Logic and common sense would say it isn't because skirting the cba is never that easy, and if it were that simple, everyone would have suggested it already BUT to be more exact and without diving through the cba (I'm studying for the bar so my breaks aren't THAT long haha), I do know that player salary increases (in back loaded contracts, which I think are the norm, vs. front loaded ones) are based on the base salary of the first yr. So your 'max' salary is determined by your yr 1 salary anyways, not some total number, know what I mean? It isn't that Dwight is owed $89M or whatever over 4 yrs as a max player...it is that he can demand up to a max of $20.5M this yr, and every subsequent yr there is a max increase of up to 5% (7% w/ bird rights) of the base salary, so that yr 2 can be up to $21.5M for us, etc., and that we are LIMITED to offering him a contract of up to 4 yrs. See what I mean? If in theory his first yr salary could be even higher, say $22M for whatever reason, his whole max total allowed would be significantly higher. They wouldn't force his later yrs to be lower just to fit within some arbitrary $89M or whatnot, though there are such things as front loaded contracts I believe -- not sure how they work w/ max players, if at all. We have to renounce almost all our exceptions if we want to sign Dwight because the exceptions actually count against our cap if we don't. So once we've done that and moved TRob and White (or waived and stretched White), we'd only have a few exceptions left, like the Room MLE (smaller than the full MLE) and maybe vet mins or some other smaller exceptions I don't know too much about lol. So after renouncing most of our exceptions, we'll be at the cap of $58.5M w/ a roster of: Lin, Harden, Parsons, Dwight (VERY small paycut, like $70k), Asik, Bev, TJones, DMo, GSmith, $490k (maybe room MLE on Garcia), $490k, $490k To get CP3 under $18.6M, we would have to either trade away Lin and Asik and like at least one of our young PFs to create enough room to sign him to close to $18.6M (if he takes a small paycut), or do a SnT w/ LAC so that we can take back probably 150% of the salary we're sending out. But due to who we have on the roster, the most reasonable thing in such a SnT would be to send both Lin and Asik out and take CP3 back. That'd leave us with: CP3, Harden, Parsons, Dwight (VERY small paycut, like $70k), Bev, DMo, GSmith, $490k (maybe room MLE on Garcia), $490k, $490k , $490k, $490k So technically the above is possible under the 2 paths. Problem is, neither are very likely to occur. 1) Moving Asik for free is pretty doable, but to move both Lin and a young PF for free as well? All this before we can even sign CP3, when most stars sign within the first 2 weeks of FA? Pretty tough. Not sure who would be willing to use their cap space taking Lin and Asik and a young PF off our hands, and even then, we're left w/ a pretty depleted bench. Assuming we get Garcia from a Room MLE, our bench would be Bev, Garcia and GSmith (unless we had to move GSmith for free too because CP3 demands max...doubt it though). Ouch. A few other exceptions or small moves we can do, and Morey is great at finding role players but meh. 2) We keep most of our bench and just lose Asik and Lin, but get CP3. Problem is, why in the world would LAC agree to this? We would only do this AFTER we've signed Dwight, so we've lost our leverage. LAC knows CP3 most likely can't go and just sign with us, and there are almost no other viable teams he could leave LAC for. LAC would become his best remaining destination. Why would LAC help us by helping their star leave when they know he has little leverage/options left? Makes no sense. Also, why would they want Lin and Asik from us when they have Bledsoe and DJordan? They'd have to start moving some players to make a more sensible team, which is not guaranteed and hard work.
Lin and Asik getting the 5-5-15 structure was due to a trick in the cba Morey exploited. It is the Gilbert Arenas provision. http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q44 Does not apply to this case.
I am not sure if the Clippers would do that. When we sign Howard we don`t have the cap room, so CP3 can`t say: I´ll go to the Rockets no matter what, so you better do the s&t to get something in return. Sure he could say: I leave no matter what, if you don`t do the s&t I´ll just go to the Mavs or Atlanta - but that would be a gamble on his side (I guess he wouldn`t want to go to a rebuilding team without another star that is not past his prime). So the Clippers could really just sit and watch until he agrees to their offer. And remember, they have D. Jordan, they might not even want Asik. I guess we might get him if we include Parsons and at least one first rounder - I guess we should still do this team, because we`d have a legit big three, maybe even the best in the league. But it would hurt to lose Lin, Asik and Parsons and be left with a gutted roster without a real 3 or 4. I am pretty sure we would get 1 of them at most - which would still be enough to make us a contender. But if it is CP3 we desperately need to use Lin to upgrade our 4 (maybe s&t for Millsap or Smith).
Agree with your assessment, but highly doubt we land CP3 w/o Dwight. I don't think CP3 will even entertain coming here w/o Dwight, but Dwight might very well come here and then foreclose the realistic chance of CP3 coming. A catch 22 of sorts. I would not give up Lin + Asik + Parsons for CP3 in a SnT. I think that we would end up w/ a worse team. CP3 is great, but that's putting too many eggs into one basket, and we would literally have no SF and no backup C (I barely count GSmith as a backup C, he's really a PF). Pretty gross.
Yeah, I totally agree with you. CP3 alone is a major long shot. I believe Morey is trying anything to convinve him, but I don`t think we have a legitimate chance. Dwight is a whole different story. I would be hesistant to trade Lin, Asik and Parsons for CP3 - but in the end I would do it. The team that ends up with the best player usually wins a trade, and we would wind up with a top5 player in the league. But then Morey would have his work cut out for him to get some usable role players next to them. But let`s say we can somehow sign Garcia, Barnes and Carl Landry and we would be the clear cut favorite to win it all with this line up: CP3/Beverly Harden/Barnes Garcia/Jones Landry/Moti D12/Smith
That is a great lineup. Just not sure how we'd snag Barnes AND Landry AND Garcia. They'd have to agree to dirt cheap contracts to play w/ us. Barnes and Garcia I guess aren't impossible (Room MLE? Vet min?), but I feel Landry is young enough and good enough (look at the K he'd be choosing not to opt into) to warrant and want a lot more money than we can give him. That being said, my other reason for being hesitant there is we're placing a lot of eggs in two slightly damaged baskets. Dwight's injury history scares me a little, but I can deal w/ it. But add in CP3's injury history as well? If either one goes down for a significant period of time, we'd have nearly $20M just sitting there collecting dust...w/ a crappy bench to show for it This is also a really dumb reason but...I've been wondering if adding CP3 might actually somewhat inhibit Harden's growth. He has a lot of room for improvement still, and playing w/ ball-dominant and floor-leader CP3 might give Harden fewer opportunities to push himself or even WANT to push himself.
If we already got Dwight then: In a word: no. Very, very very very hard to do. I don't even know if mathematically it could work out. We'd have to do a SnT w/ LAC after we get Dwight, and w/o sending Lin means we would have to send DMo + GSmith + TJones instead. We would literally have like no bench. Lin is a great 6th man I bet, but not if he's the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th man as well If we only get CP3 then: Yes, possible, but I don't think that is a great lineup tbh. Too much tied into that position and a gaping hole at the 4. No great backup C either.
Also, in general: http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q17 http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q53 Reading cba more fun than studying for the bar. Tells you something.
No chance this happens. Reading the article it sounds like Howard OR Paul...of course there going to mention going after both...every NBA team with money is going after them. Only way Paul and Howard team up is an ATL.
That is actually less likely to happen than them coming to Houston. I think it is a common misconception that they can both go to ATL, but they can't. I mean, they TECHNICALLY can, but it'd be worse than just coming here. ATL has 3 guaranteed players for next season: Lou Williams at $5.2M, Al Horford for $12M, and John Jenkins for $1.2M. CP3 and Dwight demand $18.6M and $20.5M maxes, respectively. But that is for FIVE players on the team. Even if they renounce rights to all other non-guaranteed players, they're left w/ 7 minimum roster charge cap holds of $490k each. 7 x $490k = $3.4M. 5.2 + 12 + 1.2 + 18.6 + 20.5 + 3.4 = $60.9M, OVER the cap by $2.4M (bit more if you count change). Dwight and CP3 would each have to take like a $1.2M paycut or more to just fit under the cap w/ ATL. But then that means ATL has used its whole cap of $58.5M on just 5 players...them being: CP3/Lou Williams/John Jenkins (who??)/Horford/Dwight Howard That isn't a weak bench, that is a NON-EXISTENT bench. They would also have to probably trade or give away their picks for virtually nothing (they have 4 picks I think) or hope to sign some rookies to really low deals, snag a few vet min players and use the Room MLE to try to make some semblance of a roster. This will be VERY hard to do when $58.5M is tied up in 5 players, only 4 of which are good.
THANK YOU. Rep for this. It's getting so annoying to have to continually discredit the Atlanta scenario. So these guys are going to give up the 5th year, full-max deal and still pay a state income tax... all for the Atlanta Hawks? A perpetually mediocre organization with an unproven GM, unproven coach, literally nothing on the roster outside of the "Big 3", and an owner/fanbase that hasn't shown a willingness to spend to luxury tax levels? Puh-lease. And if someone wants to play the "what if they trade Lou" card, it is a million times more likely that Houston can find a home for Asik and Lin than Atlanta being able to move a 27-year-old, undersized shooting guard on a multi-year deal and coming off a torn ACL. If Dwight and Chris Paul play on the same team next year, it will be in Houston. Period. The ATL scenario is irrelevant.
Morey will pull a switcharoo and offer Lin/Asik/TRob for Dwight without telling the Lakers, who would rather have something than Dwight walk to Houston for nothing, that he has CP3 lined up to sign before the trade is officially executed.
That would be amazing, but almost certainly not reality. LAL FO isn't that dumb lol. They agree to that SnT when they see us have the cap space to sign him outright? CP3 not yet committed? Actually decide to go through w/ it AFTER we sign CP3? Once we use up our cap space, the remaining team, whether that be LAL or LAC would not SnT to us because we've lost our leverage. The player's claim that they will leave LA to go to Houston will not hold much water because they can't EXCEPT with the help of their current team. Sure the player could also then say they will go to x other team w/ cap space, but most of the other teams w/ cap space suck and would be worse than their current LA team (esp. after the other superstar between CP3 or D12 have already signed w/ Houston). Bluff...called. lol
Thanks Those are great reasons as well. I just don't see either doing it for a host of reasons. Dwight has even said he does not WANT to play in ATL, his home city. I guess ATL could in theory amnesty Al Horford...but come on, will they seriously amnesty Al Horford, who is making $12M a yr for multiple yrs? If they do, Houston will be RIGHT THERE winning that bid for him hahaha. I will be just as ecstatic if somehow (fantasy world) we get Horford in this offseason from amnesty bidding and keep a ton of our cap space lmfao. Win.
