He is playing hard ball doesn't want to give up any guaranteed money for freedom, Rockets want to get under the Lux tax by buying him out at a bit less than his guarantee.... Gonna be interesting. DD
How in the world can ANY ROCKETS FAN favor Scottie Pippen?? I honestly think you don't understand what Pippen did. He set the team backwards for YEARS. I can't accept ANYONE WHO THINKS PIPPEN WAS RIGHT. PERIOD. Did you not read Clutch's article???? No. They are all NOT FORMER ROCKETS. Pippen SCREWED THE ROCKETS. You thinking that he did something right makes my blood boil. Could you imagine Harden or Howard QUITING AFTER ONE YEAR AND DEMANDING A TRADE AND TRASHING HIS TEAMMATES IN PUBLIC???
Lawson does not have a team option. He has a non-guaranteed salary for next season if he is waived by June 24th.
You're right. That part of my question was not necessary. Should have just said, we buyout both years, without exercising our option of cancelling the contract for year two.
I would not give up the $$ either. Coming to Houston and giving up that second year basically ruined his career. Yea. Maybe facing the demon of alcohol has really affected him. But, maybe facing that demon AND trying to be a spot up shooter on this team combined just flat was too much for him. He has sucked badly. But, I feel a little bad for him. He came here with hopes of pushing us over the top and has been nothing but a train wreck. Put his shoes on for a minute. You know as a man this has to really affect your confidence and self worth. Not many on here would keep their chin up after this kind of fall a good part of which is what he is asked to do.
A buyout of Lawson is not stretchable because he has no guaranteed salary owed to him next season. Since we would be waiving him during the season all his salary for this session would be counted in this year's cap and apply towards the luxury tax. So the only way to use Lawson to get under the luxury tax limit with his current contact would be to get him to agree to give up basically all his remaining salary for this season, somewhere around $3.2 to $3.4 million. Lawson already gave up a $14 million guarantee for next season that he is probably going to have a difficult time recouping in a new contact. So it's not likely that he'd be willing to give up another $3+ million on this year's salary. Now his contact could be modified and/or extended and there may be a solution in a modification and extension that would both get us close to or under the luxury tax line but I need a greater cap expert to rule on it. I don't feel confident that what I'm suggesting would actually be within the scope of the CBA. My suggestion was to modify Lawson's current contact to remove his remaining guarantee for this season. Then extend him for an additional 2 seasons with a small guarantee in 17-18 that makes up for the salary he would be giving up this season. If this actually is do - able it should make his contract stretchable over 7 seasons. If we gave him 4-5 million guaranteed in that extension then that would amount to a small cap hit of roughly 600-700k over the next 7 seasons. 1. Don't know if this is legal in the CBA. 2. Don't know if Lawson would even accept this arrangement. But it's probably the only possibility. I can't see any way Lawson would accept losing more money to get out of here. He feels shafted already. He has zero incentive to help us get out of the luxury tax since we didn't trade him and he probably has motive to spite us. I think it's much more likely that Jones is waived and picked up by another team than for Lawson to get bought out.
I think this sentiment is ridiculous. He has had plenty of opportunity to 'run the play', but has proven incapable. Perhaps the man needs to be drunk to play good ball? Perhaps it is that JBB is incapable of drawing up a play? Who knows, but to label his failure a result of 'being a spot up shooter' is a poor analysis. Sure, he fails at that aspect, but that isn't the only thing he has been asked to do here, and he has been worse at trying to play his 'normal' game.
According to BasketballInsiders, the 2016/17 salary is non-guaranteed until the day following the final game of the 2016 NBA finals, or the day following the 2016 NBA Draft, whichever is later." Morey is not an idiot.
How does a thread about Ty turn into a Pippen rehash/lecture/history lesson/brutal memory refresher? Wait, I know... EDIT: TL;DR rant came out just from the mention of Pippen. Sorry. Ty has had a MISERABLE year with Houston, but even with his horrible shots and lack of direction, he will never be on the same level as the man who tortured Rockets fans long after his brief stint here. "Tortured" is the correct word, as the mere mention of his name creates a PTSD-like moodswing for the die hard fan in all of us. Personally, I still have images of costly turnovers in Los Angeles and having to watch Kobe Freaking Bryant embarrass a "man" who implied that he was what the Rockets needed to get that 3rd 'ship. I still feel very badly for Charles. He could have made much more money, but his desire to win a ring pushed him into a financial sacrifice. I respect that. It's awful that we invested so much in an AGING Scottie Pippen, but during that time in the league, he was considered one of the premier players with MJ gone (temporarily). While I understand Pippen's frustration with losing in the playoffs, in terms of the general feeling of losing big games, I think he responded while he was still digesting the defeat. He never had really lost like that, and when you're used to winning, you don't always know how to react to an epic disappointment. There's no excuse for his behavior or what he said, but I wonder if Scottie gave himself more time to accept the playoff loss and allowed himself more time to move on, if the Rockets would have gotten another chance to compete the following year. Just something I've wondered... When I read the history between Chuck and Pippen though, it sounds like they had some deep-rooted issues before they were teammates. I forget which publication it was from, but I remember reading about some animosity between the two, possibly stemming from MJ's friendship (at the time) with Charles. Pippen was never a "friendly" guy and he wasn't well-liked by players throughout the league. That makes his time in Houston even more upsetting. As polarizing as Charles could be, he put his ish aside and invited "Big Nose" to come play with himself and the Legend. That was both financial and psychological sacrifice...swallowing your pride in order to achieve what only a small percentage of players experience over the course of a career. I agree with the posters that suggest the Pippen trade set us back. I wonder what other offers were on the table, but because his salary appeared to be so massive back then, maybe it was nearly impossible to get anything close to equal talent in return. That trade seemed lopsided. The ONLY decent piece we got out of that was Walt "The Wizard" Williams. We knew Augmon and Shaw weren't going to stay, but dang, Plastic Man was no slouch and Shaw helped the Lakers win championships. We did get the notoriously bad Kelvin Cato, and THAT destroyed us financially. Someone has the story down better but...didn't he have some amazing PRE-SEASON game (like a triple-double with blocks/rebounds/points...nothing crazy these days) and CD awarded him with a huge extension? That guy was with us for years and never averaged more than 10 points a game. He had terrible hands and got destroyed by opposing forwards and centers. He was great at spending his salary though...you can still youtube a segment of him going through the mall and bringing stuff home to his massive mansion. Orlando HAD to absorb his salary for us to give up Stevie and one of my all-time favorite players, Cuttino Mobley, for TMac. So yeah, if you look at the aftermath of Scottie Pippen's time in a Rockets uniform, he is absolutely the most disgraceful player in Rockets history. Not only was he a dud statistically, but the trade that he forced set the Rockets back for almost a decade. We couldn't make the playoffs, watched our beloved Chuck and Dream decline, went through disappointing (but fun) seasons of IsoBall and had to go through a complete rebuild before being relevant again. I despise Scottie Pippen. Ty Lawson is Mother Teresa in comparison, even with the 4 DUIs. And, I don't think he's going anywhere. From what I've heard, he's doing and saying the right things. He's good in the locker room, JB believes in him (from reports) and we all know that he and James are close. At this juncture in the season, the Rockets need less distractions or chemistry killers. From one Ear, I'd be very, very surprised if Ty wasn't with us going into the playoffs. (Yeah, we're making them. ) ...I'm sick to my stomach after reading about Scottie...it's him or the radiation. I'll blame him. Damn 10-foot-long nose,Black Mamba manhandled,turnovers to Derrick Fisher, DUI in Houston earnin', drunken daughter arrested for PEEING in a hotel lobby havin',JailBlazer leader, no championship after MJ havin' ass. (Lol...players' "roast sessions" coming out in my thoughts)
Thanks for pointing that out. I had read elsewhere that the drop-dead date on Lawson's contract was June 24th...which is still after the season, just not before the draft. Doesn't change the point that a decision about Lawson's deal has to be made by that date or he becomes guaranteed for 16/17.
Thanks for hearing me out, basketballholic. It encouraged me to pull out my complete text of the CBA. In the below, I'm going to try to explain myself using CBA language as used in the Agreement, with citations for you/others to reference. I see what you're saying. You're saying the team and Lawson can only amend the provisions of Compensation Protection for this year, and not next year. That would mean any reductions apply to this Salary Cap Year only. That could be correct. What I'm saying is I'm not so sure about that. The contract covers next year, whether it converts to full Compensation Protection or not, later this year. It doesn't matter if we terminate by negotiating a buyout, it still covers next year. So, the question is: in accordance with Article II, Section 3 (l) (Page 17), are teams and players allowed to amend the provisions in Exhibit 2 of the contract during termination negotiations. Indeed, it seems that is what a buyout is -- amending the provisions of Exhibit 2. And if so, can we amend it to re-add Compensation Protection to next year, whereas normally a buyout reduces protection. At the time of the trade, we amended Exhibit 2 to reduce the Compensation Protection for next year to zero, if terminated within time. So, can we add some back. That's my question. Since the contract covers next year no matter what, there is no stretching needed. Since there is no talk in the CBA for reducing the Base Compensation ($12.4m this year, and $13.2m next year), I am assuming that a buyout is strictly about amending Compensation Protection for Lack of Skill. make sense?
I believe you're suggesting what I suggested in these posts. We need Bima to rule on this idea. I'm not comfortable that it is absolutely possible and would meet all the criteria of the CBA. And even if it does I don't know if it would generate the inexplicable "CIRCUMVENTION" ruling.
I'm not suggesting an extension. Sounds like we are talking about two different things, according to language of the CBA. I'm saying the contract covers next year, now. And asking if we can add Compensation Protection for next year, as part of "agreeing upon provisions [in Exhibit 2] for the purpose of terminating an already-existing Uniform Player Contract." Article II, Section 2 (l). The contract already covers next year. I'm asking, since we already amend Exhibit 2 as part of the trade to reduce Compensation Protection to zero, can we amend it again now to add some protection back. If so, Article VII, Section 7 (d) (4), spells out the pro rata rules, which wold be for this year and next.
