Yes, if they are one-year deals. In that case, the Rockets would only pay (and they'd only count for cap/tax purposes) $947k, with the league picking up the rest of the tab. However, if they are two-year deals (like Dorsey signed last summer), the team pays the full freight.
Dwight should be more about $29.5M and Durant $25.3M per Pincus. I think the only way it would make sense to land Durant and keep Lawson would be for the Rockets to have a deal in place to release him and resign him if he clears waivers. Most likely that would be to the room exception after signing Durant. So, you would effectively be working from about $87M with Dwight's cap hold still on the books. If you can get him to take about $20M a year on a short salary, we are down to about $79M. Trade Terrance Jones (or renounce him) and Brewer for no salary back and you are working right at about $66M. At that point, you are darn close to Durant's max salary. All that would be left would be dealing KJ for no salary back or getting Durant to take slightly less than the max with the promise of having a very, very deep team and using the room exception on Lawson. Extremely unlikely all around, but some semblance of possibility. Dwight signing for far below his max and Lawson taking a steep discount with the promise of a big raise the next year are the biggest keys, though.
Morey could swing some sort of deal during the season for an expiring contract, a useful-if-not-great player (David Lee + picks?) to help set us up for an offseason run at KD. Plus re-sign Howard at 20, Lawson at 10 or 11. If he thought KD would be a lock.
BBHolic already pointed out that Dwight's max is wrong, but I don't think those numbers are right either. Durant's max should be 30% of $90,000,000 (projected) and Dwight's max should be 35% of $90,000,000. I have no idea how Pincus came up with those max salaries based on a salary cap of $90,000,000 which is what he did in this article http://www.basketballinsiders.com/projecting-2015-2016-max-salary-tiers/ Those numbers he gave seem to based on an ~$84 million dollar cap. If Bima could confirm which numbers are correct that would be great. The CBA bases max contracts off of 25%,30%, and 35% of the salary cap according to years of service (other than the special rookie 30% extension criteria stuff). Dwight's max being off really doesn't change the numbers much, just makes it look like Dwight is taking less of a pay cut. But here is what I posted earlier with the correct numbers: Spoiler I'm not sure why you think the only solution is to release Lawson and somehow convince him to take a HUGE discount where a lot of teams are going to have a lot of cap space and not many really good players to use it on. If you can trade 3 backups in Ariza, Brewer, and Beverley for Kevin Durant and keep Ty Lawson, I'm pretty sure that is what Morey would do in a heartbeat.
Max salaries can be: http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q16 25% of cap for players with 0-6 years experience 30% of cap for players with 7-9 years experience 35% of cap for players with 10+ years experience So 35% of a cap of 90 million would be 31.5 million salary. But remember that the cap is figured differently for purposes of a max contract calculation. That is why the the max for Dwight next season would be about 29 million and not 31.5 million. http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q38 The cap hold for Dwight would be the lesser of 150% of his current salary or the maximum salary he can recieve. So 150% of Dwight's current salary is 33.539 million which is obviously where the previous poster got that figure. However, since 29 million is the max that Dwight can receive then his actual cap hold will be 29 million not 33.5 million.
Thanks. I wonder if giving a 1 year deal would be a hang up for either Terry or Hayes. Also, while they play completely different positions, could it be possible that we will only take one of Terry or Hayes? Just seems weird that we kept hearing "getting close" from local and national guys, but it hasn't happened yet.
Durant will be a 30% of cap max player after next season since he is a 7-9 year vet. Dwight will have been in the league over 9 seasons so he is a 35% max vet. And those percentages will probably be closer to 28% for Durant and 33% for Dwight because of the formula they use. EDIT: Bima may have these precentages down to the .01% for next season. I've never taken the time to fully digest the formula. I just know it typically lags the max percentages by around 2%.
You're absolutely right. I missed this footnote in the faq: Thanks for pointing that out to me, I had never heard of it before.
Thanks Bima. I updated the max salaries with this information and put it in spreadsheet form. I also took a complete guess at Harrell's salary for next season. Spoiler link in case the embed didn't work: http://www.imgur.com/dIRlMHm I made the spreadsheet using google docs. You should be able to view/download the spreadsheet from here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1s5ZL-juL7gufZJ0p0Y9Flddao5jf_c1enyIudjnZBtI/edit?usp=sharing You should be able to make changes to it if you download it, just remember to leave empty roster spots salaries blank so that incomplete roster charges are calculated correctly.
Looks like you did this with three different options to make Durant work. Of the three I like the first one. You drop Bev, Ariza, Jones, and Brewer and Howard takes $20m. McDaniels becomes your primary backup 2/3 and you hope Dekker, Harrel, and Capela are capable. Plus you keep Dmo! Lawson Harden Durant/McDaniels DMo/Dekker/Harrel Howard/Capela That's the core and we're hoping KJ can be 6th man extraordinaire. Add a few vet min ring chasers at PG, wing, and PF and that is one crazy team.
Not sure if this article was posted, but the author give Morey a ton of credit http://houseofhouston.com/2015/07/21/houston-rockets-making-right-moves/ Spoiler On Sunday, GM Daryl Morey struck again when the Rockets made the trade to bring in point guard Ty Lawson. While the deal may not go down in the annuls of the NBA as the greatest trade in history, when you peel back the curtain of this Rockets offseason and dig into the numbers you can’t help but come away impressed. And while many fans may not have much of an understanding of the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which gives NBA teams most of their salary and transactional rules, we’ll do our best to explain the rules as they pertain to this and the transactions leading up to the Lawson trade as well as where it leaves the Rockets currently. The Rockets traded Kostas Papanikolaou, Pablo Prigioni, Joey Dorsey, Nick Johnson and a lottery protected 2016 1st round pick to the Nuggets for Ty Lawson and a 2017 2nd round pick. That’s arguably the last four guys on the Rockets current roster. Papanikolaou and Prigioni both have non-guaranteed or partial guaranteed contracts for the upcoming season and may be released (Prigioni already released). As the Rockets came into the offseason, Daryl Morey to Kevin McHale to James Harden to the relatively serious fan knew that the Rockets needed another playmaker on the offensive side of the ball. Having ramped up the defensive side of the ball significantly in recent years with Patrick Beverley, Trevor Ariza, Corey Brewer and Dwight Howard, the Rockets were squeezed in key moments in the offseason, when double and triple teams were throw at Harden, the teams only real playmaker that could create for himself and others. Another factor has been Harden’s minutes, leading the NBA in minutes played in the 2014-2015 season. While he wouldn’t admit that he wore down in the playoffs, immediately after season’s end he admitted that the Rockets needed someone that could shoulder some of the load in the backcourt, which the veterans and even a healthy Patrick Beverley simply cannot do, at least not the playmaking role. If you don’t think Lawson can be that for the Rockets, think again and check out this highlight clip from this season. The Rockets did their due diligence for this offseason – as is smart business – which was to kick the tires on LaMarcus Aldridge because he was at least willing to give them an audience. As expected, though, they lost out the Spurs. But Daryl Morey had a plan. The Rockets did not panic and instead went with their plan A (or B), re-signing Patrick Beverley and a few days later Corey Brewer. Then the crazy twist that was DeAndre Jordan occurred, initially leaving smart Rockets fans glad he was headed to Dallas and thereby severely hurting the Los Angeles Clippers only have a change of hurt and spurn the Mavericks. Some Rockets fans, as it is their right, delighted in Mark Cuban, Chandler Parsons and the Mavericks feeling that painful loss that was a swift kick to their offseason. But some Rockets fans, as they should be, are alarmingly concerned at how good the Clippers could be this next season having added some significant pieces. But Daryl Morey had a plan. Then Josh Smith chose to take the Clippers veteran minimum salary offer of $1.5 million over what is believed to be the Rockets offer of what would have been his qualified offer, with non-bird rights status, of $2.49 million. This posed a two-fold concern, one because the Rockets lost Smith to the quickly improving and Western Conference rival Clippers. But what that move also did was make Terrence Jones who would have appeared available to put into a trade for a guard, not as available as we might have thought he would have been had Smith returned. But Daryl Morey had a plan. In all likelihood, the Rockets had the makings of a trade before the Josh Smith Clippers signing or at least had a good idea of what Ty Lawson was going to cost them and it didn’t include Jones. So they thanked Smith for his contributions and said goodbye. A few days after the Smith signing the Rockets announced the re-signing of restricted free agent K.J. McDaniels to a new three-year contract. The Rockets utilized part of the only salary exception still available to them, the non-taxpayer mid-level exception (MLE) which is $5.46 million. McDaniels will get $3.19 million in year one of his contract leaving $2.27 million of the MLE remaining. Daryl Morey had a plan. The McDaniels signing needed to take place prior to the Lawson trade. Additionally, although some signings were “announced” such as guard Marcus Thornton, some have not been officially signed yet. Again timing is significant. The reason timing is significant is after the Lawson trade was made with the four salaries going out along with a trade exception and Ty Lawson’s $12.4 million coming in, it pushed the Rockets total team salary much closer and even over the NBA’s tax threshold. The tax threshold ($84.74 million in 2015), is the point at which NBA teams must start paying a penalty or TAX back to the league to be distributed to the non-tax paying teams. The purpose is of course incentive for teams to not go too far over the league’s soft salary cap as the dollars escalate quickly beyond the actual payroll. Another technical number in the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement is the Tax Apron, which is $4 million over the Tax Threshold. The significance of this number is that any team over the Tax Apron is considered HARD capped and is very limited in their transactional movement. In the Rockets case this would have meant the remainder of the MLE, the $2.27 million that they still have at their disposal, they would no longer have. Have we mentioned Daryl Morey has a plan? That $2.27 million, assuming the Rockets don’t spend it on veterans Jason Terry and Chuck Hayes (deals for veteran minimum won’t affect the MLE money), they will have available throughout the season to offer any free agent or a player released from another team, just like they did with Josh Smith last year. Having this, CAN give them an advantage if a player of interest becomes available, versus other playoff bound teams. So after the Beverley and Brewer signings, letting Josh Smith go, McDaniel’s signing and the Ty Lawson five-player trade, and assuming veteran minimum deals for Jason Terry and Chuck Hayes and the official signing of rookie Montrezl Harrell, want to guess where that leaves the Rockets? If you said just under $4 million over the Tax Threshold, thereby NOT over the Tax Apron and maintaining the rest of the MLE ($2.27 million), give yourself a prize! And if he hits that mark while on the fly with various transactions happening, that is damn impressive! Here is the projected Rockets roster after the expected signings to round out the roster and the totals. As it stands today the Rockets will likely pay roughly $6 million in tax, barring future roster changes. The Lawson addition while on paper looks great for the Rockets. However, it’s not without risk. Lawson has been charged with two DUI’s in the past six months and is currently in rehab in everyone’s hopes of getting his personal life together. Additionally the Rockets have stated they will reach out to NBA legend and Houstonian John Lucas to council Lawson and be a local person who has walked the walk and beaten drug and alcohol addiction, should Lawson be open to it. The Rockets also are a veteran team, with a strong administration and player-respected coaching staff. Lawson has friends on the team in James Harden and Corey Brewer and presumably will have veterans like Jason Terry to be a leader off the court as well. And Lawson is said to be excited about the trade and happy to be on the team. However, to top it all off, not only did Daryl Morey add the guard that the Rockets desperately needed to keep pace with the Spurs, Warriors and Clippers in the Western Conference, but as part of the deal, Lawson agreed to make the 2nd year remaining on his contract non-guaranteed. This is HUGE and means that if things don’t go well with Lawson, the Rockets can let him go and move on next season. For Lawson it’s huge incentive to MAKE it work. If he doesn’t and if he doesn’t stay out of trouble, he will take a huge financial hit in the future and could have his NBA reputation ruined, much the way Rajon Rondo has done with his on court and locker room antics in recent years. It’s a win-win for Lawson and the Rockets and in both of their interests to find a way to make this work. Did Daryl Morey know from the get-go that this is exactly how the offseason would unfold for the Rockets? That’s’ doubtful. Did he even know for sure that Lawson was the player he would end up with? That’s doubtful as well.But he had a plan, with options A, B & C. It was also a two-fold plan, to bring back the core of the team that made it to the Western Conference Finals to allow continuity to build and to add a 2nd playmaker that the team needed. He did both. And with this offseason and the Harden and Howard acquisition offseasons, you don’t have to look any farther to understand why Rockets fans proclaim the phrase, “In Morey We Trust!”. Going forward the Rockets have stars, they have veterans, they have young players who still have room to improve, they have defensive players and offensive players, and though they will be paying luxury tax for the first time under the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, they still have flexibility to tweak the roster if need be. Daryl Morey had a plan. As a result the Rockets are in good hands. Stick with us here at House of Houston for all your Rockets offseason coverage.
Also Al Horford will be a free agent next off season. He'd be a nice piece to add if we missed out on Durant. One thing you left out Madano was the possibility of trading Dekker and KJ (5 Mill) to free up space. If we could convince Howard to take 20 million, trade KJ, Dekker and renounce Jones then we'd have like 19 million in cap space after roster charges. Wonder if Horford and Howard would be interested in taking 19.5 million a piece (just for the starting year of course) Lawson / Beverley Harden / Ariza / Brewer Horford / Motie / Harrell Howard / Capela Would be a sweet roster.
I was focusing specifically on Durant and only gave a few possibilities whether they were likely/unlikely. As you've said though, the good news is that the Rockets will have several ways of creating space whether it be for Durant or another quality free agent.
Bima, could be hurry and make a updated financial situation post on the Rockets.... also on how a potential Durant addition could be had.
This is the kind of thing that makes clutchfans great for people like me who don't post much. I was just wondering how all these salaries would play out & thinking it would be great to have a spreadsheet explaining all the options and variables. And here it is! So I salute you sir!
I'm holding off writing a new salary cap update until the Montrezl Harrell situation plays out. Whether the Rockets use the MLE on him will greatly determine their cap flexibility for the next 11-12 months. As for Durant, the Rockets have assembled a roster filled with players who (seemingly) have positive trade value. Assuming certain players don't kill their trade value next season, the Rockets can always trade away guys into other teams' cap space to create room. Remember, there will be many teams with oodles of cap space and no star free agents to use it on; so they'd maybe welcome a chance to add a Corey Brewer or a Trevor Ariza on an affordable contract without having to give up much in the way of (non-space) assets. That said, as Madano's models (which I have not reviewed in detail but seem close enough to being fairly accurate) show, a lot depends on what Dwight wants in his next contract. If Dwight opts out (and I think he will), his cap hold will be nearly $30 million until he either re-signs, is renounced or signs with another team. If Dwight wants a full "super-max" contract, then it'd be very difficult to sign Durant outright as a free agent AND keep all of Howard, Harden and Lawson. (Hell, it'd be difficult enough even if Dwight opts in at $23.3 million or otherwise takes a new deal in that same range.) And if Lawson is any good this season, I don't think playing around with his non-guaranteed 2016-17 season will work. Even if Lawson doesn't get claimed off waivers, the Rockets would have no Bird rights to Lawson and would have to compete using the same cap space they need to sign Durant, meanwhile fighting off other teams trying to get the rehabilitated Lawson. While it is extremely unlikely that OKC would ever cooperate, the best hope for the Rockets adding Durant might be via sign-and-trade, as the Rockets would have plenty of enticing pieces on relatively affordable contracts to work the salary matching, either directly with OKC or as part of a 3- or 4-team trade. Don't hold your breath on that happening, though.
