Can't believe all the idiots that want to get rid of Scola. He has shortcomings just like everyone else, but he brings a lot to the team. You're gonna miss him one day
Like Bima said, they're almost undoubtedly high/unattainable, since they were added in by management after the 4/$36 was agreed to. Highly doubt the details will ever come out; tons of players have them, and they generally don't change the contract all that much. Chuck Hayes' final deal with the Rockets was a total mess, from what I recall; absolutely no way of pinning down his cap number from year to year. MLB specifically forbids stat incentives in their contracts, limiting bonuses and vesting years to plate appearances and individual awards (MVP, All-Star appearances, Gold-Gloves). In fact, they're even going to close the loophole that allowed for A-Rod to get paid massive bonuses for each of his record breaking home runs ($6M apiece for getting 660, 714, 755, 762 and 763). The NBA, however, gives broad leeway to performance bonuses and partial-guarantees; anything from individual awards, to the team winning a certain number of games/making the playoffs, to box score stats. The only one that could really come back and bite the Rockets would be minutes played, since that's the only thing that is fairly independent of skill, and might actively hamper the Rockets developing prospects; if Scola's minutes are cut significantly in the next few years in favor of younger prospects, he could easily get the players union to investigate/sue the Rockets. I doubt very much that management would open themselves up to that kind of trouble.
Thanks. I figured it was something based on games played, which meant Scola would most likely qualify since he stays pretty healthy. I didn't know they added on that extra year with the probable high performance milestones so they could use it as an $11M dust chip. Interesting stuff.
No problem. I want to state emphatically though that this is only my conjecture based on publicly available reports, nothing confirmed. Adding in games played/mpg incentives ARE allowed, so it is of course possible that the Rockets have saddled themselves with a bad contract; but if there's been one thing that management has been excellent at so far, it is getting good terms written into contracts, and if they were willing to give Scola an extra year at age 35, I'd expect they know what they're doing.
Dragic doesnt seem to play as well in a back up role. If we do end up keeping him I hope we give him a bigger role.
Yeah, while I do not know this for sure, I THINK (again, just an educated guess based on the very limited information I have) one of the incentives for that final year guarantee is the Rockets winning an NBA title or at least a Western Conference title. Whatever the incentives, I think they are of a nature that the Rockets would gladly pay Scola if they were ever achieved.
I've seen a lot of comments from people pointing out that Kyle Lowry "used to be" a fan favorite. I don't think anyone here hates Kyle Lowry, or undervalues what he's brought to this organization. But ultimately if we want to get out of basketball purgatory we have to prepare ourselves to put our money where our mouth is and support the big moves we beg for after every loss. He is our biggest trade piece, and best chance to move up in the draft if we choose to do so.
That's very interesting; if true, it might actually affect his trade value in 2014, where I would envision him being shopped to a contender ala Antawn Jamison; while a contending team might love to pick up an expiring veteran to play 20mpg off their bench for the stretch run, the offer might get reduced if a team must risk paying a bench player $11M at 35, particularly if they're trying to defend a title, or get back to the finals. Wonder why it's so hard to get info on this? I would think that the Rockets would love to leak this kind of info to the media to make Scola seem like a more attractive trade piece; heck, we had heard about Dampier's deal for ages, and half the justification of Brendan Haywood's deal immediately after signing was that his last year was unguaranteed...
I wouldn't say they were idiots at all.. Scola is declining and you can see the wear and tear this season took out on him... Plus he's not going to get any rest this summer since he will be playing in the Olympics and it's not like he's getting any younger. The problem with most teams is they hold on too some players too long. T_Man
