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Anderson Varejao did not meet with the media Sunday, but a league source said that he intends to opt out of the final year of his contract and become an unrestricted free agent on July 1. This option was part of three-year offer sheet Varejao signed with the Charlotte Bobcats that the Cavs matched in 2007. Varejao will likely leave $6.2 million on the table coming off a season in which he set career highs in starts (42), points (8.6) and field goal percentage (.536). Cleveland Plain Dealer

http://www.cleveland.com/cavs/index.ssf/2009/05/cavaliers_insider_fatigued_ben.html

no surprise there. I'm not sure if he's going to get much more money than he already had as a contract price however. But this does get rid of some of his injury risk.

Not surprising at all, but of course that doesnt mean he's not going to resign with us. In fact I would put the odds of him being back in Cleveland at extremely high.

I think we could get him back for something like $6-7 million per year.

B Mac wrote:Not surprising at all, but of course that doesnt mean he's not going to resign with us. In fact I would put the odds of him being back in Cleveland at extremely high.

+1

With the economy, salary cap going down and a small number of teams with more than MLE money your statement is very strong in my mind. In my Mind, Varejao is a great 6th man and spot starter which doesn't translate into a 10 million a year man.

Yeah, I think he resigns with us, and the summer is significantly less weird than 2 years ago.

I forget who it was that disagreed with me a few weeks back about my pricetag on AV, but I would like to take the opportunity to correct myself and say that Anderson is going to be lucky to get much more than MLE money this offseason. With all of the available options and so few teams looking to spend he is going to find it hard to get a big contract. Of course like I said before, it only takes one idiot GM to throw money his way for all of that to be moot, but the chances of that happening are definately decreasing.

It helps that everyone is trying to clear cap room for 2010, nobody wants to clog up money then on lesser talents this offseason. It's a buyer's market and the Cavs are one of the few buyers.

I hope he comes back for <$8M and I wouldn't give him one penny more than that.

6-7 is about right. 8 or more is way too much.

I think $7mil is too much. Glen Davis won't get $7mil this off-season and he's a better player than Varejao.

Not really surprising. I saw this coming.

What he figures is that Cleveland will use the MLE and does not want to have to replace AV with the MLE. Thus Cleveland wants two players. AV will use that to get a little more cash.

AV knows that by opting out this year it's his best chance to get a multi year deal starting around $7 mil. He has to know that this summer the Cavs will be willing to pay his price tag to make sure they don't lose him for nothing when they want LBJ to stay, so if he can't get paid anywhere else, there's always Cleveland. However, if he were to decline his opt out and play 1 more year and if the Cleveland Basketball Apolcalypse occurs the Cavs are going to be more likely to use cap space in a different rebuilding direction.

If Ferry is smart he'll recognize that Varejao is done developing and is nothing more than a hustle guy. While they are important part of the team, they are not worth 7 million per year. The Cavs have too many needs to pay a one-dimensional player that kind of money.

Well, Varejao can be a Rodman type of player for us.. Unfortunately, he isn't near the defender Dennis was. 7 million is way too much for Varejao IMO.. Let's hope that we won't have to deal with that contract situation a couple years ago with his agent.

Frankie wrote:Well, Varejao can be a Rodman type of player for us.. Unfortunately, he isn't near the defender Dennis was. 7 million is way too much for Varejao IMO.. Let's hope that we won't have to deal with that contract situation a couple years ago with his agent.

He isn't near the defender nor rebounder. He'd be beggar man's Rodman at best.

who cares, they don't need him for a high price anyway.

I'd rather go out and sign a Channing Frye for cheap than bring back Varejao. I think Frye gives you just about the same robounding and defense with better offense and shot blocking ability.

Verajao was exposed in the playoffs against D. Howard. His stock is not as high now b/c he's really a player off the bench. Not a starter. He will be disappointed by the market for him.

I think that Varejao is a better player than you guys are giving him credit for. No he can't guard Howard, but I don't think anyone thought that he could before hand. What Varejao can do is do a good job against (normal) PF's. He's never going to be able to stick with the tweeners but he's still better than you guys are giving him credit.