. However,
It was in last CBA, too. There is no hard cap in the NBA, unless you choose to do certain things. One is using the Non Taxpayer (larger) MLE, which is much higher than the previous MLE which was set to league ave salary, and now called the taxpayer MLE. The other is doing a SnT. These are now things only the non taxpayers can do. GSW and CLE didn't do any of the things that hard cap you.
@BimaThug on twitter right now "MINI-CAP UPDATE: At the moment, #Rockets have ~$105M guaranteed to 9 players. They're hard-capped at $125M." I was off by $3 million bucks. 9 players put us even more in a bind.
The wild card in all of this is Nene. If he's willing to sign for the non-Bird rights deal Houston offered for three years, then Morey still has all of the non-guaranteed deals left to acquire a solid role player or to package with Anderson for a star (in theory, although it's unlikely). However, if Nene isn't willing to take the deal, then the Rockets will have to use the MLE on him and sign and trade the non-guaranteed contracts for Tucker, which only leaves the BAE and veteran minimum deals. They can still add some solid role players that way, though, and I'm not opposed to that if it means locking down Nene. They could go to a team like Phoenix and just dump Anderson's contract for more cap flexibility, but I'm not a fan of that at all unless they have something lined up to upgrade at PF. Unless they're getting Melo, Love or Millsap (all unlikely right now), they should keep Ryno and build up his value. Who knows—he could play himself into an asset this season. And, if nothing else, his contract will be a hell of a lot easier to trade in a year if they want to shoot for that third superstar next summer.
All this sounds greek to me. Can someone please explain in simple terms like I'm an idiot what is that we should be looking for right now? Except for vet minimum players? Can we sign someone using our " TPE"? Or because we are capped out we cannot?
So they're sitting at $20 million in room essentially to add five guys. Take out about $7 million for Nene and whoever they add with the BAE, and you're looking at $13 million for three guys. If Nene doesn't require the MLE, and the Rockets use that on Tucker, Morey could still use the non-guaranteed deals in a trade to bring in a quality veteran role player. Let's say they spend $8 million on that. That leaves $5 millionish for the last two roster spots, which would likely go to veteran minimum guys. In the end that probably leaves them with about $2 million in wiggle room. That's tight, but it's doable.
@ me if someone responds with something helpful. I've given up trying to understand what the hell is going on with our cap. I'll just wait until it's all over with unless someone can talk down to me enough so that I understand.
So I'm no cap expert, but this is the way I understand it right now. The Rockets have the following tools to sign players: - A non-Bird right contract they can offer to Nene for three years (which Nene is pissed about, because he wanted that fourth year) - The non-taxpayer Mid-level Exception (MLE) which is about $8.4 million and can be offered over four years (Qi took up some of this already) - The Bi-Annual Exception (BAE) which is about $3.2 million over two years - A bunch of non-guaranteed contracts that total something around $11 million when combined, but there's a ticking clock on these that pretty much runs out once free agents start signing July 7 (I think, please correct me if I'm wrong on this) - Veteran minimum deals to fill out the roster So if Nene signs that non-Bird rights contract, then Houston can use the MLE on Tucker and still has all of those non-guaranteed deals to play with if Morey wants to trade for another solid piece. If Nene doesn't sign that contract, Morey will have to use a good chunk of the MLE on Nene and then hope Toronto is willing to do a sign and trade for Tucker with those non-guaranteed deals. But no matter what happens with Nene, Morey still has the BAE and veteran minimum deals to use.
