I know for sure that Moochie, Baker and Wesley come off the books after the 05-06 season? Can someone give me a webpage to find their salaries and/or tell me how much that would save us? When does Weatherspoon come off the books? Does Maloney's contract expire after this season or next? Looks like we will have a lot of money to play with during the summer of 2006. Who's going to be available? I'm sure there will be plenty of guys interested in joining the Rockets before the 06-07 season starts! I'm predicting we will be title contenders that year! If Wesley continues to play the way he has, I'm all for re-signing him. He looks to be rejuvenated playing in his home state.
Maloney comes off after THIS season. Here is everyone else: Free Agents 2005: Jon Barry Ryan Bowen Dikembe Mutombo Scott Padgett (player option) Free Agents 2006: Andre Barrett (team option) Clarence Weatherspoon David Wesley Moochie Norris Vin Baker (player option) Yao Ming (rookie contract) Mike James (player option) Free Agents 2007: Charlie Ward Free Agents 2008: Juwan Howard (player option) Bob Sura (player option) Free Agents 2010: Tracy McGrady
I would be willing to bet that Vin Baker retires or gets paid by the team to not accept the player option in some kind of buyout.
With the trade deadline officially over, we can officially remove the Donyell Marshall/Gary Payton speculation threads... thank god, I didn't want either of those guys!
So we should have a ton of cap space after next season. Spoon, Moochie, Baker, and Wesley should add up to somewhere around 20 million coming off the books. That should give us enough money (even after we re-sign Yao) to get a solid PF and a solid PG through free agency.
Player option means the player has the option of continuing to play under his current contract or opt out and become a free agent. Obviously, if he is paid a low amount and are playing great, he'll want to opt out. If not, he stays. The team options means the team holds the option to make the player a free agent or extend the contract.
Actually, even better than that, it will give us a LOT of expiring contracts, which will very likely be of value to teams in a trade just like many of the deals done today were salary dumps. Seems more likely we can get a talented player that way than through straight up free agency.
Jeff, I can't figure out if that website is a joke or not... its some girly Maveric fan page??? Isn't there a link from NBA.com, espn.com or foxsports.com?
man that sounds great. CD has done a great job this year in building around Yao and T-mac, hopefully with more assets to trade (the expiring contracts) we can get a legit PF in here.
Nope. None of those sites are anywhere close to as thorough as Patricia's page. It may not be much to look at, but her contract information is some of the most accurate out there. She's been putting that info up there for years. Try these links from her page: Current Player Contracts Salaries for 2004-05
I go to hoopshype to get salary info. Its better. After the 05/06 season, the Rockets will have 19.5 million in expiring contracts. Ben Wallace will also be a free agent that year. Lets start the speculation... 06/07 Starting lineup: Yao Wallace TMac Sura James