thecampster

I already detailed in another thread our cap situation for next season. See Here. Short answer is we have plenty for Millsap and more next season. You can make sense of it here. Trading Dennis for Westbrook is ridiculously stupid as we control Dennis for 2 more years at an average of $4million/season. Next year the Hawks have over $21 million in expiring free agents, with a bump to the cap of $14 million. If Sap opts out, that's another $20 million. Then count the small normal bumps in salary for the remaining players (and the current 3 million in cap space we have) and it works out to about $55 million to spend on free agents. Paul could get up to $35 million next year but won't command that due to age. He will get a 4 year deal for about $100 million assuming he stays healthy and produces this season. That would leave the Hawks in excess of $30 million to flesh out their roster. If you add in the rookie contracts from this year + next year's 1st round pick...we only have about $46 million in contracts next season (not including Paul) with a cap of $108 million (ish).

To clarify...35.2 grams of pot is (according to the all knowing internet), about 60-90 joints. 10.9 grams of ecstasy is 109, 1 stack pills or 36 triple stacks. In other words..he had enough to "distribute". This is not just going away...Scott's case is fairly unique in the NBA and he is facing a long ban and jail time.

Regardless, there is the legal penalty and then the league penalty. The real issue is will the case be done by season's end. If it will just be litigated over the next year, then there is no issue. But legal issues > BB issues. If the trial is going on during the playoffs next season, there is no do-over. Mike really needs to be waived so we can move on. And for you legal eagles saying he isn't going to jail http://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/hawks-mike-scott-faces-up-to-25-years-on-two-felony-drug-charges/ . This isn't like getting caught with a joint. It was 35.2 grams of marijuana and 10.9 grams of ecstasy. Here is a site with a brief history of player suspensions related to drug use. Mike's case (due to the quantity and the arrest) is a bit unique. The NBA policy for DUI comes with a mandatory treatment program, 2nd offense $25,000 fine, 3rd, 5 game ban...etc. But in Scott's case, ecstasy is a whole different ball game.

Because he is more than likely going to jail.

He's the worst for many reasons. Last night he was trying to argue that the guy who scalped a ticket to get into the FT. Bragg game wasn't a bad guy for doing it. Zino is former military and he couldn't understand the concept that an autograph seeker scalping his way into a baseball game meant only for military personnel was no different than stolen honor. The guy is a serious boob.

So I was sitting here last night trying to figure out why in the world the Hawks haven't waived Mike Scott yet or filled our their remaining 3 millionish of space. Then, looking at the roster it kind of hit me. Mike Scott + Tiago Splitter are on expiring deals which with the trade kicker = $11.858 million. When going over the cap, you can take back up to 150% of salary. I'm thinking that regardless of the salary situation, we are keeping these 2 right now for a trade deadline situation. For cap purposes, we could take back $17.78 million in salary. But the trade deadline is 50 games into the season, meaning the actual cap hit would be $3.6 million. I'm thinking Bud is planning to use the first 50 games of the season to further develop Edy/Moose and at the trade deadline move these 2 expiring contracts for a solid player @ $17 million per.

Schröder is less than 7 years experience...his max is currently about $21 million....that $25+ million number you are looking at is for players 7-10 years in the league.

and the estimated salary cap for 2017 is 108 million so you're estimating another $5m to high.

You have 1 to many draft picks in there. They aren't going to go over the cap by $19...but given you dropped 22 million on Haywood, its safe to say that Prince is the starting SF next year (assuming he can).

I was nerding out with spotrac.com and took a look at our 2017 cap situation. Here is how it looks Dwight Howard - $23,500,000 Paul Millsap - $21,472,408 (early opt out). Kent Bazemore - 16,910,112 Walter Tavares - 1,014,146 Malcom Delaney - $905,249 Bembrey, Prince and 2017 1st round draft pick (aproximately $4.5 million). Schröder - $3,824,518 (Qualifying Offer) THj - 3,335,707 (Qualifying Offer) Total - 10 players - 75,462,140 Projected Cap - $108,000,000 Available space - $32,537,860 Okay so things to remember....Dennis will get offers from other teams, so that number is going up. THj will be gone unless he takes a big step forward. Assuming Dennis got a huge $20m next year and THj signs elsewhere, we'd have approximately $19 million to sign players with. If Paul opted out and got the max, that number goes down to $10 million. Either way, at least it looks like we won't suck for some time.

Hmmm....Howard stated that he and Horford are friends??? So the reports that Horford left because he didn't like Dwight were fabrication?

I would argue the torn pec affected Horford mentally as evidenced by the stats showing he's moving farther and farther from the basket.

Howard is not in decline...they are the same age within 6 months. Horford has missed far more games in his career due to injury. Howard's point production going down in Houston was based on shot opportunities/scheme...not a decline. Yes both Howard and Horford and not jumping out of the building like they used to be, but going on PER 48 stats, the two at worst are even.

In 13-14 season...the Hawks were 17-11 with Horford on the floor, 21-33 without. in the 11-12 season....the Hawks were 6-4 with Horford on the floor, 38-34 without. Though to be fair, in the 13-14 season we had a ridiculous number of games lost to injury across many players. Millsap missed 7 games, Korver 13, Teague 5, Lou Williams 25, Antic 34, Scott 10, Jenkins 69. At one point we were starting Brand at Center with Ayon backing him up and pretty much Mack the backup SG. So you can't blame Horford for the 12 games under .500 record.

So doing a bit more digging on this "comparison". I went to 82games.com and pulled up some differentials between Dwight and Al last year. The interesting comparison is at the center position only. Dwight posted a per 48 PER of 21.2 and his opponent a PER of 17.9 for a differential of 3.3. At Center, Al posted a PER of 21.0 but his opponent a PER of 19.4 for a differential of only 1.6. Al's differential at the PF position was a whopping 7.4 which is what inflated his win shares.

Basketball is such a simple game. The average fan loves the dunks, weak side blocks, but go back and watch Stockton and Malone make an entire team of scrubs better. If it weren't for Jordan, Pippen and Hakeem....my bet is on Utah to have won 2 or 3 titles in those days. The 1998 Jazz gave the Bulls all they could handle, eventually losing 4-2. Simple basketball never goes out of style. The key this year is health and Dennis. Think of the numbers Dennis was putting up with the second unit.

<--- my take. Starting point guard - marginally better with Dennis Starting SG/SF - Baze 1 year older = better, Korver 1 year older = worse...so same. Starting PF - Millsap next to a true center = marginally better. Starting Center - Better. Backup PG - substantially worse. Backup SG/SF - Unknown Backup PF - Unknown Backup Center - as constructed, a healthy Splitter/Edy > last year. Since the starters play 3/4 of the minutes, I am going to say we are marginally better overall.

AHEM! You mean Softman don't you?

That isn't cap space, that's LT space.

Don't get crazy about this quite yet. The warriors (with the KD signing) currently have 101,967,679 million in salary. What this means is that in order for them to sign KD outright, they need to clear 7,800,000 in salary. But wait, there's more. They only have 9 roster slots filled...so add 1.5 million to that in min slot holds for 9.3 million to clear. But wait, there's more. They also have cap holds on the following players: Harrison Barnes, Marreese Speights, Festus Ezeli, Leandro Barbosa, Jermaine O'Neal, Ian Clark, James McAdoo, Brandon Rush, Ognjen Kuzmic, Anderson Varejao, Damian Jones. Of those, Damian Jones is a draft pick...add the difference back into their salary...They now need to clear a full 10 million and they can't sign any of their holds, if they do, the salary they need to clear goes up. Now the logical player to clear is Andrew Bogut and his 12.68 million cap figure. However, that would leave Golden State without a true center or true power forward on the roster and no cap space to sign one. Therefore, the next logical waive is Andre Iguodola. So at bare minimum, the warriors lose Barbosa, Iggy, Banes, Ezeli, Speights, Rush, Varejao in order to sign KD. They'll be playing KD at PF or Green. The team is going to get killed on the boards and in the second unit.

I am a bit confused by his article...not that he's wrong but I think he said it a bit too quick. Trading Teague for incoming contracts does not "give us space". Trading Horford for incoming contracts does not give us additional space. Space is a fixed number, and in the end of it all is calculated by total salaries, holds and kickers. The current state of the roster not including holds is 91 million...no amount of trickery will change that. The only way to lessen the current cap is to remove current players. Now using sign and trades we can bring in additional salary on top of the cap and in Al's case, the full $25 million of his salary. But that would put us $21 million over the cap and that's a luxury tax land you don't want to live in (every dollar over the cap costs another $3.75 in tax....ie...21 million over is close to $80 million.....more next year). Staying with $5 million of the cap is the only financially responsible long term answer in regards to the flexibility to resign Sap/Dennis. The no-brainer move here is Scott has to go and to use that space to sign people straight up...the only reason it hasn't been done is to provide a waive capable contract to another team as a kicker. But that needs to be done in the next 5 days.

That is not cap money because the player never counted against our cap. The reasons teams buy 2nd round draft picks is to lock the player (once they join the team) into the bargain basement rookie salary for 2 years. This is less than a vet minimum and far less than spending on things like the MLE. Let me explain it this way. $94 million cap / 15 players = 6.27 million per player. ($94 million in cap - 3 players >$20 million)/12 = 2.83 million per bench player x12 ($94 million cap - 2 2nd round picks /13 players) = 7.1 million per player. (94 million cap - 2 2nd round picks - 3 players >$20 million )= 3.3 million per bench player. NBA rotations are 10 deep...8-9 + injury replacement. The last 5 guys on the roster have a couple of jobs....practice opponent, garbage time, night off for veterans. Those 5 guys typically earn the vet minimum (1 million a season) to the MLE (5 million a season). The average salaries for those jokers are about $2.5 million. Teams like Cleveland who are over the LT by a lot desperately need to reduce salary without giving up their core. The current salary of the Cavs is $113 million and they exceeded the cap last year making them repeat offenders. The LT is tiered by $5 million increments. First 5 million = $1.50 tax per $1 spent over, with repeat offenders paying $2.50. Next 5 million is $1.75 and $2.75. $10m to $15m over is $2.50 and $3.50. And the $15m to $20m over is $3.25 and $4.25 per $1 spent over. From there add 50 cents per 5 million more over you are. So in the case of the Cavs who are currently $19 million over the cap and repeat offenders, they are spending $4.25 for every 1 dollar spent over. Their 19 million in LT is costing them a tax of $80 million dollars this year. For ever 1 million you reduce you save an additional 4.25 million. So Buying a second rounder for 2.5 million that allows you to swap a 2.5 million veteran for a $500,000 rookie for 2 years is an annual cap savings of $2 million and an annual LT savings of 8.5 million. Buying the Hawks second rounder (if he gets a roster spot) saves the Cavs $18.5 million dollars in salary (but not cap). For teams like the Hawks who are under the cap or nearing the cap, those contracts are actually bad. The minimum team salary is $84.29 million. For a team that is vastly under the cap (a rebuilding team), a $500,000 contract means they'll have to overpay for someone at some point. This is why you are seeing free agents priced out of the market right now. Most NBA teams last year had salaries between 65 and 70 million. By jumping the Salary cap by 24 million, they also moved the minimum bar up 21.6 million. Each team not over the cap needed to up their team salaries by as much as 20 million + free agents lost. Teams who miss the minimum salary are charged a surcharge and the money is distributed equally among the team's member. So there is no benefit to being a cheap team. So back to topic. Cleveland bought the 2nd rounder because they were shedding salary and avoiding as much of the LT as they can while keeping their core together. The Hawks sold it because they were already under the cap with a near full roster and would rather have a vet in that slot. The sale is cap neutral because it never posed a hold and didn't touch salaries. Cap = active salary and holds...not actual money. As a side note, this is one of the reasons you aren't seeing the Hawks waive Mike Scott or trade Splitter/Korver/Sefalosha/THj yet. Until they have a deal in place to sign a free agent, those players in question keep the Hawks above the new minimum salary of 84 million (we are 7 million above it right now). Giving away Splitter and waiving Scott for nothing gives a potential free agent leverage because they know we have to be over then min.

You would think that....but between 2007 and 2011, long before Hack a crappy FT shooter strategy started...Dwight had between 9.1 and 11.7 FTAs every season for 5 years. The career averages I posted were skewed down heavily by his 1st two seasons in Orlando and his last 2 seasons in Houston. Some basic math. A good shooter in the NBA shoots 50%, a good 3pt shooter shoots at least 33%. Each percentage works out to 1 point per possession. A foul while shooting works out to 2 foul shots. shooting 50% from the free throw line is equivalent to the typical NBA possession. Dwight shoots almost 60% from the field for his career. So technically, fouling him is a better points per possession against Dwight. Shooting he's worth 1.2 points per possessions, FT's he's worth 1 point per possession. Now the problem with this strategy is that on possession where the foul yields an and 1. The Al vs Dwight argument is that Al yields less than 1 and-1 per game. Dwight = 3 or 4. The free throws in those cases are bonus chances to score. The better shooting percentages + the greater and-1 opportunities more than makes up for the bad FT shooting.

The easy answer to this question is Paul Millsap. The constant double teams on Dwight and PnR defense help against Dennis means more opportunities for Millsap to go to the basket. I can see Paul's stats across the board (except rebounds) going up. I mean seriously, being on the floor with Dwight Howard made Brandon Bass look like Charles Barkley.

In their careers, Dwight averaged 9 more games played per season that Horford....IE..Horford = more fragile.