Everyone is so upset that Memphis has offered Posey a contract and Posey has indicated that he will take it. So what. In all likely hood the Rockets are just letting him set the market value be set for Posey and will match his contract. But in the event that they don’t match his contract what if they have alternate plans? What if the Rockets plan on using the Glen Rice expiring contract upgrade a position significantly? Would everyone still be in a tizzy? I certainly have no info on this but these are just some possibilities. 1. Glen Rice and Eddie Griffin to Atlanta for Shareef Abdur Rahim – Shareef has played most of his career at small forward and could come in and be a huge upgrade at that position for us. Mo Taylor would obviously start at the 4 with Badiane being the official back up but in all likely hood would not see much time since Shareef would likely slide over to the 4 with Boki subbing at the 3 when Mo went out. Of course this would trade would depend on Atlanta trying to dump salary for next year. 2. Glen Rice and Kelvin Cato to Portland for Rasheed Wallace – This trade would sure make us thin at the 5 spot but it would sure make us strong in 4 of our 5 starting spots. That would be a very good defensive front court. Of course the Rockets would be taking a very big chance that Boki would pan out at the 3 spot but Rasheed might just be worth taking that chance. Those are the only two scenarios that come to mind. And yes before anybody says it I know it is highly unlikely but what if the Rockets brass is planning something like this. Not necessarily one of these two moves but something like it. In any event the Rockets only have 9 players under contract right now so they are definitely going to sign at least a couple of more people. If they don’t match Posey’s offer from Memphis and they don’t have a back up plan to upgrade the team at the 3 spot then IMO that is an unforgivable offense for an owner of a team. I personally will never except the luxury tax as a reason at least maintaining your team. Of course its not like I have any recourse. Having said that I just don’t think Less is going to use “slightly exceeding the luxury tax” as an excuse not to at retain a good player when you don’t have anyone behind him or coming in that is competent to hold down that position. Personally though I will wait until training camp to see who the Rockets bring in before I start criticizing Less.
well i don't think portland is gonna trade sheed anyway if they're serious about reducing payroll. he's 17M off the cap next year. and even if they did, i couldn't see anyway they don't want EG also. i'm not sure how good eg/cato/rice for sheed is for either team. we get the best player obviously, but we are extremely thin up front then and we're not really that far under the cap when his contract expires. and he may not wanna resign with us. now if they took mo instead of rice (yeah right) then i'd love it b/c sheed and rice expiring would put us way under the cap and we could actually do something (or just sign sheed back). either way, i can't imagine sheed playing for us next year. i kinda hope they aren't planning on doing anything with rice's contract, unless it's for a guy who's contract expires in 4 years along with mooch's and mo's (and possibly posey's new one) to give us cap room right when yao and steve should be in prime form. i want that 9 million back from rice so we'll be free to use the mce to our heart's content next year with no LT worries.
francis 4 prez, Not sure why the Blazers would want EG since they already have Zach Randolph. Their GM is on record, as saying he thinks Randolph deserves a chance to hold down that position. I personally think the Blazers could get a better deal for Wallace but this was just a possible scenario.
I'm not sold on matching Posey's contract. We aren't gonna win any championships next year so I'm more inclined on letting him walk. Don't get me wrong, he's an average/good player with good D skills and 5 mill ain't too bad, BUT, the real reason is the thought of us having about 10-12 mill (without Posey on the books) in cap space next season for a chance at a Kobi, Sheed, KG, to name the big three. Who knows? They might like the idea of playing with the next dominant center and one of the most explosive pg in the league. I know it's a long shot, but with our cap at 43 mill and the cap threshold projected in 53-55 mill, one can't help but wonder. BTW, crash, the (past) possible trade for SAR is very tempting, if still available.
This years cap is $43,840,000.00 and we are currently over by $12,133,570 which makes us at $55,973,570.00 total. We are already committed to $47,674,760.00 for next year after Rice comes off of the Books. So we are already over the Cap again for next year, so even though we may not be over the Luxury Tax threshold we are still over the cap and will only have the mid level exception to spend. Unfortunately we are not to be a player in any major free agent signings since KG, Rasheed etc.. will be asking for a lot more than 4.9mil or whatever the exception will be worth next season.
while i have thought of the fact they like randolph a lot (which is why wallace is on the block anyway), i still say they want griffin to even out the talent, if only to trade him later. no way they give us the cap room advantage and then the talent advantage by that much.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/2007210 "We have 15 days to make that decision, I can't make it up in my mind right now," Dawson said. "That's why we have the 15 days. ... He was the only guy we made an offer to, and so we'll see where we are and decide what we're going to do." Memphis could be trying to work out a sign-and-trade deal, considering they have a slew of guards and small forwards. But if the Rockets agreed to such a deal, they would be faced with the same luxury-tax issues that resigning Posey would bring. Dawson said the Rockets will look at a number of options while deciding what to do about Posey's offer. The Rockets have shown interest in Clippers shooting guard Eric Piatkowski. Dawson said there are a number of other players of interest, however. "There's a lot of backup options, so we'll look at those and try to decide what's best for the team," Dawson said.
Maybe Rox can sign and trade Posey for Battier and change. If Posey starts at SF for Griz then Battier is expendable. Battier would be a nice fit for Rox, and not necessarily a long term commitment.
