EDIT: I see what you did. You forgot to include the salary holds against the Rockets. The Rockets would have to renounce the rights to Haywood, Lowry, AND Scola under your scenario for them to have that. If you renounce them, they are no longer RFA and can sign with anyone. So it's unrealistic to think you would be able to renounce them AND re-sign them. I think RFA count against the salary cap at double their salary, if I'm not mistaken. So you have to factor in this "hold" when adding up the payroll, unless the Rockets renounce those rights. To sum it up, I wasn't really saying there's a downside to this trade or that I didn't like it. This trade is kind of the low-risk move for Morey.. attempt to pair another big name with Yao, but if Yao can't fully recover or it doesn't work, we can easier hit the restart button. I was more responding about the Haywood argument. He's a nice player, but I can't envision him on the Rockets past this season if we did the trade. The trade would essentially be McGrady for Caron (McGrady-Caron/Haywood), which I'm OK with. A little disappointing, but better production than what we've gotten out of McGrady the past few years.
It'd be Lowry for sure. I think Iggy is a top 25 player definately top 30. We can get by with 4 top 55 players and 3 top 30 players. Last year we had 3 top 30 players and when Tracy went down we was still on cruise controll with Landry and Brooks untill the end when Yao went down. Landry and Brooks qualify as a top 60 players maybe top 50.
Another concept I had no idea existed. Man, this salary cap stuff is complex. Either way, whether Butler puts us over or under the cap, re-signing Lowry/Scola to go with Butler would be easy to do and we wouldn't be near the luxury tax. We couldn't make an impactful signing other than that, but do we need to? We'd at least have the MLE to play with without worry of the LT.
I think the bigger concern would be convincing Washington to do this trade since they're not getting much cap relief. I dont know if TMAC + Buddinger is enough for Butler and an expiring Haywood...
Butler is a top 35-30 player and Iggy top 30-25 player i think Butler is the better fit though both on the court for the system and financially.
Agreed. I'm not sure if I'd want to do a Brooks or Landry for Butler sort of swap. Probably not Brooks, perhaps Landry if we make Scola our long-time PF. Still, if we can keep Brooks/Landry and still acquire Butler, I'm all for it.
Not Landry. Honestly I would not trade Landry straight up for Butler, let alone give them cap flexibility in TMAC. The most I can see Morey give up would be Chase or Lowry. But then that might not be enough....Honestly, unless Morey works his magic, I dont see why Washington trades with us.
Look at Boston during their first year. They had 3 top 25-20 players in their big three and Rondo sneaks in as top 50. Look at Lakers this year. They have 3 top 30 players - one of them top 5, and Odom falls in the 45-50 range so they have 4 top 50 players. This year minus Yao Ming at best we only have 2 top 50 players and they fall at the bottom half in that catagory.
I don't know. I don't know if that team is a contender or not. Caron's going to be 30 years old. He's averaged missing ~19 games a year over the last three seasons. I'm not sure how much faith I have in him to win it all. We also would still have a void at backup center, as I don't think Andersen is a rotation player for a championship team. I think a lot of it depends on what happens this summer. If the Rockets land in the lottery, that could open up a lot of possibilities for them (trade or draft pick). Caron + whatever we do this off season could put us in a position to be that contender. Another factor: what happens when Yao/Caron expire in 2011? Do we restart? Do we sign an aging Caron to a big deal? Did Yao show us enough to warrant trusting him with another big contract? The best thing about this trade is that it gives us flexibility in our ability to hit the restart button. I'm really hoping the Rockets land in the lottery this year, mostly because I know they won't be next year and if they do restart after 2011, at least we'd have a lottery pick to help jump start the process.
Them 2, plus McGrady's expiring would bring us a superstar. But the "top 5 talent" that you speak of is not available so its a moot point.
I don't understand what you're trying to say here. Having Haywood's Bird rights is a NEGATIVE??? Since when has having a player's Bird rights EVER been a negative? Sure, team management may get lured into wanting to overpay that player, but that assumes that team management is stupid. The Rockets have very smart people running their front office. What having Haywood's Bird rights will do is it will give the Rockets MORE OPTIONS. Morey loves having more options. While you may be right and the Rockets probably won't end up signing and trading Haywood, it doesn't mean that the Rockets should completely foreclose the idea of such an option. For example, say that "Team X" has $9M in cap room and wants to sign Haywood and another player as free agents. The other player is demanding a starting salary of at least $5M. Haywood wants a starting salary of $6M, and Team X is willing to pay that, but they don't want to lose out on the other free agent as well. Now, say that Team X also has a player making $2M who Morey and the Rockets kind of like (we'll call him "Player Y"). Well, the Rockets could then agree to sign-and-trade Haywood to a contract with a starting salary of $6M and trade him to Team X in exchange for Player Y. The other team can then absorb Haywood's new salary and still have enough cap room left over to sign its other free agent target. The Rockets only take back $2M in salary (teams can ALWAYS take back less salary in trades) and it's for a player they like who would otherwise be unavailable via free agency. Please, tell me how THAT is a negative. Option, my friend. Options.
You're right, negative was the wrong word to use. I guess neutral would be a better word for what I'm arguing: I still don't see his bird rights benefiting the Rockets in any way. I just don't see a team giving up a cheap piece whose productive in favor of signing a 30 year old center to a deal. The only reason they would SnT with us is because either a) they want to pay him more; or b) they want to give him an additional year. Either way, I don't see a team giving up anything valuable for the option of adding an extra year or extra few million to Haywood's salary. To me, adding Haywood is a moot point, and perhaps negative in the aspect that he might help us win more games this year (cue the people blasting me for wanting a lottery pick.) As I said before, I believe the trade is essentially Caron for McGrady. I don't see the Rockets doing anything with Haywood's contract this offseason. You're right though, bird rights are never a negative thing; it's just another option, one which I feel the Rockets won't use.
Not true. See Larry Coon's Faq http://members.cox.net/lmcoon/salarycap.htm#Q20 esentially if you are 3 million under the cap then the MLE is added to your salary cap and you can sign a player up to the MLE or any other exception that a team posses.
That's fine and all, but you were responding to a post from REEKO_HTOWN where he was simply stating a minor added benefit to a Butler/Haywood package. He was completely correct, and his post added something new to the conversation (which is more than I can say about 90% of the posts on this BBS). No need to go blasting him for raising the issue. (I know, I know, you didn't mean anything by it.) Nothing in his post even suggested that it was a major factor for considering a trade with Washington. Just that it was another positive. And, yes, I will blast you for wanting a lottery pick. The fact remains that, after this recent losing skid, if the Rockets make the playoffs, they'll likely be a pretty low seed. And if the Rockets miss the playoffs, there's almost NO CHANCE they pick higher than #12. (FYI, the chance's of the #12 "slotted" lottery team landing the #1 pick is 0.7%.) So, in a draft that looks to have a drop-off after about the first 9-10 picks, why should the Rockets "tank" to get the #12 pick when they could just go ahead, make the playoffs, have a positive season, be more attractive to free agents this summer, AND still get a pick around #18 or 19?
If Rockets can't make their bilateral move of McGrady for a top 35-30 player by the deadline, then they'll be stuck in medocrity which means winning games, making the playoffs will net you no better then top 20 picks. It will be another 5 years of this making playoffs is not good enough. You have to move McGrady+youth excluding Landry/Brooks for a top 35-30 player and then move Landry/Brooks for a top 15 player to match that '3' top 30 players to have a shot at winning a championship. That is the blue print with most recent championship teams. They was close last year then injuries stepped in the way. All of them except the Pistons of recent have had better then '3' top 30 players, Spurs, Lakers, Celtics. They want the Bosh's without moving Landry/Brooks ain't going to get er done! They want Iggy's without taking on Dalemberts and refuse to move Lowry's. That won't get er done, but this is actually smart. Iggy is a 3rd option who is over paid. Butler is a perfect fit, Martin is a perfect fit. Both have 'bads' with their 'goods' as all three really do. Both Butler and Martin have injury issues and we just went through 5 years of that.
Exactly. As great as it sounds to land a lottery pick this year, the difference in #12 and #18 might be a matter of luck as to which pick lands the better player. There is a cost to having a losing season. There was a time when JVG's Rockets won a pointless late-season game and missed out on Brandon Roy as a result. This year is not 2006. We are not jockeying for the #6 pick. When you weigh all the factors, it makes little sense to favor the draft over winning.
