NBA At 2: Marc Gasol Available?
The Memphis Grizzlies did the improbable over the last month, entering the playoffs as the West’s eighth seed and toppling the San Antonio Spurs, then giving the Oklahoma City Thunder all they could handle in the second round before finally facing defeat in Game 7 of the Western Conference semi-finals. What’s even more impressive is that the Grizzlies did it without their best player, as Rudy Gay was sidelined for most of the second half of the season with a shoulder injury. Anticipating the Grizzlies’ penny-pinching owner, many have wondered if Gay might now be on the trading block as management tries to keep the core from this playoff run together.
Earlier this week Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley went on the record saying he won’t trade Gay, even saying the mere speculation of such a move is ticking him off. In one conversation he proclaimed his allegiance to Gay, said he would probably keep Marc Gasol, and even assured Grizzlies fans that prized reserve Shane Battier would be back, as well.
That all sounds great, and fans in Memphis have to be elated to hear their owner give his team such a vote of confidence. At the same time, they have to be wondering about the math.
As of today the Grizzlies have roughly $37.5 million committed in salary for next season. Considering the NBA is talking about imposing a $45 million salary cap next season, that’s a pretty good place to be. Of course, that number doesn’t include restricted free agent Marc Gasol or the aforementioned Battier, both of whom will garner significant interest in the free agency market this summer. Gasol is likely to command somewhere in the $15 million range beginning next season, as he is expected to be the most sought-after big man in the class. Battier is more of a glue guy, but will also command a decent amount, perhaps as high as the $7 million he made this year.
So let’s take a conservative stand and say Gasol gets $12 million and Battier $5 million. That would put Memphis over $57 million for next season, some $12 million over the NBA’s targeted cap, and with only 11 players under contract. The obvious fact here is that Memphis can’t afford to keep this group together as structured. It simply can’t be done, and that’s ironic, given that for the first time ever their owner is actually willing to spend the money it takes to compete for a championship.
The next question we have to ask, then, is just how realistic it is that the league will get a $45 million cap from the new CBA? The vast majority of NBA teams are well over that mark, with no easy way to get under. There is a lot of talk about an amnesty clause, which would allow a team to buy out their biggest contract and then waive the player, as the Dallas Mavericks did with Michael Finley a few years back, but for most NBA teams – especially playoff teams – that’s a drop in the bucket.
Let’s say, for example, that the Orlando Magic decided to waive their worst contract off the books. Gilbert Arenas makes more money than Dwight Howard, if you can believe that, and he would be gone so fast he would think he was on the new Harry Potter ride at Universal Studios. "Expecto petronum!!!!" And he’s gone. That would still leave the Magic with roughly $56 million in contracts . . .and only nine players on the team. Teams like Boston and Miami would face even bigger challenges, as the bulk of their money goes to their top three players. Who will you waive, Chris Bosh? LeBron James? The Celtics could get to $45 million if they waived Kevin Garnett, but that would leave them right at the cap with only seven players under contract (including the two O’Neals).
If the NBA insists on a hard cap of $45 million we may be watching the last NBA games we’ll see for a very long time. We’re talking about forcing every star player in the league to take a retroactive pay cut just to allow teams to have the minimum numbers of players required to field a team. Coming back to our original subject, it creates a very hard position for the Memphis Grizzlies, even as their owner is finally willing to open up his wallet. To start with, it probably means Marc Gasol is available.
"Basically, I’m not going to sit and pay a contract which everyone says is ridiculous," Heisley said Monday. "But my intention is to bring Marc back. If he wants to be here, he will find I will be very, very receptive."
If he wants to be there? Marc Gasol wants to be on the team that will pay him the most to play basketball. It sounds to me like Heisley is preparing his exit clause, and that’s music to the ears of teams like the Houston Rockets, who covet Gasol.
But then again, under the new CBA teams may not be able to afford to add players . . .and Gasol may have to go back to Spain to find a job.
The NBA’s proposed solution to all of this is for everyone to take a tiered paycut. Players who make less that $2 million lose something in the neighborhood of 15%. Players who make $5 million would lost something like 20%. Players who make more than $5 million a season would take something like a 25% cut. In other words, it would be a tiered reduction based on size of contract.
The end goal would be to achieve an across the board reduction to the tune of about 23% on all existing deals, so that could change the Gasol discussion or at least complicate it.
For more on how the owner’s structured their latest proposal, be sure and check out HOOPSWORLD’s Steve Kyler’s piece on the subject here!
How open will players be to taking such a pay cut? That very much remains to be seen.
It’s going to get grizzly, NBA nation. Very, very grizzly.
Up Close: Russell Westbrook
It’s been quite a year for Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Russell Westbrook. Not only did he emerge as an All-Star and an MVP candidate, he’s helped power the Thunder all the way to the Western Conference Finals. He talks with HOOPSWORLD about his impressive season, what he’s learned about his game in the playoffs, the important of the rowdy fan base in OKC and more in this HOOPSWORLD exclusive!
|
This div will be replaced
|
For more exclusive interviews and content from HOOPSWORLD, be sure you "like" our page on FaceBook by linking here!
Pick #5 In Play, Too
The 2011 NBA Draft is fast approaching, and in the wake of last night’s draft lottery we’re starting to hear significant chatter about teams looking to trade their picks. The Minnesota Timberwolves were disappointed that they didn’t land the number one overall pick, which would have given them the chance to land the floor leader they’ve lacked in Duke’s Kyrie Irving, and sources close to the team tell HOOPSWORLD that they don’t believe there is a clear-cut #2 pick, despite what many are saying. With that in mind, the Timberwolves are actively engaged in conversations about trading the pick, and they’re not alone. Last night Toronto Raptors GM Bryan Colangelo told our friends at Draft Express that he’s exploring a trade for the fifth overall pick, as well.
"I’m not happy that we moved from three to five," admitted Colangelo. "I think after the first two picks, which are fairly clear-cut at this point, it’s pretty murky with respect to who’s three, who’s five, who’s seven . . .but I do like a number of players in this draft in the top seven or eight and it’s pretty clear that we’re going to get one of them if we stay the course at five. A lot of things are in play with trade conversations, preparing for free agency, so we’ll have to spend the next four or five weeks preparing for this process and drilling down to try and really find out who the right pick is for us. It might be the best talent or the best fit for us position-wise. We do have some glaring needs, but we have a very young team and I think we can be strategic with respect to what type of player we’re going to pick. At five you have a little bit different type of pick. Maybe it’s more of a project type of player versus a guy who’s going to come in and maybe be ready immediately. I do think we’ll get a nice players at five. Whether it’s a shorter-term piece or a longer-term piece, we’ll have to see. The silver lining is that the cap charge is a little bit less for the five spot than it is for the three spot, so we’ll try to make the most of that."
Even though he didn’t get the higher pick he coveted, Colangelo remains a fan of the lottery system, which rarely rewards the team with the worst overall record with the top overall pick.
"I’ve always been a fan of the lottery, think it adds some intrigue to the process. I don’t know if it’s structured or organized exactly how it needs to be organized. I’ve always said that the way the numbers are allocated, rather than in blocks, they should be random distribution. I think that would be a true lottery system because the numbers would be a little bit more random, if you will. The odds would stay the same. Somebody would have 250 combinations, somebody would have a little bit less. In this case we would have had 156 combinations. If there was random distribution I think it would skew the results a little bit. I’m not a statistician, but I do think it would impact the formula. Obviously, losing the most basketball games does not often give you the number one pick. If you want the number one pick, the moral is don’t lose the most games. I think that’s only happened once in the last twelve or thirteen years where the worst team got the top pick. Still, we all know how this works. The system’s been in place for a while, you know what the results are, and you live with it."
Trading unprotected picks (Nets, Clips)
Clippers fans are a little put out this morning, as the pick they traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Baron Davis/Mo Williams deal turned out to be the lottery winner. As HOOPSWORLD’s Eric Pincus wrote this morning, that pick had a 2.8% chance of grabbing the top spot, yet there it is. The New Jersey Nets also saw the Utah Jazz grab the third overall pick thanks to the unprotected first rounder they sent out in the Deron Williams trade. For his part, Colangelo is opposed to trading unprotected picks for just this reason.
{AUTHOR_BOX}"We’ve always been averse to trading unprotected picks, but those were significant deals that were made by those teams. In the case of the Nets acquiring Deron Williams you could say that they won the lottery. They got a great player, a franchise type of player. I know there are issues with his status down the road, but for now they got one of the top point guards in the game. Those kinds of deals will continue to be looked at, it just depends on how risk-averse you are and what your situation is at the time. I think those deals are working out favorably for both."
Now the real work begins. The Raptors know where their pick will fall, so it’s up to them to decide if they want to keep it, use it, or trade it away. The next part of that decision will be made in Chicago later this week.
"Next for us is Chicago (Pre-draft Combine), where we’ll meet with the players, see them go through some light workouts, and then get right back to our own workout schedule. We’ve got four or five dates where we’ve already put names on the board, so we’ll be getting ready for that. We have a top five pick, and I’ve been saying all along that we’re going to add a top five talent. Now we just have to determine who the right guy is. It’s the final process of watching and scouting their games over time, background checks, performance testing. It’s an ongoing process, but the draft is June 23rd, so we’ve got a little bit of time. Still, the time goes fast."
It certainly does, and as always, HOOPSWORLD will take you every step of the way. Steve Kyler, Yannis Koutroupis and Luke Byrnes will be in Chicago and we’ll be bringing you exhaustive coverage of the proceedings there, while also continuing to bring you courtside coverage of the conference finals. In the mean time, for more great draft coverage, check out our friends at DraftExpress.com.
HOOPSWORLD Twitter: Make sure you are following all of our guys to insure you are getting the very latest from our team: @stevekylerNBA, @AlexKennedyNBA, @jfleminghoops, @TheRocketGuy, @EricPincus, @joelbrigham, @alexraskinNBA, @stephenlitel, @TommyBeer, @DPageHOOPSWORLD and @YannisHW.
NBA Chats: There will be two NBA Chats today starting with Steve Kyler’s weekly NBA Rumors Chat at 1pm EST. Senior NBA Writer Tommy Beer will host his NBA chat at 8pm EST. Tommy covers the New York Knicks and the Eastern Conference for HOOPSWORLD. You can always find the next chat here: Upcoming NBA Chats.
Loading ...
