[BimaThug Memorial Thread] The Myth of the Rockets and the McGrady Trade

I think we need to give up a future 1st round pick.

 

Yeah that would work as well

 

First of all, Les Alexander has already spent more than a reasonable amount in order to make the team better: he's hired one of the best coaches in the biz, been buying draft picks AND most important of all funded DM's statistical research. Do you have any idea how much it costs to have state of the art equipment and statistical geeks running around your company? Those guys don't come cheap, I assume the Rocket's R&D budget probably goes into millions of dollars a year already. He pays the luxury tax, and there's a high probablity Les will start cutting corners on other areas which I just mentioned, and frankly I think I'd rather he spend on draft picks and personnel rather than using it to pay for tax.

Secondly, there is no guarantee paying the luxury tax will result in a good team as its quite hard to discern how a player will perform over a certain number of years. Quite often performance drops off once the player gets locked into a contract. Take for example NO's James Posey. When NO signed him for 8 mill, they probably thought they were getting Battier 2.0 as welll as someone who can be their 3rd option after West and Cp3. Fast forward today and they couldn't wait to get rid of the guy. You say that a lot of good teams pay the tax, but only one team becomes a champion every year. Everyone who paid the tax but didn't win the championship just got robbed.

Finally, in my humble opinion the biggest knock in paying the lux tax is it helps everyone else but harms only you, otherwise known as a double whammy. Hypothetically speaking, say Les Alexender and resigns everyone while trading Tmac for AI and Dalembert, putting us 8 mill into lux tax. What happens next?

1) We just paid 20 million for Dalembert (12 mill contract+8 million tax), essentially 10-15 min backup for Yao Ming.
2) We lose out on the pot money teams under the tax get. This money could have gone to buying picks or upgrading personnel instead.
3) We gave everyone under the tax more money to play with. That's right, even the Utah Jazz will be sending the Rockets a thank you card this christmas
4) Its makes resigning the rest of the players more difficult. You think DM can still go to Scola and say "Hey man, I think you're worth 5 million". Scola will roll his eyes and point out that the 15 min. backup C gets 12 million a year, why can't he get as much?

Les Alexander stated that he'll only go over the tax for a really special player, and I agree. Its got to be at the very least Pau Gasol type of player, otherwise its not worth it. The lux tax is like steroids, it might help now, but in a few years you'll end up with man boobs, cancer and a receding hairline.

 

uh...yeah, it's basically what all the other good teams do. well not basically...the Lakers salary is over $90 million this year. it's not just a coincidence that they have one of the league's best teams. all the good organizations have highly paid players, coaches, GM's, scouting departments, etc. it's professional sports - it's been statistically proven, teams that spend more, win more.

good point. we should be happy being the clippers. hey, we're statistically not likely to win it all anyways, so might as not spend much at all and have a crappy team....

at least our owner will be making money....

clearly there's poorly managed teams that also spend money. i guess you could argue that it's the worst case, though as a fan, only because that means it would take longer to improve...not because i care whether or not the owner is overpaying for a bad product. i don't care if les is making money or not, EXCEPT as it relates to his willingness to continue to spend it, which he MUST, in order for the team to be great.

there are very very few teams that win, much less are dominant, without "over-spending"

no, you paid $12.5 million for the backup. the fact that the overall salary of the team is then in the luxury isn't on one player, but one the team as a whole.

Again, it's not that you're paying the luxury tax - you HAVE to (well, okay, it's not a 100% absolutely, but pretty close) if the goal is to win a championship.

Arguing that Dalembert is overpaid (as it relates to his actual contract) and won't help the team that much anyway is a different argument, and one I think does have credit

I think you are caring too much about the owner's pocketbook. Could it prevent those late 1st round or 2nd round pick buys? Maybe. But then again, you're one glaring hole right now is a 10-15 mpg backup TALL center, which Dalembert is (overpaid or not, he'd be effective there, something you are absolutely not guaranteed to get in that pick, and certainly not highly effectively in that pick's early years). Could it prevent you from upgrading personnel? No. Because short of using the MLE, you can't upgrade personnel anyway, and even then, doing so would put you back in the same situation - PAYING the luxury tax, which is apparently what you have the issue with.

Frankly, imo, the types of deals done are done SPECIFICALLY to upgrade personnel - not to prevent you from doing it. Iggy upgrades personnel. Dalembert is a personnel upgrade.

you continue to miss the point. teams that spend more, win more. its statistically correlated. given this, the argument that spending more actually hurts because of a luxury tax which is then split between teams that don't spend a lot isn't actually true. it doesn't hurt you by giving other teams more money. on the contrary, it helps you, by likely helping your team win more. it is factually true that the teams under the cap share in some of the luxury tax, but a team is likely in that position because they DON'T want to spend more money on their team, understanding that means they are less likely to be successful, and will continue to NOT do so in the future, regardless of whether or not they are getting some luxury tax money.

if the Rockets weren't close to a championship, i might agree more, under the theory that Les shouldn't overspend now, should collect profits now, because as the owner he's been over the years, i'd understand that he'd be waiting for the right time in the future (hopefully near future) to turn around and then overspend a bit to field a championship caliber team. The Rockets are not in that position, though.

"Hey Scola, I'm offering you a 5 year deal starting at $6 million a year. Yes, Dalembert is getting paid more than twice that amount for one year, but he is ridiculously overpaid and will be a FA shortly, and things will correct themselves."

Shane is getting paid more than Brooks, Landry, Scola. Nearly everyone is getting paid more than Brooks right now. These players aren't idiots, and nor or their agents - they understand it's a business and sometimes teammates are overpaid.

I don't see this argument, at all.

IMO, Iggy is a Pau Gasol type player. He consistently averages 18+ ppg, 5.5+ rpg, 5+ apg, 1.8+ spg, 0.5+ bpg...and, this year as an exception, has always shot at or above 45%. He's not the best three point shooter, but he is an all around great player. plus, he's just about to turn 26.

in regards to the later part of your statement, i think it would be applicable to some deals, but not all. In the one example being discussed, Dalembert's contract expires the very next offseason. With the Rockets, so does Yao's, Shane's and Carl's. They'd be quickly back down to reasonable spending level if it didn't work...

...though, as I've pointed out repeatedly in this thread now, though, imo the team would be best off (as in on court performance) by once again trying to pick up a bunch of players that make sense.

I clearly think you HAVE to overspend. As such, the best constructed team is likely one that has contracts that stagger, with a few expiring every year, so you can constantly tweak the team through either letting players go, trades, or signing players with exceptions, in addition to draft picks, etc.

 

Great post!

 

Well good job talking outa' your ass

Statiscally proven? For the 2008-09 season:
http://www.nba.com/2009/news/features/art_garcia/07/08/salarycapinfo/index.html
1)Knicks 23 M
2) Dallas 23.6 M
3) Cavs 13.7 M
4) Celtics 8 M
5) Lakers 7.1 M
6) Trail Blazers 5.8 M
7) Suns 4.9 M

Out of the 7 teams who paid the luxury tax last season, only 2 teams have won a championship the past decade, they are the 4rth and 5th place in lux tax players. How does a 29% success rate to a championship sound like a good plan to you? Again only 1 team wins the championship, and every other team who paid the tax just got robbed.

So now every team that doesn't pay the luxury tax are destined for the lottery? Not paying the luxury tax means you have a crappy team? In the West last season 5 out of the 8 teams while in the East 6 out of 8 who made the playoffs didn't pay the tax.

Of course I care that the owner makes money. Making money doesn't mean the owner will spend to win, but I've never heard of an owner who continually loses huge gobs of money yet still spends funds necessary to win a championship. Newsflash: Les Alexander doesn't need to spend a dime more than the league mininum if he doesn't want to, and no way will he be spending extra if he's losing cash big time.

12 teams who made the playoffs last season didn't have to pay the luxury tax, versus 6 who did. How can be there be "very few" good teams when they double the teams who had to pay the tax?

This doesn't even make sense, the sole reason you're paying the luxury tax is you traded for a 12.5$ million backup. If you didn't do the trade you wouldn't pay the tax, how can it be on the team as a whole?

Our glaring hole isn't a backup tall dude, David Andersen is listed at 7 ft and will function as a backup for the forseeable future. Our glaring hole is 70$ M in capspace due to Yao and Tmac. We can upgrade the roster without using the MLE, once Tmac's contract expires we will have 7 million capspace to sign someone. 7 Mill> 5 mill, and we didn't have to pay lux tax to get it

Upgrade over whom? Our backup C who will ideally pay 15 mins tops next year? Sure I'd like an upgrade, but not at 12.5 million not counting lux tax. That's like calling 911 3x because Mcdonald's won't give you Chicken Nuggets

Silly boy, it is not statiscally correlated. Payroll wise the past decade the Knicks and the Blazers have spent more than the Pistons and the other Spurs, yet the Spurs and Pistons are more successful. If winning is correlated to money than money ball means we would be a lottery every time, and yet we're playoff team with only a 30% salary.

 

Leeb, you keep trottin' this out here every chance you get, and I still think you're crazy. Couldn't disagree more, but you already know that.

 

Morey just said in his interview that they have a list of players that they are targeting that they would be willing to take on a significant amount of $$$$ to acquire.

DD

 

Nice.

Hopefully we get that stud SG in the trade (hello Iggy). That way, Ariza can come off the bench with Lowry and Landry.

 

Reported Granger, murphy, Dunleavy deal I do all day long over the Iggy deal. It really seems to have legs now

 

Morey laughed when that "alleged trade" was mentioned and said...no that was not being offered.

DD

 

Did they ask DM about Granger?

 

So what you are saying is there is a chance :grin:

 

This has been a great read, but to me there’s nothing more than speculation just like all the other posts and articles out there. The difference is, a lot of these posts try to stay grounded in the numbers which makes for some infinitely more interesting discussion. My problem with it is there are too many unknown variables. My thought is that each time you make a “round about estimate”, the further from fact we travel (though I appreciate the attempt to try working with objectivity.)

- No one knows yet what the luxury tax threshold will be next year, and “give or take a couple million” could be huge and in the end be the difference between re-signing a player and having to make a tough decision concerning the LT.

- No one knows T-Mac’s true value. We’ll never know what teams are offering or why. Most say T-Mac is just a contract, but we don’t really know if other GM’s think he can get back to form, or if they see him as a person to fill seats (#2 in Western Conference guards shows that he is still popular). Thus, it’s hard to know what Morey will do, because there are 30 parties involved, none of which are showing their hand to the public (well… maybe the Knicks).

- No one knows what Scola and Lowry will demand in free agency. I agree that we most likely value our guys more than other teams do, so the question then is, are other teams going to be throwing a bunch of cash at them? We don’t know what the market demands. We also really don’t know what Scola/Lowry want (playing time, money, security, play for a winner, to start, etc.) or if they are willing to make some personal sacrifices to stay in Houston. Again, each takes a million or two less than the OP numbers and we’re talking a whole new ballgame.

- No one know if the Rockets saying they’ll only pay the tax if they get a “special player” was a smokescreen to prevent all the garbage for T-Mac offers that they were sure to receive as soon as teams thought we were vulnerable and had to get rid of him.

- We know the Rockets said they’d go into tax land for a “special player”, but we don’t know what the Rockets consider a “special player”. Yes, Chris Paul. Yes, LeBron James. These are no-brainers. However, we know Morey is unconventional in his methods and has a history of seeing “special” where others don’t. He may see a very young Iguodala as a “special player who can become a leader and mature along with this young team. We don’t know the parameter’s of special as it pertains to Houston.

- And most obviously, no one knows how willing Les is to go into tax land this year, for how much or for how long. Tax for one year (Dalembert) is a lot different than tax for multiple years (Brand). My guess is it isn’t as black and white as the OP makes it and the willingness to go into tax land is going to be looked at on a deal by deal basis.

Still I’ve been loving the debate in this thread. Keep it up! I’ll go back to lurking now.

 

From what i've heard there are 3 players on the list:

1-Lebron James
2-Lebron James
3-Lebron James

 

I'm just setting you up for heartbreak my man :grin: . Maybe I see further most. I know you get the impression I'm anti-scola which isnt the case. I really appreciate scola's tenacity,ahrd work, the way he gets involved in the game vs some stat whores talking about a guys impact. We know who without mentioning his name too. I just think with landry's play this year and just his improvement in general and if the have the ability to get a guy like iggy, then scola will be lost. Scola is worth a udonis haslem type of contract, but is he worth that to the rockets with the risk of losing landry?

 

No problem. At least I understand where you're coming from, agree or not. DD seems to believe Von Wafer is Jesus. That's harder for me to understand.

 

Like that matters. The speculatation is the fun part.

After last night's clank-a-thon, I sure would like clutch shooter at the starting 2.

 

thanks

so what you're saying is that out of the 7 teams that paid the luxury tax last year, all but the horribly mismanaged Knicks were good teams and all but 2 made the playoffs? And that the team that won it all is one of those teams?

I'm not saying it is an absolute. To win the championship you have to seriously overspend. That's not true.

But what is true, and can be proven through simple statistical experiments (I know, as I did some as calls assignments back in college - 10 years ago now, but still holds) is that teams that spend more, on the whole, win more.

If you just look at the NBA today, and historically, it is true. Even if you look at teams that don't jump out at you immediately - say the Spurs, who didn't considerably overspend yet won a bunch of championships - well they're really the exception to the rule, as they got INSANELY lucky through the draft, acquiring both Tony and Manu as very late picks, who were on very cap friendly deals. Once those cap friendly deals went away, the Spurs payroll jumped, and even with that they have struggled to keep up with the other bigger spenders (Celtics, Lakers, Cavs) of the world. Spurs payroll was only $47 million in 04-05, but jumped to $79 million the next year and has been over $65 million since.

I'm certainly not advocating the Rockets turn into the Knicks. I'm not really even advocating they turn into the Lakers.

I am advocating that YES, the team is closer to champion than it is to lottery bound - if you don't believe that, then you don't believe Yao can come back healthy and a top 5 center, and if you don't believe that than, sure, take a completely different approach. I am advocating that the team may have a unique opportunity to acquire a star level player at the expense of having one of the league's highest salaries for 1 year, when they should be very good anyway.

 

one point here....some still have a misconception that jerseys(and other sales on Rockets related gear) sold means anything to the team.
The amount of jerseys sold has very little effect on the Rockets bottom line since all merchandise sales goes into the league-wide pot known as BRI (basketball related income). Sponsorships and local broadcasting fees do go directly to the Rockets IIRC.