I am in agreement with your point of view. Things are starting to get murky,instead of clearing up. Some members asked will Smith's decision be tied to Brewer's as well? Even a backup PG/SG like Llull can be beneficial for Harden, but Smith's game might suffer with the presence of a better PG, since he relies on his versatility(playmaking/ballhandling/ shooting) to thrive, despite his inefficiency.
I think we might lose Brew if he feels there's no playing time here if Llull, who plays both guard spots, should sign....maybe cybersex is making this reference?
Only thought behind not being confident with brewer is if he gets a large contract that would put us close to a hard cap of some sorts. Idk the cap as great as bima or even bbholic. So maybe someone with insight could elaborate ons of those possible angles. Another reason I can see is morey really believed in kjs potential. He did trade two 2nd btw. Maybe he's trying to keep him for the qo with the appearance of solid playing time behind Ariza. Maybe that's enough to convince him to sign on at a valuable contract. Also maybe morey is planning on bringing in a high salary player via trade somehow and is wearry of the hard cap and needing multiple players at lower salaries compared to one at a high salary. Not really sure but I appreciate the info as always cyberx.
Maybe that means for sure that Bev is matched. Then it would be both Bev and Harden and Llull as a combo guard coming off the bench. In that case is not even worth to pay around 8 per for Brew. Maybe the Rockets then said to Brew that we will you give 5 per if Llull comes and he's determined to try free agency with a better role and more minutes. Matthews is back on the court. Then there is Afflalo and Caroll. Danny Green, Bellineli Jeff Green Gerald Green. Deng. And more. There is no way that Brew gets more than 8 per in the market. IMO. He can't shoot. But he can get around 7. Or maybe instead of Bev there is a trade for another guard prepared.
I'm not an expert, far from it. But if you use the tax payer mle you don't get hard capped I think. And that's the one we are planning to use I believe. Kj will get both time as a backup and more millions by many other teams who are not contending like the Rockets.
If all we get is Llull and Bev at point then we need to get Aldridge or another impact 4. Llull is not going to cut it... could very well end up being another Matt Maloney type signing. We need another ball handler that is a threat to go consistently outside Harden.
I thought Brew's bird rights made it a lot easier to sign him even with offseason additions. Smith and KJ were the ones presumably gone
Only in theory I guess. He probably doesn't want Sergio to take part of his SG minutes. If the Rockets can create cap room with a Brewer S/T I will be in favor of it, provided if the full MLE is available too. I have my doubts if LMA, or Love/Marc Gasol want to come to Houston, but getting Danny Green instead of Brewer would be nice.
In my humble opinion, the real reason we'll probably lose Brewer is because the combination of Llull and Brewer on the books for 2016 will infringe on us being able to have max cap space to sign a premier free agent out right. We'd have to trade guys away, give up picks, etc. Whereas we can probably afford to lock up one or the other of these guys for around $5-6 million per and still have max cap space. A quick peak at 2016 cap: Harden $16,784,032 Ariza $ 7,806,971 Llull (MLE) $ 5,709,880 DMo $ 6,223,825 (cap hold) ________________________________________________________________ Total $36,524,708 Now Dwight has an opt-out and is eligible for an even larger raise. But let's assume for the moment that Dwight doesn't opt out and his cap number is $23,282,457. That brings us to $59,807,165 for 5 players. Let's assume best case scenario that we've cleared out everybody else and we'll have 7 minimum salary slots against the cap. That means everybody's gone including Capela and Nick Johnson and our 2015 and 2016 draft picks. So, 7 minimum salary slots at $543,471 each is a total of $3,804,297 bringing our total cap under these premises to $63,611,462. Now, let's assume the 2016-17 cap goes to $90 million. That means we've got $26,288,538 in cap space. Sounds good, right??? Well, stop and think for a moment. If the cap is $90 million then the max salary for a 10-year vet like LaMarcus is going to be in the neighborhood of $30 million. The max salary for a 7-9 year vet like Love is going to be right around $25 million. Now, that's best case scenario right there. And that's without throwing in a salary for Corey Brewer or McDaniels or Capela or Nick Johnson or any of our draft picks from 2015 and 2016. We obviously promised to make Brewer good. So we're obviously going to offer him his $4.7 million back...on a one-year deal at least. And we'd probably be willing to keep Brewer on a longer term deal if his number was at the MLE level and we weren't bringing in Llull. But you add Brewer's cap number to that 2016-17 cap and you see we are then significantly short of cap space. ========================================== All this is based on my theory that Morey is not going to allow our cap to fill up with salaries that he can't move out to sign a max free agent in 2016-17. Most of the 2015 free agent class that are max free agents and many of those that aren't max free agents, are going to defer signing longer term contracts and will sign 1+1 deals this summer. The 2016-17 free agent class is going to be L-O-A-D-E-D. And I'm confident Morey wants to go into 2016-17 with max cap space available to add a top tier player....UNLESS HE IS ABLE TO TRADE FOR THAT TOP TIER PLAYER BEFORE THAT, which would mean between now and the 2016 trade deadline, or at the very worst after the 2015-16 season and before the July 2016 moratorium. But it becomes much harder to trade for a player when the other team knows you don't have the cap space to offer him a max free agent contract during the summer. You gotta give up a lot more assets and most times the team that has that player will figure out something else beforehand. Players have options and teams have options. We have to have the ability to create max cap space in an economical fashion without gutting the team in order to attract another free agent here. So I am convinced that Morey is going to guard the cap to leave max cap space available for 2016-17. And that means that if we sign Llull, we most likely won't be able to keep Brewer, UNLESS brewer agrees to a short 1-year deal with us (at probably an inflated rate) rather than a long-term deal. We simply can't keep him on a long-term deal without it infringing on our 2016 cap space or causing us to have to move somebody else out. =============================================== These considerations are why I have proposed that Morey might consider trading Ariza this summer if the right deal can be found. It's a step back to take 2 huge steps forward. Because if Morey knows a max free agent (LaMarcus or Love or Marc Gasol or Jimmy Butler) wants to play here, then it might make more sense to trade Ariza for some sort of draft pick assets and/or non-guaranteed/expiring contracts and signing a max free agent outright instead of trying to orchestrate a sign-and-trade for that player that costs us assets that we could retain while still retaining max cap space for 2016. =============================================== And finally, I remain and will remain unconvinced that Llull is going to come over until he actually signs a Rockets contract. I am convinced at present that Llull is doing all this to get Real to give him a raise. I don't think he's got any intention at all of coming over. And I'd probably trade his rights if I could get some ignorant team to throw me a high second rounder for him.
Cyberx, thanks for the news. Llull would be a great get. You should have your own thread in the dish about other trams rumors. Speaking of rumors, hear anything about LMA? lol
There's no reason to assume that Dwight won't opt out. I thought he and Morrey had a good relationship. Even if he doesn't play at contract level next season he can be reassured to be resigned if he opts out.
Against who? The warriors? They are one of the greatest teams in the history of the game according to the stats and wins. So i wouldnt classify us losing to them as a defesive failure. They are just the better team.
You'll just stated in a report that he's flattered by will stay at Real Madrid. http://piratasdelbasket.net/llull-el-interes-de-houston-quiero-quedarme-en-el-real-madrid/
"I'm flattered that they think highly of me but right now I'm happy in Madrid with a few years left on my contract. Right now I'm focused on Sunday's game." Nothing earth shattering.
