Poison pill invented in the NFL by the Vikings, with the "If he plays more than 6 games a season in Seattle, his salary increases by 4 million a year." Morey invents this to NBA with the Third year spike, what a genious!! Now others are following the concept, like colangelo.
leeb, like it was explained before, it's a bit different in the NBA. The way the CBA is set up, you generally can't frontload a contract, outside specific circumstances - the Gilbert Arenas provision for 2nd round picks w/o Bird rights who blow up is one such case. I know Nick Collison got extremely frontloaded, but I'm unsure just how that occurred. The idea is to put people in a severe cap quandary by matching a contract that is less painful to the other team and harder to deal by the matching team. Joe Johnson is a special case? Why is that? He's a top-5 shooting guard in a league bereft of 2 guards, traded for by a team desperate to keep Deron Williams, urgently needing a splash and who have the pockets to absorb the impending super-luxury tax hit. How often do the circumstances fit just right to move a mega contract like that for a (just barely) All Star caliber guy? Not very often - planning like those contracts are easily moveable is foolish from a GM's perspective. There's a reason the amnesty clause is called that; it lets teams get away from horrible contracts for salary cap purposes.
The poison pill isn't new to the NBA, it has just that it was explicitly outlawed by prior CBAs. In fact they are still outlawed under this current agreement with the exception of the Arenas provision that Houston used. Way back in 1981 Moses Malone was coming off an MVP season and he signed an offer sheet with the Sixers that contained a poison pill clause. If I remember correctly it was a bonus of $1m that would be paid if the team was not in the top 5 in the league in road attendence Moses contract offer started at $2m per year which was a record back then. Philly had Dr. j,McGinnis, Dawkins,Bobby Jones,world b free and Andrew Tony, they were a lock to lead the league in road attendence. The Rockets, on the other hand, were going to be in the bottom half of the league. Ultimately the league ruled that the provision was unfair and had it removed. Of course the $2m starting salary was too much for Houston so they ended up trading Malone anyway.
The question isn't whether you can trade a guy, the question is what you can trade him for. For example, Joe Johnson got traded for a collection of guys they don't want (Petro, Morrow, and Farmer (who is being bought out)) plus a lotto-protected 1st round pick. And that's for a proven star player. His contract obviously lowered his trade value. If Joe Johnson was getting paid $7M a year or even $10M a year, he'd be worth much more on the trade market. Asik is similarly possible to trade, but (1) if they match, he has veto rights over all trades for a whole year, and (2) because the 3rd year spike on his salary will also apply to his new team (only the Rockets get the benefit of averaging out cap hit over 3 years), a potential trading partner will likely be leery as to what it does to its own tax/cap situation that year. The rules don't prevent the Bulls from matching, it simply makes tips the balance of the incentives. The point, however, is that your original comment about "why don't we poison pill an elite player" is ignorant of how the NBA really works. You gave a couple of NFL examples but the rules there are completely different. In the NBA, the "poison pill" in quesiton here applies to a very limited # of players: (1) They must not be 1st round picks, (2) they must have 2 years of experience or less when they hit free agency, and (3) they must have done enough to justify a market value of their contract at more than the MLE. Most non-1st round picks don't even last 2 years in the league, some do not hit free agency after 2 years (Rockets tend to sign their 2nd rounders to 3-4 year deals), few do enough in 2 years to justify earning more than the MLE, even fewer achieve truly elite status. So, to answer your question, one reason why the Rockets didn't "poison pill" an elite player this year is that there are no such proven elite players available to "poison pill." The second reason that the Rockets would not "poison pill" an elite player even if such an mythical elite player selected outside the 1st round in 2010 existed is that it would be pointless. If a player is truly elite, the most you can offer (4 years, $40M) would be a no-brainer automatic match. It would be a waste of time to make such an offer. The only instance where it would make sense is with a player who you view to be worth significantly more than the MLE, but not quite the maximum allowed (4 years $40M) and preferably when they are on teams with luxury tax issues. Those will be guys that for you, is worth the cap hit at the average salary amount, but for the matching team, may or may not be worth the 3rd (or 4th) year cap hit at the backloaded amount. Those are not going to be proven elite players, but rather those who have demonstrated potential for excellence in limited # of minutes or games.
What's foolish you're thinking that if the bulls really wanted asik back they wouldn't match. The guy played 14 minutes a night. Orlando matched gortat and traded him later. There are always team willing to take that contract. Think about this, they match and so they can't trade him for x days without his permission. After those days are over, a team like toronto might want someone other than amir johnson. Or maybe the bulls match, send noah and filers for howard. Howard leaves, they amnsety boozer,but still have asik. They have the options, its just a matter of them giving a kcuf.
So now with Jeremy Lin's contract, New York is looking at having to pay $20M for Lin's salary alone those last two years, and then another $60M in tax on top of that? Where we would just be paying 20 so long as we don't go over the tax ourselves. Why do people think New York would be willing to do that again? It sound to me like our chances to get him, albeit at an overpriced amount, are not too bad. 75% of his value to us unfortunately will be for marketing purposes.
Lin is Taiwanese which can be controversial to mainland China and will be interesting to see how it plays out. However, I think many are underrating Lin.
I think Morey is offering these contracts hoping the other team(s) matches (especially in the case of Lin) This will make these teams strapped against the cap going forward, and unable to offer Howard a max contract in Free Agency. Bulls/Knicks are 2 very likely destinations. Especially NYK...they could amnesty Amare' and go after Howard. Having Lin on the books at 10 mil. will make it difficult for them...thus making it safer for Morey to pull the trigger on a deal for Howard with no guarantee he will re-sign here.
No one said a poison pill is a 100% deterrent to the other team. Yes there's always ways around things. Its always POSSIBLE for the most BLOATED contracts to go SOMEWHERE. But it doesnt hurt to limit the other team's options and make THEM HURT. And its purely speculative to think that there's ALWAYS a PRESENT situation and ALWAYS a circumstance to make a deal. That there's always a open flexible market to dump off anyone. Yeah the Wizards can deal Andre Blatche, but more often than not there's a Les Alexander out there who doesnt want to pay deep luxury tax to take them in. Yes the Rockets CAN make all kinds of other moves to absorb the hit. But WHY would they want to for Andre Blatche? Its the Andre Blatche level people where it matters, not the REAL stars. I know you understand how it works. But thats the dare - Do you want to give up Boozer and Noah and make 4 other complimentary moves to keep Asik in there? Does their front office have confidence in their manuvering ability where they won't feel he's a deep tax liability? Goran Dragic was allowed to leave just for wanting a player option. Imagine if he wanted TWICE the pay on his last year, and Rockets had THREE times the tax on that year.
