thecampster

For the last time. The Hawks will not offer JJ the max or the deal would be done. there would be no reason to do the free agency thing. We offered 4 years 60 million last year. Why would we lowball by 59 million dollars if we were going to shell out the max contract in the end. There is no reason to play this game. JJ is gone, deal with it.

You would not see that kind of trade without Mike Bibby being involved. Bibby has to go in any scenario that would make this team move Josh Smith. Like it or not, Josh Smith sells tickets. Owners don't trade players that sell tickets without dumping salary in the process. Additionally, there is a whole lot of offense to replace when you drop crawford and Smith from the roster. Chris Paul alone does not make that up. That starting lineup can not reliably shoot the 3 because only Horford would command a double team inside. Other than Paul, teams would play man zone and stop almost all penetration.

You know what, that just stands to explain how confusing this is. I completely forgot that when figuring it. And Hawksfanatic is right, we really wouldn't have that money which was the point of me saying "IF". JJ would have to walk and we'd have to sign Chillz on the cheap to even have cap space at all which at that low amount is really none. I just get frustrated when I keep reading what we should have done or should do. There is no room to do it and more importantly, the crowd screaming "sign JJ or else" doesn't realize the situation that puts the team in. They already have reasonable contracts on a few players and a few more are either coming off the book or are very tradeable in the next 2 seasons. But if you pay JJ 17 million a season, added to the money you will be giving Horford and adding in Josh Smith and Marvin's salary....none of those 3 are going anywhere....then you are saying this is our team for 4 years. Marvin, Josh, Al will be making a combined 33-35 million within 2 years. Add 17 million for JJ and there is no room for anyone else. Signing JJ to a max contract will handcuff the franchise for 3-5 years. Marvin isn't going anywhere is a big part of that. Love him or hate him, he makes a reasonable salary if producing, but not if he's not. If Marvin produces we hold on to him, if he doesn't, no one will want him. Josh Smith is not a tradeable commodity. He's too valuable when you consider his salary. You will never get equal value back for him. Players that produce what he does, don't make 10.8 a year, they are near max players. We all know Horford is a must keep player. So these 3 players are your franchise right now. They will hold 30+ million in Salary by the 2012 season...if you give Joe the max, you won't be able to sign/bring in another star level player without hitting the luxury tax. You are settling for above average but not great play.

Ton of talking about what we can do in a few days. I'm hoping to clear that up right now. Salary Cap - 57.7 million Josh Smith - 11.6 million J Crawford - 10.08 million M Williams - 6.7 million Mike Bibby - 5.56 million Z Pachulia - 4.25 million A Horford - 5.45 million M Evans - 2.5 million Total - 47.63 million. Space remaining 10.07 million Cap holds JJ - 14.976 million Childress - 10.89 million Jordan Crawford - .85 million empty roster spots 5 - 5x$473k = 2.36 million Assuming the rookie signs and plays (why wouldn't he?) and assuming Chillz resigns at about 5 million (his worth) which would clear his cap hold. Assuming Joe walks for nothing (clearing his cap hold once he signs elsewhere). that would put us at 47.63 + .85 + 5 + (3x473k) = 54.899 million. Leaving us 2.8 million to sign free agents. For each player signed, a 473k credit goes back toward the cap. If Chillz isn't signed or signed and traded, his cap hold eats up the rest of the cap. Regardless of what happens, We need to offer an extension to Al next year or the year after and therefore can not handcuff ourselves with salary. Now this is where it gets tricky. Assuming we resign Joe, it's going to be for 16.5 million the first year. This would undoubtedly push the Hawks with their other roster adds into the luxury tax. Before last season started, Joe was offered 4 years, 60 million dollars. His max value is 6 years 119. The teams are starting 59 million apart when negotiating. This is not a small number. Joe is leaving, get used to it. You can not bridge a 59 million dollar gap when other teams are willing to offer him the max. The only answer here is to sign and trade him to get cap value back but we don't want more than 10 million in cap value back because we need to avoid the luxury tax threshhold. So looking at it from a business standpoint, your 3 highest paid players right now are JS, MW, JC. The simple fact is that Jamal is getting paid starter money and needs to start. Bibby as your 4th highest paid starter is not producing and needs to be traded. Marvin Williams needs to step up and put up starter numbers. 10 million comes off the books next year with Jamal and Evans being FA, Bibby can be traded as an expiring contract. Quit trying to trade Marvin as his production is not worth the future cap hit to most contending teams. Only a rebuilder could afford to take him on.

Childress to Washington would have been realistic except Blatchey opted for surgery....McGee is much more needed now. Salmon is going to sign as a leftover prize for someone who loses out on the elite players in FA at 6-8 million. We can't afford him without Cap gymnastics. Sorry but this doesn't work. I'll be posting a new thread here soon talking about the cap. Check for that.

I've been trying not to start a new thread on this but anyone expecting JJ back in the ATL next year is fooling themself. We offered JJ 60 million over 4 years. That is 59 million dollars less than he can get in a 6 year deal in a sign and trade right now. Should that sign and trade be to a state without state taxes, that is an additional savings of about 7.5 million. It is in Johnson's best interest to leave Atlanta. The ownership group is not going to pay him 119 million for 6 years. Another team will. In the world of negotiating, we are $59 million apart to start with. The only reason to move on JJ's part is giving a hometown discount. He already burned that bridge with the fans. JJ is gone. Best to start deciding how to get the most out of him being gone.

What you want is Josh to share time between the 3 and the 4. You do not want him to be a 3 full time, but as the 3 he presents matchup problems for opposing 3's. He is just too strong for them to stop while moving toward the basket. He will draw fouls and force the opposing teams bigs to step out and stop his drives, cuts, posts. This is why Lebron is so successful. He is a handful for all opposing 3's.

okay...that is a better answer. So they don't have the room today but are hoping to have it soon....cool and thanks.

NO that is not correct. 29. Can a team sign all the free agents it wants (up to the cap limit) and THEN re-sign its own free agents using the Bird exception? Yes, but there's a restriction. A team's free agents continue to count as team salary (against the salary cap). This charge is called the "free agent amount." So there may not be enough money under the cap to sign another team's free agent, because the team's own free agents are taking up all their cap room. ( Source: http://members.cox.net/lmcoon/salarycap.htm#Q29 ) So in the case of wade his option year salary of 17million counts against the cap until he signs with another team and his current team. I know that is not allowed. I'm trying to figure out if I'm calculating the salaries wrong.

So I did the math. They have 4 players under contract right now. DWade (player opt out) - $17,149,243 Michael Beasley - $4,962,240 James Jones - $4,640,000 Mario Chalmers - $847,000 That's 10.4 million without Wade, 27.5 million with him. Cap is 57.7 million. Since they only have 4 players signed there is an 8 player penalty pf 473,604x8 for $3.788,832. So even with Wade signed, the actual free space for Miami as far as I can tell is about 26.4 million (granted 2 players signed refunds 2x473,604 to that so closer to 27.3 million available). Am I missing something? That doesn't seem like enough to sign both Lebron and Joe or any other 2 free agents. One would get 17 million per and the other about 10. Then the roster gets filled with vet minimum vets and their 4 draft picks. Those draft picks are all second round and would cost against the cap since they are drafted (owned by the team) no matter what order they are signed. Someone who knows for sure please help with this math.

That is correct. Sorry. On another note, I also mistated the Knicks cap situation. since they now have only 6 committed contracts, there is a 6 player rookie minimum cap hold in effect. It's a little less than 3 million. So technically speaking their current cap situation is 21.7 million, not 18.7 million. With each player signed, they get a reduction of the cap hold by 1 mimimum rookie contract. What that means is if they sign Amare first at 18 mil first year like they would be capable of doing, That would be a cap of 39.2 charge leaving them 18.5 million to sign. If they signed JJ for 16.5 first year that leaves them 2 million to sign new players. However if they signed Lee for 10 million first year, that still counts against the cap and would only leave them about 7 million for JJ. Same song, different verse, because the players are signed in the same year and Lee's contract alone doesn't put them over the cap, it counts like any other player signing. They don't have enough money to sign all 3.

I went over this in another thread. The Knicks will not be able to afford all 3 (Amare, JJ, David Lee). They will be about 5 million short.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/7083521.html Houston Chronicle

FYI, no problem. The numbers may be off a bit. Couldn't find an exact on the maximum salary for this year for a 9 year player so added 250 thousand to last years and pretended. That article is pretty insane by the way. Over 100 questions to clear up the salary cap.

Because free agent is a relative term when discussing the NBA salary rules structure and bird rights. JJ may not technically belong to the Hawks but JJ's earning potential is directly tied to the Hawks. No player leaves money on the table and playing nice with a sign and trade will get JJ a 6th year and a little more per year. Think Speedy Claxton. When Speedy signed his last deal, do you really think he thought he'd be out of the league in a few short years? No he did not. Nothing is guaranteed in the league of blown out knees. You have to get as much money as you can each contract. MrHonline did a write up about 7 weeks ago on the amount of money JJ loses if he goes 5 years as opposed to 6 and it was huge...like 30 million. The basics of it are covered in this link, question 80. http://members.cox.net/lmcoon/salarycap.htm 80. Why would teams or players want to do a sign-and-trade? Teams benefit because it allows them to get something in return for players they would otherwise lose to free agency. Players benefit because they can get a richer contract, and/or play for a team that is over the salary cap and otherwise wouldn't be able to afford them. Unlike the new team, the player's original team can use the various Bird exceptions (as long as the player qualifies) to sign the player without regard to the cap. Also, if the player's original team has full Bird rights, they can offer the player larger raises (10.5%, as opposed to 8%) and more seasons (six, as opposed to five -- see question number 46 for more information). So sign-and-trade is a useful tool for teams that are capped-out and unable to offer players large contracts. Question number 46 is as follows: 46. Is there a limit to the length of a contract or the raise a player can receive? Yes, but it depends on the type of contract: Type of contract Maximum years Maximum raise Notes Larry Bird exception 6 10.5% See question number 19 Early Bird exception 5 10.5% See question number 19 First round draft pick 2 plus 2 option years Defined in salary scale See question number 41 Certain restricted free agents 5 Can have a substantial raise in year 3 See question number 37 Extensions 6 (including remaining seasons of current contract) 10.5% of the salary in the last season of the contract being extended. See question number 51 Other 5 8% Some exceptions have a shorter maximum length. See question number 19 Incidentally, raises take effect July 1 of each year. So using fuzzy math. The knicks offer JJ the max for 5 years. The first year salary would be about 16.5 million. 2nd - $17,820,000, 3rd - $19,245,600, 4th - $20,785,248 and 5th - $22,448,067. Ffor a grand total of $96,798,915 for a total contract. The Hawks sign JJ and trade him to the Knicks for a 6 year deal. First year 16.5 million. 2nd $18232500, 3rd - $20,146,912, 4th - $22,262,338, 5th - 24,599,884, 6th - $27,182,871. For a grand total of $128,924,505 or $32.1 million more. That sir is why JJ would want the Hawks to work out a sign and trade because you can bet your left butt cheek that the ASG is not paying that joker $129 million dollars over 6 years to choke in the post season. And by the way, for all you guys screaming we need to resign JJ, that will most probably be the cost. Do you really want to resign the choke artist at a cost of $129 million over 6 years?

no, totally cool. I'm by no means an expert on any of this but from everything I've heard, double SNT's could be used repeatedly this offseason. There are too many names and double snt is too helpful in cap manipulation right not to not be used. These players want that last year to get the bigger up front and the longer security going into labor troubles. It's a big deal. Plus most of the sites putting up cap numbers are not accurate as they are not listing rookie and RFA cap holds (like our cap hold for Chillz and the new rookie).

OH no they can't. The cap for this season is set at 57.7 million. They have currently under contract $18,637, 293 (source: http://hoopshype.com/salaries/new_york.htm) That leaves them $39 million. Lee's contract has to come off the books first. Even if he signs 3rd, since they are under the cap, they must count Lee's salary under the cap and the new player salaries will have to fit under the cap. Assuming both JJ and Amare signed for 17 million each, that's $34 million. That would only leave them $5 million for Lee. Per NBA rules, you can go over the cap to sign your own player. But for accounting purposes, that players contract is counted before the signing of othe team's free agents. Option 1: Lee signs a 1 year deal non qualifying offer. Highly unlikely, with the addition of 2 big name players, Lee's production will go down and negatively affect his value. Option 2: Lee signs a multiyear extension for 9 million per season starting. If he does this, the accounting brings the team salary to 27.7 million, leaving 30 million to sign free agents. This leaves the Knicks with only 30 million to sign 2 big name free agents or about 15 million a piece and at only 5 years. Highly unlikely they get 2 players and this leaves them no one on the roster as only vet minimums can be signed after that. Option 3: Lee signs a multiyear extension as above but to get the 2 players mentioned signed, the Knicks have to find a taker for Eddy Curry's one year salary of 11.3 million meaning they have to fork up probably 2 lottery protected firsts. Option 4: The Knicks find a way to dump Curry on another team packaging their other talent and or double sign and trading their FA's. Option 5: David Lee gets a 10 million dollar per year, 5 year offer to play alongside Lebron/Wade in Miami where there are no state income taxes. New York decides not to match to give themselves cap flexibility next year. Option 6: The Knicks sign and trade David Lee to one of the teams they are stealing a free agent from, sign and trade Duhon to one of the teams they are stealing the other free agent from and add incentives for one of the other team to take Curry off their hands so they have enough money to sign Bosh to play along side Amare and JJ. If I were the Knicks and I could make this happen, this is where I'd be working towards. Remember that a big expiring contract like Curry's will be important in the possible Carmelo sweepstakes next year.

and you can not honestly believe Lee is staying, can you? You can not sign your own player retro to other signings and get the credits under the cap. If they sign Amare and Johnson first, then sign Lee...Lee can only be signed for the difference between the cap and their new salaries. Your own players take precedence....it does not matter what order they sign in. If Lee is offered 10 million by another squad (very likely) and NY matches...it counts against the cap pre signing of JJ and Amare thereby limiting what you can offer those 2 players. They have to deal with Lee first if that's the case. Lee will command as much as 60% a max deal in this market and they wont' be able to bring him and others back at that price. The Knicks are hamstrung by Eddy Curry's contract.

Again. I said possible, not probable. JJ holds all the cards and every major free agency player has roster drops that can be signed back. In any normal year this would be out of the question. But with the total number of free agents and teams/players considering this a make or break year, all things are on the table. It may not happen with JJ but take the top 10 free agents. One of them will be involved in a double snt, mark it down. JJ is a prime candidate because his old team is going to be over the cap. Once the major players in free agency commit all their green to the few top level players out there, the leftover players (ie Duhon for ex) will only be allowed to sign for vet minimums/exception deals. It is in their best interest to play nice in the double snt scenario as it will net them more money. The bottom line is there is no excuse not to get value for Johnson. He is going to a team under the cap, capable of adding additional talent as long as money is right, that will have non tenured/willing players to work with. Answering your question, yes....the incentive to sign and trade is for JJ to get his 6th year which is much more money up front. JJ is most likely to sign with the team that can get him 6 years and that requires a sign and trade.

Wrong....dead wrong. Any player that is signable by the knicks that was on their roster last year is signable and tradeable to us in them taking on JJ. On that list is: Tracy McGrady David Lee Al Harrington Chris Duhon Eddie House Sergio Rodriguez JR Giddens Jonathan Bender Any and or all of those players could be signed and returned to us in signing and trading JJ to the Knicks. The incentive to the Knicks is that in signing and trading for JJ they can give him the extra year and insure his signing. The Player they sign and trade to us would do it because it would increase what we could off them to play for a winner. If JJ is signed for 17 million, we can take back up to that amount in signing and trading him away. David Lee and Chris Duhon for a total of 10 million would look really nice to get for JJ walking. Yes that is possible. I wrote a lengthy writeup about this about 5 days ago.

Far more often this season Horford, Josh, Crawford were better and won us ballgames. I would say JJ was the second best player on the floor 2/3rds of the games last season.

I got castigated last night for trying to explain this was a very good business decision. We are very close. We are no longer rebuilding. If we want to contend, we can not afford to jerk around with roster spots for non contributors and people we are developing to be backups in 3 years.

Oh this whining about the 31st pick is making my head ache. Here's the skinny. Without Joe and assuming Chilldress signs with another team and we don't have his cap hold, we only have about 8 million to spend without going over the cap. If Joe does sign, we're over the cap....period. So we have only 2 choices, unsigned rookies, or vets at the minimum (except for the exception). We currently have 8 players under contract and 8 million to spend. Add Joe and the 2 rookies and you are way over the cap, approaching the luxury tax and still only have 11 players. You still need to sign one more player bare minimum and probably 3. Even if you sign and trade chillz, you are over the cap if you sign JJ. That money to sign a vet big was way more important than developing a prospect center who had health issues at his physical. Expect Chilldress to be gone to clear his cap hold and for us to take back the bare minimum back in salary. Expect Joe to be gone and us to take back an underutilized or undercoached veteran.

I'm assuming because then you'd want us to sign Beasley. Beasley is a pot head and will be out of the NBA in 5 years.

FYI....the cheapest thing you can do in the NBA is pay a 2nd round draft pick. If they pick a vet to fill that roster spot, it will cost them the vet minimum of a million plus. Not wanting another rookie on the payroll is actually spending more money, not saving it.