we need to put all our eggs in the marc gasol basket. overpay him. he will not only serve as a great center for us, he would also serve as the "center"-piece (pun intended) for any blockbuster trade we do. *cough* dwight howard *cough*
For the millionth time: STOP DREAMING ABOUT GETTING MARC GASOL. The following facts preclude it: --Gasol is a RESTRICTED free agent, and Memphis has made it abundantly clear that it will match ANY offer for Gasol. --The new CBA is likely to include an amnesty clause, so Memphis can lessen the burden of overpaying Gasol by waiving another player (perhaps even Mike Conley, whose extension is just NOW kicking in). --The Rockets themselves eased the burden of re-signing Gasol by taking Hasheem Thabeet (and his $5M+ salary for this season) off their hands (although, in fairness to Daryl Morey, they probably could have dumped Thabeet on a number of teams willing to take a flyer on him; and the Rockets might as well have been that team). --Assuming that the Rockets offered Gasol a salary that was SO ludicrous that Memphis doesn't match, Houston's cap situation would be screwed up for the next 5 years. People need to just forget about top restricted free agents like Marc Gasol and DeAndre Jordan, and instead just focus on either getting Nene (an UNrestricted free agent whose team just lost 3 rotation players to China for most/all of next season) or a lower level free agent. Frankly, though, other than Nene (and maybe a guy like Dalembert), I don't see any free agent out there who the Rockets can REALISTICALLY get and who is clearly better than Chuck Hayes, a well-tutored Thabeet and maybe even Marcus Cousin. Their top (highly condensed) offseason priorities should be (1) pursue Nene at a reasonable salary; (2) re-sign Hayes to a reasonable new deal; and/or (3) seek to improve via trade.
Exactly. The only hope for getting a guy like Nene is if (a) the Rockets amnesty cut Thabeet; (b) Nene is so disgusted by the situation in Denver that he doesn't want to re-sign there; and (c) he likes the situation in Houston so much for himself (on and off the court) that he's willing to sign at a reasonable salary.
You're reaching. I've read that Memphis will not match if Gasol doesn't want to be there. You are also ignoring the sweetheart deal we gave Memphis for Battier. They very easily could of said "Hey loan us Battier for this run" and if Gasol wants to bolt, we will try and direct him to you.
I'm thinking it'd be kind of cool to get a good one, but beyond that, how can you speculate about anything like free agency when we're in the middle of a lockout?
If there's an amnesty clause, what would the Rockets do with it? Edit: ooops, missed your earlier post... so we would cut Thabeet?
Of course Memphis is going to say that. Every team says that about all of their RFAs. If the offer is out of their reach, and given Memphis' salary commitments, then I can definitely see them not matching. First of all, we have no clue if there is going to be an amnesty clause, and what it would even look like if it does happen. There could very well be a rule in there saying you can't resign players that you cut via amnesty. That being said, no team is going to amnesty someone just for the sake of using it. They gave Conley an extension because they want him to be a part of their future. I doubt they would amnesty him if it meant not being able to resign him. I just said overpay. Not "Rashard Lewis" overpay. We just need to offer him a contract that is a little over his value, and out of reach for Memphis to match. As lars mentioned, there have been a few reports floating around that Marc doesn't want to stay in Memphis. If a free agent doesn't want to play somewhere, restricted or not, they will let that be known and won't be re-signed.
Nene was offered a $12.5M/year contract extension, which he turned down. I know we could offer something in that range or slightly higher if we amnesty cut Thabeet, but don't forget about Indy and NJ. They have less payroll than us to begin with, and if they also cut Posey/Outlaw, they can offer him more, plus the ability to play his preferred PF position. If we sign a free agent center it will be Sammy Dalembert. I don’t know what the new cap rules will be, but we should be able to offer him more than MLE money, which is the most teams like Miami and NY can offer. I don’t really like Dalembert, but I wouldn’t mind him for slightly above MLE type money.
I think we need to wait on the CBA and see how it all shakes out and if there are some amnesty cuts before we answer this question. DD
I’ve read that stuff about Memphis not matching for Gasol if he doesn’t want to stay, but like Bima says, it doesn’t make much sense. After their first playoff berth in years and playoff series win EVER, I don’t think they’d just let Marc go for nothing. If the luxury tax got really harsh under the new CBA, they’d probably just trade Gay for cap relief and some good picks over losing Gasol. The center position is just so important and also such a scarce commodity right now (which we all know too well).
Me too, I just wonder where we can get a Center (assuming we can't get Howard) Cousins is probably untradeable, if the Suns get rid of Nash, we might be able to land Gortat, although I don't know if Morey considers Gortat worth the contract he has, he certainly didn't think so when he was an FA. If Howard goes to the Nets (as an FA), maybe we can get Brook Lopez for Martin or Scola, I think both Lee and Patterson could step up and fill the void left by a trade of one of those two.
Gasol, Chandler and Jordan will be too hard to get. They were all pivotal to their clubs success last season and is oonsidered almost untouchable by their clubs. So there is no way they are going to just let them go. NeNe is the most likely to play somewhere else. He wasnt very happy with Denver. If not him, that leaves us Dalembert. I really dont want to see Hayes play the 5 again. And I don't want to see Thabeet and Hill play there either.
Good point, DD. I forgot to add that as a viable option. Agree with just about everything here, except that I would much rather pay Chuck Hayes a reasonable (sub-MLE) salary than to pay Samuel Dalembert above the MLE to be the Rockets' starting center. Sure, Dalembert is a better shot-blocker and defensive rebounder than Chuck; but I just think Chuck's all-around game is at least on par with Dalembert's. He's a better man defender. He's a much better passer. He's got a higher BBIQ. I'm not saying that Chuck is some All-Star or anything. Just that he's close enough in talent to Dalembert that I'd rather keep him and wait for something better to come along than to blow my wad on Dalembert at the expense of having more cap room in 2012.
