No... because no one else will pay him the MLE, so we should never be in a situation that we'll have to match. And the market isn't big enough for him to take the qualifying offer and then split (if it was they would be offering money now). Morey isn't the type of GM that will just throw the MLE at guys anyway. I remember someone quoting him in an article saying that the majority of guys on MLE contracts are overpaid. Morey sounds like the type of guy that would rather get a 2 million dollar player at 1 million a year than get a 4 million dollar player at 6 million a year. Which sometimes sucks, but at the same time its nice knowing we will never be the Knicks.
All I want to know is.... Is there a deadline for restricted free agents to be signed? At least then I know how long to expect this Landry situation to drag on.
Okafur for sure since we can't afford JS !!!!! But Damn I like JR Smith the guy can flat out shoot !! So what if he's cancer on the team as long as the Rockets are winning !! Adelman can handle that !!
The fact that Baker won't let Landry go through more tests makes me think he's hiding something, or he really is stupid. If I'm Morey & the team doctors feel he'll be healthy, but I'm not completely sold on his health, I think I'd bump my offer up to a 1st year salary of $2.5 million with a team option after the 1st year & a player option after the 2nd year to see if his agent will bite. This basically comes out to a 3 year $12.0 million contract. I do this because I don't want to lose Landry & I need to act now to have a chance at making a couple of moves on some other players. I'd take the remainder of the MLE (~$3.0 million) & offer it to RFA Chris Quinn (PG) of Miami. This kid looks like a sleeper. He's been in the league for 2 years & put up some serious numbers last year when he started getting starter minutes in the last 2 months of the year. He shot 42% from the field & 40% from 3pt land. His assist to turnover ratio was better than 3:1. His steals rose significantly & he's not a bad rebounder for a PG. Check out this link to his game by game stats. I think he's pretty impressive. The kid looks like he's ready to bust out. http://www.nba.com/playerfile/chris_quinn/game_by_game_stats.html Another player I'd take a look at is Kareem Rush (UFA)(SG). He's a big guard (6'6") with a nice shooting touch that is finally starting to realize his potential. Of course, I wouldn't offer him more than a $1.5-$2.0 million 1st year salary.
What about Wilcox-1yr 6.7m and Wilkins 2yrs @ 3.1m per for Jackson 1yr 6m, Head 1yr 2m, Hayes 3yr @1.9 m and a 2nd rd pick. The Rox let Landry walk and essentially have Wilcox play his spot backing up both spots and wilkins gives the Rox a young atheletic 6'6 swing. At the deadline, they still have wilcox expiring, and francis expiring which still makes them a player at the deadline.
Mo Taylor, Eddie Griffin, Kenny Thomas, Kelvin Cato, blah blah blah.... How quickly people forget how badly we've struggled to fill the PF position over the years with quality players and here we are nickel-and-diming a guy over a couple million. When push comes to shove you need to give him the MLE, if that's what it takes. No, I wouldn't be happy about it but if it prevents him from going overseas and involves us keeping him happy & motivated, sign me up. DD, I see what you're saying and it would be great idea if any decent players out there would actually consider signing for the MLE and/or their ballclubs not matching our offer. Sure, if you gave me the choice of choosing essentially between Landry or Deng, Okafor, Aguodala, Smith and all those other guys it would be a no brainer but there's really no realistic choices up there that would cancel out losing Landry.
I think Morey is waiting for a big move, maybe even if we don't get it this year. The Rox can get that third star via trade, sooner or later, but we have to have money to pay him. If we blow our money beforehand, Morey will have to go into the LT to take back much more salary, and Les won't do that, unless we can get somebody really hot.
There are problems with most of the theories, though interesting. Okafur has a 7 mil qualifying 1 year offer. Then he becomes a free agent. It makes no sense for him to consider a 5.8 mil deal for 1 year which then gets matched and reduces his salary for 1.2 mil over 1 year. Most the other guys like Okafur are 9mil + year players. Josh Smith, Deng, Gordon, Biedrens, Iggy, etc. By inking them to MLEs we are doing their host teams a favor, because they immediately match. Remember both Maggette and Childress got around 10 mil and rebuked MLE or just over MLE offers, keep that in mind as a baseline (most of the above guys are worth more than them). Your overall theory is correct, we could target restricted free agents, sign them, and have time to match Landry if it failed so long as our offer was presented 1st. Oh, and in either of the JR Smith or Sasha case, those team might decide NOT to match based on those prices, and then they could turn around and sign Landry for a 2 year 4 mil year and poof he is gone (we would have to way to match). A player in such a scenario has to be so much better and promising than Landry and that we are willing to pay this guy a whole lot more. A guy I had thought about in this situation earlier this year we might have thought doing this was Sasha. But he reupped with the Lakers at 3year/15mil. JR Smith we could roll out a full MLE, but the Nuggets probably match (they indicate they would), and he isn't exactly a sure fire proven kid in terms of the team game (if they don't match an MLE that also tells you something). Also, the landing of Barry for the LLE makes combo guards or pure SGs roles less clear. Other modestly promosing possibilities to wring free with all or most of the MLE--Delonte West? Dorell Wright? Krstic? Gomez (supposedly he and Minny agree, how much, who knows)? Louis Williams? Potentially overpaying any of the plausible/realistic MLE types (Krstic, West, JRS--I'd say most promising for considering an MLE offer) versus signing Landry at probably a reasonable contract less than an MLE doesn't seem like a sound move. Again, the guy I most thought of in this scenario early in the offseason was Sasha, either make the Lakers pay big and long to keep him, or get a fairly promising 24 year old swingman. But 1), singing Barry made going after a swingman less of an immediate priority, and 2) he signed the other day at around MLE prices for 3 years. I suspect the Lakers would have matched a full MLE anyway--though a side benifit is we could have made them pay a little more and reduce their trade flexibility.
Haha. I was thinking exactly the same thing. We can play Scola, Artest, Chuck and Dorsey who can all play some PF. I LOVE Landry but buh-bye. Sign him for cheap if you can but he isn't worth the risk with two major knee injuries in 3 years.
