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Here is the salary cap for forwards in the NBA

https://www.spotrac.com/nba/rankings/2020-21/cap-hit/forward/

I think we need to reconsider how we value players. If you are 6' 8" and can shoot 38% percent or better from 3 your are going to be an $18M plus player if you can play any defense. The higher your percentage from 3 three, and the higher your defensive value and the higher your ability to create your own shot the higher it goes up from there.

The fact of the matter is people over 6'8" are rare. If they have the eye hand coordination to shoot well they are even rarer. Lastly if they have any ability to move their feet and play defense they are just damm hard to find.

You see lots of comments in the press and on here about the cost of Barnes, or Middleton, of Hayward, of Harris. The fact of the matter is it is really hard to find guys like that and scarcity drives value.

Money is one kind of cost. Draft pick/young players given up in trades is another.

As a SAC fan I feel you brought this up in context of Barnes. Were he a FA, he probably gets close to his contract value now. But will teams be willing to give up quality young players and/or picks to take on that financial commitment? Most likely not. A player can have lots of FA value but not much trade value because now cost is doubled in a sense.

It’s one thing to use cap space for a guy like this. It’s another thing entirely to have to trade salary and players on your roster for them. In theory, maybe a team would take your Barnes for free, as if it was signing him as an unrestricted free agency. But they’re less willing to give up salary to match with guys they may like and heavily unlikely to pay up picks or young players.

A guy like Barnes is doubly tough. He’s not a bad player. But he’s not really a great player either and he doesn’t really excel at any one thing. For Indy, we have that kind of guy, but a couple inches smaller, in Jeremy Lamb. He’s not a bad player, but he’s ok in a lot of things, and doesn’t really hurt you and can chew up a lot of roles. They’re like the swing starter/long reliever in baseball. Really useful in situations, but not really a great or desirable player.

I have been saying this for quite a while. There is a scarcity of resources. Quality centers can be had cheaply. If you have two right now you need to start fishing out trades b/c the value of a quality 5 will only decrease...unless they are perfect for small ball.

In the draft teams should be doubling down on wings as well.

Overpaying for average production is overpaying for average production. The position is far less important than the production you're paying for. The points, for and against, matter far more than the position they're coming from.

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