What I take from all this is, Dwight coming here is not nearly such a sure thing as we seem to think.
If the taxes don't do it, one Magnitude 6 earthquake will cancel all that amazing weather and set those stars to packing.
It seems people have forgotten, it's still L.A if he plays for the Clippers. He'd still be taxed way more in L.A than in Houston & I don't think he would want to play with a bunch of old & current stars if KG & Pierce end up there somehow. Too many egos. He'd have more fun in Houston, make more money, be the focal point of the offense, and win. Advantages were and will always be Houston.
Backing down from "we will not s&t free agents (to teams without the cap space to sign them outright)" would have some really long term detrimental effects, it's like saying "we will not negotiate with terrorists" and then paying the ransom at the 13th hour, you just know what's coming in future.
Let's say the Lakers don't want to make a trade yet Dwight sets his heart on going to the Clippers, would you still want a disgruntled Dwight? His attitude is bad enough as it is.
Just a scenario: This is even harder to pull off but would be ideal. (assuming we trade Thomas Robinson for a pick) Lakers sign and trade Dwight Howard for Omer Asik. Clippers sign and trade Chris Paul for Jeremy Lin. Lakers get a replacement center. Clippers get a replacement point guard. Each team's salary isn't completely disintegrated in 2014/15. And we can even throw in Thomas Robinson in one of the sign and trades. Or another scenario would be to sign and trade one(D12/CP3) for either Lin or Asik. Then get another team to eat the remaining player w/Thomas Robinson or w/o. (Maybe Utah or Detroit) But we would have to know Chris Paul is on board also.
Besides LAL and LAC never going for a deal that so obviously shafts them...it wouldn't work for salary-matching purposes in the trade anyways. We're taking too much in and giving too little out.
1. It's better than them walking. 2. We have the Salary space to eat Dwight and CP3s contracts if those 2 deals get done.
1. Is it? LAL might instead prefer the extra cap space they would have in 2014. They might also have much better deals on the table, say if LAC offers Griffin/Bledsoe for Dwight in a SnT. Also, LAC could just say no to us because once we traded for Dwight, maybe we can't otherwise move Lin and DMo and TJones to sign CP3 outright, so there goes our leverage. 2. Not if they are taking their maxes. Assuming TRob is gone for a pick already, and we waive and stretch White, we're at the cap if we sign Dwight. Sending out Omer's $8.3M gets us $8.3M down. Sending Lin out alone is not enough to sign CP3 to $18.7M here though. We'd only clear $16.6M. Salary match would not be within 150% or $5M either because it would be $18.7M vs. $8.3M. We would have to also send out TJones and DMo w/ Lin.
1. Depends solely on where Dwight and CP3 want to be. With a broken Clippers team without Griffin or with Parsons and Harden. 2. What is max? because there would be space for 40.822... Million after trading away Lin and Asik.
If Griffin/Bledsoe doesn't happen, it make more sense for LA to let Dwight go for nothing and cash in on one of the 2014 free agents (Lebron, Kyrie, etc) than take on Asik/Lin's contracts
1. To a point, but that won't matter if LAL would prefer the extra cap space to say, Asik or Lin. If Dwight says he will go to Houston no matter what, LAL can either say 1) We'll SnT for Lin/Asik! or 2) Bye! I am not sure which they would prefer -- I know I would lean toward the cap space myself if it were Lin and Asik, but for Asik alone...mmm 50/50. 2. $20.5M for Howard and $18.7M for CP3. How did you get $40.8M after trading away Lin and Asik? Right now we wouldn't even clear $17M before moving TRob. We have to essentially waive and stretch White AND move TRob for free to absorb Howard's $20.5M. I think you're forgetting to factor in roster capholds. We would be well short of the 12 man roster minimum, so we have to assign $490k per spot up to 12 before the trade goes down as 'team salary' under the cap.
This is not necessarily true at all. It might be, it might not be. Call up to them -- I Think it is reasonable either way. It might be $8.3M they need next summer to sign that second max star free agent. Think of it this way -- Lin's $8.3M this yr is sort of what is keeping us from having more leverage and getting CP3/Dwight to come here more easily. If Lin were not on the books, you know we'd be in a better position to sign BOTH CP3 and Dwight. Now if we could benefit from this, why couldn't the Lakers next yr? Also, Asik would not cost them only $8.3M. They would get into luxury tax for him, though not too deep, and be paying closer to $13M for his services. Maybe they'd rather tank a bit and save the $13M to get a high pick and more summer flexibility next yr. Who knows.
