Many just make a blanket assumption that the Rockets can't or won't pay the huge luxury tax bill that would be required to bring back most of the core. Fertitta has said that he'll pay the tax so we will see. The other problem is that the most likely scenario to acquire another star is via a trade. That gets difficult because you have to match salaries. We don't have much in the way of assets that we'd be willing to move and that teams would want. A Lebron scenario is extra tough because if he is leaving Cleveland the they will go into rebuild mode. That would mean that the be looking for young players with big upside and draft picks. That would make it difficult for us to match his salary since Cleveland isnt going to want Anderson. PG13 would be a difficult trade since Pressi isnt likely to trade him to us. Anything short of CP3 and LBJ taking sizable payouts, it will be difficult to pull off a deal for a star.
Pretty much what I have been saying for months accept its not technically a sign and trade as the players Morey is supposedly targeting (Lebron and PG13) have player options and are technically already under contract avoiding the issue of the hard cap. This is Morey's grand plan …. being a team the best players want to play for. Desire to play here and leverage over their current team to force a trade is the key to keeping the entire roster aside from Ryno and EG and still having a MLE to play with - this would really put them deep in the luxury tax but they'd be the title favorites for the foreseeable future. CP3 gets his max LeBron coming via trade is already a max contract Capela gets paid Ariza via bird rights doesn't matter how much he makes aside from tax purposes Retain Green via non bird rights - 120% of his previous salary Luc can also be retained via non bird if he doesn't get a better offer. You have a taxpayer MLE to use Your roster looks like: CP3 / MLE Harden / Green Ariza / Luc Lebron / Pj / Zhou Qi Capela / Nene / Hartenstein / Onuaku Yep , its an expensive roster and you have to find a point guard or combo guard with that MLE but its the odds on favorite to win it all
Cannot do a “S&T”, as THAT will impose a hard cap. They can do a deal either in late June or later in July. The cap math changes on July 1, but they can do it at either time. Still, they’ll likely need to get everything lined up before LeBron agrees to opt in. His deadline is June 29.
Thanks for the responses. How can they do a deal in July if LeBron has to opt-in by June 29, since we can't do a S&T? Or are you saying we can do a S&T, but if we do then the hard cap will be triggered?
They could agree in principle to everything by June 29, then LeBron could opt in, then all parties could wait until after the July Moratorium (when teams’ cap sheets roll over) to actually consummate the trade. They CAN do a S&T, but that would trigger a hard cap. Given where this team’s payroll is expected to be (with or without LeBron), that would destroy any chance of keeping this core together. I just don’t see that happening.
Thanks for that clarification. Would you be kind enough to explain how the caphold + active roster salary work together when it comes to free agency. When I read the CBA rules regarding this, it always sounds like a team entering Free agency that is over the soft cap can’t slimpy just renounce their free agents to add space. There is a statement saying since the rockets are over the cap that even renouncing our free agents doesn’t actually add salary cap.
Also, Morey would want to have all of his deals done like the CP3 deal prior to FA to have the optimal number of team's cap flexibility between the draft and the end of the moratorium. Not saying everything will be done by then but if you have a 3rd or 4th team involved you want as much flexibility as possible to be able to daisy chain everything into one trade. After the draft Morey is able to include the 2019, 2021, and 2023 picks in trades. Assuming at some point here Ryno is moved to Sac or wherever of if the Cavs want to keep those assets instead and plan to dump the rest of their team the Rockets want that worked out in advance. Melo waited a long time on the Rockets, LBJ won't. Daryl is so damn thorough that I know he has plans A through ZZ set up but life is not a rehearsal. This to me is the real hurdle instead of wondering if LBJ would come here.
