I think you're probably right about what they'd look to do with Smith. (By the way, both the Rockets' DPE and the Ariza trade exception are NOT large enough to absorb Smith's salary. Everyone keeps getting that wrong.) As for K-Mart, I could see Denver turning around after a Melo trade and packaging K-Mart with one of the "lesser" future first round picks or perhaps a second rounder in order to dump him for lesser salary. Under salary cap rules, the Nuggets could take back as little as $13.16M in salary for him. Counting luxury tax, that kind of trade could save the Nuggets up to $6.78M (or more, if they actually sneak under the luxury tax threshold). For that much money, it may be worth a late first rounder.
Dallas and Orlando make sense, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if Orlando was trying to get a deal to happen right now. Dallas: Stevenson/Butler/Chandler ($27.4M, all expiring) for Anthony/Smith/Harrington ($30M) -->rental move, with Denver shaving $3M now ($6M total after tax) and drop Harrington's deal going forward. Butler isn't a shabby stand in, and they'd probably be able to keep him this summer. But Dallas has to cross their fingers that Anthony openly refuses a Nets extension. Orlando: Anthony for Richardson and a pick as part 1 (saves Denver $3M immediately), Nelson and Brandon Bass for Billups as part 2 (saves Denver another $2.5M this year). It's not much, and I doubt they're going to be real players in this. They'd love an Arenas-Anthony-Howard trio, but they've got scrap to offer. I thought that as well, but a couple folks are saying that we used a TE to get Smith and got a full TE for Ariza...which would be $6.3M and enough to cover Smith.
You know I saw that article and thought Smith made a touch more than our Ariza TE but then I saw on hoopshype that he made slightly less. Not sure which is true but bottom line is the list is small and I doubt there are many takers on that list. And most on that list would be sent into LT land if they took on JR which would double his salary cost. I'd say the odds are less than 50/50 that he's traded for some conditional 2011 2nd round pick (one of those 55th or higher picks). On KMart - Never really thought of it that way. I was thinking of they'd have to take back a bad contract in there somewhere as that is usually the purpose of trading for an expiring (sending out a plus with a minus). But if your plus was getting a pick and your minus was swapping expirings and it didn't send you over in LT land, then I could see them doing that.
Cuban could always make Lala a frontliner for HDNet, it certainly wouldn't be something I'd put past him, and would give her more exposure than she'd ever get even in NY or LA.
I assume you meant Courtney Lee instead of "Smith" there. That is correct (the Rockets used a portion of the Carl Landry trade exception to absorb Lee). But J.R. Smith still makes more ($6.76M) than the amount of the Ariza trade exception ($6.32M). www.shamsports.com is a little better than hoopshype with salary information. According to shamsports, Smith has certain incentives in his contract that, because they are currently classified as "likely", increase his salary cap figure. According to them, the incentives are based on team wins (42) and minutes played (2,000). I don't think it matters whether Smith ACTUALLY hits those incentives for trade purposes this season, though. The fact that they are currently CLASSIFIED as "likely" is what determines his cap figure. This sort of thing happens more than you'd think. For instance, Chuck Hayes's cap figure for 2010-11 went down from $2.33M to $1.97M this summer because of certain incentives in his contract being re-classified as "unlikely".
Frankly, I think that Carmelo Anthony does more harm to his team than good. The guy simply doesn't play defense. He's slow on rotations. He always seems to lose his man. His only redeeming feature is that he averages near 30 points a night. But even that isn't such a 'redeeming feature' when he does it so inefficiently. He isn't a team player. It is a display of ignorance to suggest that Daryl Morey try to get Carmelo Anthony. I suppose we do need somebody to take 'the shot' in the last seconds of a game!
^ The Nuggets do look impressive tonight without him. Beating the Spurs by 9 going into the 4th. [Edit] Jinxed them. Spurs go on a run and take the lead with 6 minutes to go.
