[Official] Cap Q&A (w/ Resident Clutchfans Capologists)

I think that's the correct interpretation.

As far as I remember, the MLE in the CBA goes something like this:

for teams with a salary higher than CAP, they get a MLE
for teams with a salary lower than CAP, the get the larger amount between MLE or the difference, but not both.

 

I wouldn't want "cash contributions" to count against the salary cap, merely added into luxury tax considerations. Ultimately, however, I suppose that it is more a sign of the weakness of pro basketball right now that teams are forced to essentially sell the rights to players in order to simply survive. The NBA badly needs to go to revenue sharing; it is a distant 3rd in American Professional Sports, has several franchises on life-support, and has lost major ground in the court of public opinion because of "Whistle-mania".

Realistically, as long as you keep every team healthy enough so they're not depending on selling players to survive, it's better for the game if bigger teams didn't simply buy up all the young talent. Prospects are inherently very risky and labor intensive. Scouting isn't easy or cheap, and a short-sighted owner or GM who skimps on developing players will save some money in the record books, but will have the team and the league suffer for it. If teams were not able to so easily turn a profit on selling a pick, they might actually have to spend the proper amount of due diligence on their picks rather than treat them as a summertime bonus.

 

you're absolutely right. you either use 5.4 or 5.9 MLE.

let's say you want to sign a fa for 5.9 mil/year. you can't use 5.4 and add 0.5 of your MLE to get the fa and expect you still have part of MLE that can be used in signing other fa. in this case, you have to use full MLE to sign the fa.

 

Great thread. Clutch, is there a way to make this a permanent thread or forum so that it will always be easily acceptable. Thanks, Pete. I've always respected your opinions.

 

Thanks for your explanation...that clears it up quite a bit.

 

I know there are probably a millions scenarios. Can someone explain bird rights, early bird rights? Also what are the ramifications of FA and Restricted FA on Sign and Trade proposals. I posted a response on another thread as an example of what got me wondering:

I think you'll find most S&T players are free agents. S&T won't work for players signed with the MLE. GSW hold early bird rights to Azubuike so they don't need to use the MLE to re-sign him.

 

I thought I'd add this, since I saw it in at least one trade idea earlier today.

See Article #76

By the way...I think this thread really needs to be stickied.

 

While you'll get a much better, more detailed explanation for all of your salary cap questions from Larry Coon's FAQ (site below), I'll take a shot at giving you a short-hand explanation of Bird rights and Early Bird rights.

http://members.cox.net/lmcoon/salarycap.htm

Bird rights: A team holds "Bird rights" (named after Larry Bird) on a player who has either played with that team for three (3) consecutive years or has played under the same contract for three (3) years. A team can sign a player for whom it has Bird rights to a deal (between 1 and 6 years long) without regard to the salary cap. Two examples of this on the Rockets would be Dikembe Mutombo and Bobby Jackson. Deke has played more than three (3) consecutive years with the Rockets. Next summer, Jackson will be coming off a three-year deal that he signed with New Orleans back in 2006. Of course, the Rockets will not likely sign either player to a large deal. But they COULD.

Early Bird rights: A team holds "Early Bird rights" on a player who has played with that team for two (2) years without being waived (but does not apply to first round picks who do not have their third-year options picked up). A team can sign a player for whom it has Early Bird rights to a deal (between 2 and 5 years long) starting at the greater of (a) 175% of that player's prior salary or (b) the average player salary (or MLE). An example of this on the Rockets is Steve Francis. If he is not traded during this season, then next summer the Rockets will have Early Bird rights on Francis, who will have been with the Rockets for 2 years. If Francis manages to come back from injury and have a great season, then the Rockets might want to lock him up to a long term deal. Because Houston will have Early Bird rights to Francis, the team could conceivably sign him to an MLE-sized long-term deal, without having to use the MLE and without regard to the salary cap.

Keep in mind, however, that all player salaries (including those of Bird and Early Bird players) count towards the luxury tax.

 

You have to remember we didn't think we would get Francis when we bought the draft pick. Then Francis fell into our laps and used up the money we were going to use to sign Landry. Combine that with Harris outplaying Landry in the summer league. So then we didn't have much money and were wondering if Landry would last.

I'm just wondering if Landry's agent shot down team option 2nd &/or 3rd years on the contract. I have feeling that is probably what we offered, and Landry's agent said no because he felt they get sign a better deal no matter after 1 year, even if there was no job security. As it turns out he gambled well.

 

He sucked it up in summer leagues iirc. I think they assumed they screwed up with his early play and thought they would save some cap flexibility by only having him guaranteed for 1 year. The worst that could happen was that Landry would be good and they would be have to use a portion or all of the MLE for him.

I think this shows Morey isn't pigheaded and is willing to look at new information to change a decision made on bad information.

 

Actually, Landry played fairly well in summer league last year. It's just that Brooks and Harris put up more garish numbers than Landry. Remember, due to lack of size on the Rockets' summer league team (outside of Kauvlaskas from A&M), Carl was forced to play out of position at center. Even then, he played admirably and was doing a good job setting screens and rebounding.

The combination of the Francis opportunity falling in the Rockets' lap and the Mike James and Luis Scola trades, which also netted the fully guaranteed contracts of Justin Reed and Jackie Butler, respectively, led to Rockets management not wanting to fully guarantee a second year on Landry's contract. With Landry being the first pick of the second round, his agent obviously wanted such a guarantee. If the sheer magnitude of players then under contract led to Landry getting cut in training camp, Morey did not want to be paying Carl in 2008-09, especially not when the team was so close to the luxury tax line (actually OVER at that time).

Plus, just to put a reality check on this BBS, how many of you honestly thought that re-signing Landry would be a problem even 20 games into the regular season? Lay off of Morey and let's get a FAIR deal done with Carl this summer.

 

man don't get why les won't let us over the cap, teams like SA are only like 3 mil over the threshold, its not too much money is it?

 

I assume that you mean the luxury tax, not the salary cap. The Rockets are WAY over the salary cap, much like about 25 NBA teams right now.

Crossing the luxury tax line not only means a 100% tax on every dollar over that line, it also means that the Rockets cannot share in certain league revenues. Otherwise, teams probably wouldn't mind going slightly over the tax line. The dollars add up quickly. I know it sucks, but I don't really blame Les Alexander for being prudent. That being said, Morey has already publicly stated that Les will go over the luxury tax for a true difference maker. Probably for someone like Artest or Maggette, but not for anyone of a lower caliber them those guys.

 

I will take your word for it. I only saw footage from one summer league game. He looked out of place, but that was only one game...and it was summer league so it was more of a guard show.

 

As for Team B, technically, they have the MLE unless they renounce it. In this case, they would have 2.1 mil cap space, and 5.9 MLE. They would probably renounce the MLE so as to be able to offer one player 8 mil. *

As for Team C, you are incorrect.

In the "5.4 under" example, you are correct, although technically, you are never considered to be 5.4 under. The NBA adds in the exceptions for you, and pronounces you over the cap.

Reference: NBA Salary Cap FAQ, #20:

 

Virtually impossible! Unless they convince him to sign that qualifying offer; they could then trade him... maybe if the new team gave him a really great parking space.