The only chance he goes to ATL is if CP goes with him. And CP isn't gonna leave Flop City! Next year DH will either be a laker or a rocket!
I just hope that when the Rockets speak to Howard/CP3, they make it abundantly clear that, if they are open to the possibility of making sacrifices to play in a financially feasible "big 3", we can do that for them with a better supporting cast as long as they coimmit. We can find new homes for Asik, Lin and Robinson. I think those teams would be happy to take back some young and useful pieces.
I read somewhere that Sterling (owner of the Clippers) is a bit of a hard head that would not agree to any S&T for Chris Paul.
Yeah, more importantly they have Bledsoe and DeAndre Jordan so out assets are less attractive to them. One player can be signed outright, and in this dream scenario where we land both superstars, I think we would have to sign Paul and get the Lakers to agree to a trade. I think Kupchak can be convinced to take Lin and Asik, and abandon this non-sensical fantasy Lakers fans seem to have about landing Lebron. They could end up with nothing in 2014 and piss away the last 2 seasons of Kobe's career.
If push comes to shove on Howard and Paul playing together we could make it happen an still maintain Parsons and Beverley along with Harden. So, Paul Harden Parsons Dwight Ohlbrecht second rounder....or possibly first rounder in this draft plus Room MLE minimum contracts (guys like Anderson/Ohlbrecht) We could trade away the guaranteed salaries for draft picks and cap space....Lin/Asik/TRob/DMo/TJones/White I think Lin/Asik/TRob would be enough to get Danny Ainge to send out Rondo and Courtney Lee. You then bid Rondo/Lee out to Utah, New Orleans, Charlotte, etc. for picks. Send $3 million cash out with White to cover his salary and entice someone not making money to take him. Trade TJones and DMo for draft picks. So, Paul, Harden, Parsons, Dwight is a lot more attractive than Paul, Lou Williams, Dwight, Horford. On another note, if it came down to this, I would bet on the Clippers giving in and doing a S&T for anything of value. I believe they would take Jeremy because of his market appeal (and his playing ability), aggregate Lin's salary with DMo and TJones salaries going to other teams for draft picks and you have enough to get a S&T done and still keep Asik. In this scenario, I would like to see some of those picks we acquire combined to bring in Cody Zeller. I think we'd have enough future picks including our own to make that happen. Bring back Delfino (or Garcia) with the Room MLE sign vets Paul/Beverley Harden/Anderson Parsons/Delfino/2nd rounder or Anthony Morrow? Dwight/Asik/vet or 2nd rounder Asik/Zeller
I see Mavericks as a real threat than Hawks because Cuban will do something extraordinary to get it done. More possible for CP3/Howard in Dallas than in Houston. At the same time, I don't think Howard wants to play on the same team with a player who has more commercials than he does. As much as #12 says he wants to win, he also wants be the One that changed the franchise. Which is why, we should be his #1 target and our #1 target.
Dallas are at best a 1% chance of getting Dwight, and they have no conceivable way of getting CP3/Howard (to put it in perspective, Harden + Bev + Lin + Parsons + Jones + Dmo + White leaves us with $2-3m less than Dirk + nobody and that requires Marion to opt out, and them to find takes for Vince, Cunningham and Crowder). In other words, if we can get rid of Asik (which portland for example would take every day and twice on sunday), if for some reason at all, no one at all was willing to take Lin or any of our young players, but was willing to take all of Dallas' crap, we could waive and stretch Lin and still have more space than just Dirk and cap holds. Cuban's last two years have been a testament to his over involvement in basketball decisions, gone is his mystique, only a franchise on the verge of irrelevance remains, and he's no LA to fast track a rebuild.
If Dwight wants glamor and a longer contract, Lakers. If he wants to win now, Rockets. Dallas offers neither.
I think they warrant an interview between Dwight and Ferry for sure. IMO they are a more attractive destination than Dallas, and everyone is assuming Dwight meets Cuban for a sales pitch. If Dwight goes to Atlanta is only if CP3 goes with him, and Im still not convinced CP3 has any shot of leaving the Clippers. Then there is the Josh Smith/Horford situation. Smith might think he's a SF but he's really a PF. If playing with a re-signed Smith is truly an attraction for Dwight, Horford will probably be a player that needs to be moved eventually. Plus a team in a city like Atlanta with their ownership situation is not going to want to go crazy into lux tax territory. I think Horford would almost immediately need to be traded. So I think Atlanta is an interesting team to keep an eye on, but at the end of the day, there are just too many moving pieces to really make it as logical as Dwight signing in Houston outright. That move only requires one pre-move in trading Thomas Robinson on draft night.
They wouldn't keep lou Williams, can they sign Dwight and cp3 first, and then use the hard cap to sign smith because of his bird rights?
No. They would have to renounce Smith's bird rights to have room to offer contracts to Dwight and CP3. Also, who exactly is going to trade for Lou Williams? Mediocre, undersized veteran guard on a multi-year contract at $5.5 million/year and coming off a torn ACL. Good luck with that, Atlanta.
they might have just eliminated themselves from getting dwight... http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-b...g-charges-ticket-advertisement-194928526.html
I believe he will have a cap hold that will keep them from signing both Dwight & CP3 first since Atlanta is holding his bird rights which counts against the cap. So Atlanta has 18.4 mil in guaranteed salary for next season and the cap is estimated to be at 58.5 mil. Assuming Atlanta renounces the rights to Josh Smith to release the cap space - Atlanta signs Dwight and CP3 on July first, that would put them roughly at 57.5 million.(based on guesses of CP3 & Dwights 1st year salaries at their max). Since they dont have the bird rights to Josh Smith, they can no longer sign him over the cap. So if Dwight and CP3 are sold on playing with Josh Smith, they must trade Al Horford for nothing to create the necessary 12 million is might take to re-sign Smith(Assuming 12 million in year 1 would be enough to suffice Josh Smith). IMO, I actually think Horford is a much more valuable player, and his contract is very reasonable over the next few seasons. Its just how its sold to Dwight and CP3 that matters because they might very well only be considering Atlanta because of the thought of playing with Josh Smith... which isn't an option unless they trade Horford. So we can just go ahead and nix the idea of CP3/Williams/Smith/Horford/Dwight & vet min players coming off the bench. It would be impossible to do so from a cap perspective. Atlanta would essentially have to choose between Josh Smith and Al Horford.
This means nothing but a potential HUGE fine. This shouldn't prohibit them in any way of signing free agents.
does atlanta even have max for two guys? howard is 20.5 and cp3 is 18, right? that's 38.5, meaning the hawks should have only 20m in salaries including capholds. horford is at 12, lou will is at 5.2 and jenkins is like 1.3. then they have two first round draft picks capholds at 17/18, which is like 2.6m combined. then they'd have 5 capholds (only 5 cuz dwight/cp3 would take up 2) which like 2.45m. so that'd be roughly 23.5-24m in guaranteed salary. even if they got em to sign there, the rest of their roster would have to be min guys, lol.
The Hawks have 40 Million in cap space this Summer. However with the cap hold of Josh Smith & the incoming draft picks, its much less. It can be done, but not without trading Horford & possibly Williams for nothing back in salary first, or renouncing the bird rights of Josh Smith.
