Bill Simmons RIPS the Raptors roster and salaries. (UPDATE Zach Lowe & Rob Mahoney go in on Raptors)

[RaptorPride]

Honestly deserved criticism, from the outside looking in for sure looks pretty stupid paying all this money for a team who hasn't done anything or even have a multi time allstar.

But nowadays I guess teams do sign and trades and just trades in general rather than gutting the team to have cap space to sign someone. Bobby or the raptors front office are supposed to be cap geniuses so they should have plans on how to use up all our cap while staying under the cap so we don't pay taxes so I'm not to worried.

We need the hate from the media just like this. I really hope our players are looking at this and all the trade rumors. Raptors started our We The North run as underdogs, no one believed in us. I wish the team and players look at the all hate they are getting. All the rumors of RJ being shopped, and no team wanting our guys. Just come in with an underdog mentality next year and play their hearts out to prove everyone wrong. Only way I see this team working out and sticking together.

[rage2021]

1. Simmons is a dummy
2. Simmons is a dummy
3. Simmons is just upset his dreams of a celtics dynasty are shattered
4. Simmons is even more upset his dynasty celts will finish below the raps
5. Simmons is a dummy

Great analysis. He's not wrong .

[dhackett1565]

Locking up IQ earlier at what he initially wanted (20-25 M) would have been way better than waiting until the end of the season.

Probably worth noting here that they couldn't have offered Quick a long term extension when they traded for him, just a mini one like they did with Ingram, and Quick probably doesn't sign for 25M a year at that point anyway with FA just around the corner.

Personally, if the choice was 25M per year for three years versus 32.5M per year for 5 years, I take the latter. Cost certainty and control will be more and more valuable as Scottie reaches his peak.

[bluerap23]

Locking up IQ earlier at what he initially wanted (20-25 M) would have been way better than waiting until the end of the season.

Probably worth noting here that they couldn't have offered Quick a long term extension when they traded for him, just a mini one like they did with Ingram, and Quick probably doesn't sign for 25M a year at that point anyway with FA just around the corner.

Personally, if the choice was 25M per year for three years versus 32.5M per year for 5 years, I take the latter. Cost certainty and control will be more and more valuable as Scottie reaches his peak.

Yeah - they would have opted for the 3 year if it was an option. He had us over the barrel because we traded OG for him and were not going to let him hit FA.

To BS - he criticizes the Barnes extension which is ridiculous. Every team in the NBA would have given him the same contract extension. It isn't even a question. The BI deal will be the one to evaluate after this season based on how healthy he is. His argument on that one is that guys are signing for less this off-season.

[Raptor_Guy]

I can defend basically any of the deals except the Quickley one, it looks even worse seeing how the market is playing out this off-season. There currently isn't a market for mid range talent like Giddey and Kuminga because with the new CBA no one wants to overpay for those types of players. Quickley was a good bench player for the Knicks, we let him go off on a tanking team then awarded him 162 mil. If he was a free agent this off-season I'm not sure he'd get more than 4 years/100 million.

It also looks silly because we didn't want to max OG and Siakam, which is fair enough, but then we turn around and pay Quickley and Barrett 60mil a year combined.

That said, I do believe there's a world where Ingram returns to form and 40 mil for him isn't that bad, and I don't like the Barnes deal but almost any team would have done that given the circumstances.

[ItsDanger]

I can defend basically any of the deals except the Quickley one, it looks even worse seeing how the market is playing out this off-season. There currently isn't a market for mid range talent like Giddey and Kuminga because with the new CBA no one wants to overpay for those types of players. Quickley was a good bench player for the Knicks, we let him go off on a tanking team then awarded him 162 mil. If he was a free agent this off-season I'm not sure he'd get more than 4 years/100 million.

It also looks silly because we didn't want to max OG and Siakam, which is fair enough, but then we turn around and pay Quickley and Barrett 60mil a year combined.

That said, I do believe there's a world where Ingram returns to form and 40 mil for him isn't that bad, and I don't like the Barnes deal but almost any team would have done that given the circumstances.

People cheerlead players getting good contracts on here too often. The proper approach was negotiate hard and get a lower annual rate. Instead management caves to the players unless it reaches high thresholds.

[JB7]

I can defend basically any of the deals except the Quickley one, it looks even worse seeing how the market is playing out this off-season. There currently isn't a market for mid range talent like Giddey and Kuminga because with the new CBA no one wants to overpay for those types of players. Quickley was a good bench player for the Knicks, we let him go off on a tanking team then awarded him 162 mil. If he was a free agent this off-season I'm not sure he'd get more than 4 years/100 million.

It also looks silly because we didn't want to max OG and Siakam, which is fair enough, but then we turn around and pay Quickley and Barrett 60mil a year combined.

That said, I do believe there's a world where Ingram returns to form and 40 mil for him isn't that bad, and I don't like the Barnes deal but almost any team would have done that given the circumstances.

People cheerlead players getting good contracts on here too often. The proper approach was negotiate hard and get a lower annual rate. Instead management caves to the players unless it reaches high thresholds.

The last two contracts the Raps probably negotiated somewhat hard, and got good deals were FVV and OG's last deals with the team. And what did they do the moment those deals were expired or near expiring, they left.

[OakleyDokely]

There are two strategies.

You can go hard for a lower starting rate, but then the contract will increase year over year, with the result being a similar % of the cap in each year of the contract.

The other option is a deal that's flat like IQs. It's higher in year 1/2, but his % of cap will decrease year over year as the cap rises, giving you more flexibility once you get into years 3,4,5. This also makes it easier to deal him later in the contract as opposed to backloading it.

[ciueli]

So right now Josh Giddey is fighting to get to $30M/year on his next contract when he is better than IQ in a number of ways https://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/281266/Josh-Giddey-Dug-In-On-$30M-Per-Year-Contract.

He's coming off a season where he put up 14.6 PPG, 8.1 RPG, 7.2 APG with 37.8% 3pt shooting, +3.0 Box +/-, and 57% True Shooting. Still not 23 so younger than IQ and a multi-positional player at a listed 6'8" who was used as a PG this season, multiple stats show he is a better defensive player than IQ (better at steals, blocks, Defensive Rating, and Defensive Box +/-) and he can't even get what IQ got last year, this is really good indicator that we overpaid IQ.

[VanWest82]

One small potential win from all the overpays is the better negotiating position on rookie extensions for Gradey, Ochai, and JKW. Sorry, we just don't have the room for what you want so take it or leave it. Obviously, this is dependent on any of them improving to the point of commanding more than MLE but I expect we'll see at least one of them do so.

[ciueli]

One small potential win from all the overpays is the better negotiating position on rookie extensions for Gradey, Ochai, and JKW. Sorry, we just don't have the room for what you want so take it or leave it. Obviously, this is dependent on any of them improving to the point of commanding more than MLE but I expect we'll see at least one of them do so.

At this point it's looking like they won't have the money to offer Ochai much next season as the projected 2026-27 cap and tax are coming in lower than the league as a whole expected. The tax is currently projected to be $200M and just looking at the salaries Bobby will want to keep they are at around $188M already, that doesn't even include the 2026 first round draft pick and assumes Sandro opts out (not a sure thing, there's no guarantee there will be a better offer on the table for him).

A lot can happen between then and now, very likely an RJ Barrett trade of some type that clears salary to keep players on rookie contracts going forward, but the question there is always what type of salary is coming back and how that fits into the bigger picture.

[DreamTeam09]

Not sure how this got to 10 pages, there's a salary cap floor that you have to spend to, and then a tax line and then the 1st/2nd aprons.
We are like a million dollars over the tax, ouuuuu MLSE is going to go broke. At the same time y'all are saying MLSE is the one rushing to make win now moves, so what do you care about their pocket books.
We control all our picks and the only long term salary commitments we have are players that we want. We are at least 2 deep at every position now with plenty of tradable contracts and assets. Flexibility to go in either direction,

[Raptor_Guy]

Not sure how this got to 10 pages, there's a salary cap floor that you have to spend to, and then a tax line and then the 1st/2nd aprons.
We are like a million dollars over the tax, ouuuuu MLSE is going to go broke. At the same time y'all are saying MLSE is the one rushing to make win now moves, so what do you care about their pocket books.
We control all our picks and the only long term salary commitments we have are players that we want. We are at least 2 deep at every position now with plenty of tradable contracts and assets. Flexibility to go in either direction,

Lol what, who's saying anything about MLSE's pocket books? This is about the fact that the new CBA is extremely restrictive with the 1st and 2nd aprons and we can't afford to be capped out on a team that may or may not even make the playoffs, especially when we have other players we're going to want to re-sign.

[DreamTeam09]

Not sure how this got to 10 pages, there's a salary cap floor that you have to spend to, and then a tax line and then the 1st/2nd aprons.
We are like a million dollars over the tax, ouuuuu MLSE is going to go broke. At the same time y'all are saying MLSE is the one rushing to make win now moves, so what do you care about their pocket books.
We control all our picks and the only long term salary commitments we have are players that we want. We are at least 2 deep at every position now with plenty of tradable contracts and assets. Flexibility to go in either direction,

Lol what, who's saying anything about MLSE's pocket books? This is about the fact that the new CBA is extremely restrictive with the 1st and 2nd aprons and we can't afford to be capped out on a team that may or may not even make the playoffs, especially when we have other players we're going to want to re-sign.

Well again it's a good thing we are not in the 1st or 2nd aprons so why are we 10 pages deep when that face is known from the outset for the most part? Which was my first point I made

[Shakril]

Not sure how this got to 10 pages, there's a salary cap floor that you have to spend to, and then a tax line and then the 1st/2nd aprons.
We are like a million dollars over the tax, ouuuuu MLSE is going to go broke. At the same time y'all are saying MLSE is the one rushing to make win now moves, so what do you care about their pocket books.
We control all our picks and the only long term salary commitments we have are players that we want. We are at least 2 deep at every position now with plenty of tradable contracts and assets. Flexibility to go in either direction,

Lol what, who's saying anything about MLSE's pocket books? This is about the fact that the new CBA is extremely restrictive with the 1st and 2nd aprons and we can't afford to be capped out on a team that may or may not even make the playoffs, especially when we have other players we're going to want to re-sign.

Well again it's a good thing we are not in the 1st or 2nd aprons so why are we 10 pages deep when that face is known from the outset for the most part? Which was my first point I made

Thats why i dont understand this discussion. We are slightly over the tax, which is a nothing burger in terms of teambuilding. As long as we are not in the first apron everything is fine. And its not like we cant make moves anymore. RJ is definitly a piece that will be gone one way or another.

[DatHomieYouHaTe]

Latest podcast and they go in on the Raptors again. Enjoy

[djsunyc]

Latest podcast and they go in on the Raptors again. Enjoy

it's because they are trolling now

[SharoneWright]

Latest podcast and they go in on the Raptors again. Enjoy

Russillo just sucking up hard to the man who writes his cheques here.

[Los_29]

So right now Josh Giddey is fighting to get to $30M/year on his next contract when he is better than IQ in a number of ways https://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/281266/Josh-Giddey-Dug-In-On-$30M-Per-Year-Contract.

He's coming off a season where he put up 14.6 PPG, 8.1 RPG, 7.2 APG with 37.8% 3pt shooting, +3.0 Box +/-, and 57% True Shooting. Still not 23 so younger than IQ and a multi-positional player at a listed 6'8" who was used as a PG this season, multiple stats show he is a better defensive player than IQ (better at steals, blocks, Defensive Rating, and Defensive Box +/-) and he can't even get what IQ got last year, this is really good indicator that we overpaid IQ.

Giddey was unplayable in the playoffs. It’s great that he put up a decent stat line on a bad team but the concerns are still there.

And it’s not an indicator we overpaid IQ. It was what the market was at the time. If we didn’t give 30 million to IQ, someone else would have. Look at what Suggs got and that guy is like a 12ppg shooting guard in a point guards body. Mediocre shooter, mediocre playmaker.

[S.W.A.N]

Latest podcast and they go in on the Raptors again. Enjoy

Russillo just sucking up hard to the man who writes his cheques here.

Meh. I just watched it.

I think the premise they use it weird. Basically he thinks that there are no trade options so the team is non-flexible and too expensive.

Well no sheep. We pay a Canada tax on contracts. Just like the other small markets.

It was interesting. They weren't really hating on the roster as much as they were the cost. Which is fair. The team is banking on the players matching their salary, and last year none of the starters were worth the money they getting paid this year.