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Projected 2008-09 Team Payroll: $58.65 million. This does not include Calderon's new salary, nor does it include Delfino's new salary. At the end of the 08-09 season, Rasho, Parker, Garbo, Baston and Moon all expire to the tune of roughly $20 million. I'm not sure if Graham's 09-10 qualifying offer has been picked up yet (let's hope not).

Projected 2009-10 Team Payroll: $40.15 million. Again, this does not include Calderon and Delfino's new deals. Player figured into this total include Bosh, Ford, Kapono, Bargnani, and Humphries. That's 5 guys, out of the required 12.

Projected 2010-11 Team Payroll: $44 million. Again, this does not include Calderon and Delfino's new deals. The big assumption that lies within this figure is that both Bosh and Ford pick up their player options for this season. Again, player figured into this total include Bosh, Ford, Kapono, Bargnani, and Humphries.

BC likes to maintain a level of flexibility. He can quickly retool given our expiring contracts concluding the 08-09 season. As most know, this summer is when we may see our expirings packaged in a trade to land another star, or it might wait until the 2009 trade deadline.

But given our recent signing of Kapono and the extension we gave Humphries, and then factoring in the contracts we will have to dish out to Calderon and Delfino this summer, landing a star through free agency will likely not be the route we take.

It's old news, but our most valuable asset going foward, in terms of nabbing another star player, is likely our expiring contracts. And with BC there's always a level of unpredictability. Point is, the team we have now is probably going to be drastically different 2-3 years from now. Hell, maybe even next year. Nobody knows, but it should be a fun ride.

Expirings are assets and have value. But all positive assets have value. So players with more than a year have value. If we have two good point guards, they represent value. A re-signed Delfino has a positive asset value. Draft picks, mid-level exceptions and cap space have value.

If Jorge Garbajosa was to get out of his contract and return to Europe, that wouldn't have value, yet in keeping us further from the luxury tax, even that might have value greater than his current post-injury skill level.

If the final years of Rasho's and Baston's contracts are not fully guaranteed, that increases their asset value.

All of this is to say that so long as you don't have any dead cap space - like Alvin Williams who is on our books this season but untradable - you have positive assets and a smart GM can make a lot of moves with positive assets.

By the way, qualifying year offers are only activated in the week's preceding a player's restricted free agency. They are usually just pro forma moves required by the CBA to retain the right to match offers for that player. So no, we have not tendered JG a qualifying offer.

dagger wrote:By the way, qualifying year offers are only activated in the week's preceding a player's restricted free agency. They are usually just pro forma moves required by the CBA to retain the right to match offers for that player. So no, we have not tendered JG a qualifying offer.

Thanks for the clarification, dagger. I thought that may have been the case, but wasn't sure.

I think Colangelo's desire to acquire a star hinges totally on Bargnani's development over the next year in a half. If he begins making big strides towards the star player we are all hoping for, then it would seem to make more sense to acquire solid role players similar to what BC did last summer. A 3rd big name could seriously stunt Bargnani's growth. However if Bargs is coming along slowly and the pressure to win builds up, we certainly have to potential to go big with our expirings/cap space.

if Kwame's 9 Million + a prospect and 2 late first rounders can land them Pau, im sure Rasho's 8 Million can land us another 2nd tier star from a rebuilding team next year (im sensing a implosion from teams like the kings and wizards)

Uh ... wheather or not Bargs is playing good or not ... you dont settle for turning ur expiring contracts into just role players... you go for high quality talent...

Gone are the days when teams use their cap space to sign star players outright. Almost no team ends up $14+ million under the cap in the offseason, and the ones that do, always end up paying more than what is required to get these star players (i.e. Rashard, Big Ben, JJ).

With the cap barely being raised to offset the growing salaries of players, not to mention restricted free agency clauses, expiring contracts are bigger assets than simply just having the cap space to sign players outright.

Bigjabroni has it right when he says it all depends on Bargs' development. If he doesn't seem to make any major strides the rest of this season, and early the next, then we'll be seeing Rasho, Garbo and draft picks being sent out for a quality player on a rebuilding team. Otherwise, BC will just sign a few role players on reasonable 3-year deals, like he did in summer '06.

Quite a few teams are going to have more appealing ending contracts than we will like I showed in another thread. I wouldn't bank on us getting anything special simply by trading away our ending deals.

The Duke wrote:Uh ... wheather or not Bargs is playing good or not ... you dont settle for turning ur expiring contracts into just role players... you go for high quality talent...

What I mean by this is, you would potentially like to trade your expiring role players, for something more then just... well more role players (on the same level as those leaving). Ideally you want to trade for a quality talent, or a vastely upgraded role player.

omeloon wrote:Quite a few teams are going to have more appealing ending contracts than we will like I showed in another thread. I wouldn't bank on us getting anything special simply by trading away our ending deals.

That's both true and not true. I don't expect we can get back a big name star, but I do believe we can upgrade the talent level of the team. We have one unique advantage: We have multiple expiring contracts, rather than one big one. That makes it easier to contemplate multiple deals, or a trade with multiple teams. So we could get back two or three useful players, and possibly package those or others as things move along. The other plus is that we have so much dollar value in expirings, we have the ability to take on $20-25 million in continuing salary. Not every team with expirings will have the downstream flexibility to trade for contracts of equal or greater value. And we have a fairly young team at key positions, so it's also true that we could spice up a trade with a first round draft pick to give that expiring contract or package of contracts more than just cap dump value.

I've also suggested that our move forward might not come in one summer. If you are able to upgrade assets like Rasho or Garbo even modestly, you raise the talent rating on the team and set yourself up for even more trades in the not too distant future even as our core assets move towards their prime years. In other words, 50 wins this year, 53 wins next year, 55-58 wins two years from now...

dagger wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



That's both true and not true. I don't expect we can get back a big name star, but I do believe we can upgrade the talent level of the team. We have one unique advantage: We have multiple expiring contracts, rather than one big one. That makes it easier to contemplate multiple deals, or a trade with multiple teams. So we could get back two or three useful players, and possibly package those or others as things move along. The other plus is that we have so much dollar value in expirings, we have the ability to take on $20-25 million in continuing salary. Not every team with expirings will have the downstream flexibility to trade for contracts of equal or greater value. And we have a fairly young team at key positions, so it's also true that we could spice up a trade with a first round draft pick to give that expiring contract or package of contracts more than just cap dump value.

I've also suggested that our move forward might not come in one summer. If you are able to upgrade assets like Rasho or Garbo even modestly, you raise the talent rating on the team and set yourself up for even more trades in the not too distant future even as our core assets move towards their prime years. In other words, 50 wins this year, 53 wins next year, 55-58 wins two years from now...

Again if Andrea shows quick improvements then our Expring Contracts could be useful to get someone like Darko who if willing to play of the bench can be our rebounding/shot blocking big to round of our front court. I would take a chance on him.

Again like you mention the young players, picks and expiring contracts give us soo much flexibility that we can spread our assests to get 2 key players depending on our current talent improvement. If we still need a bonifide star ( meaning Bargs hasnt improved as muc) we put all our eggs in one basket and go for one. If we don't need that star then we spread our assets to get the players we want to fit in the posititons of need ie Defending Big and lesser scoring wing.

The trade for the Lakers was unbelievably good considering where they are in their stage development as a team, what are the chances of a "perfect" storm happening for the Raptors.

1) Disgruntled star/semi star player UNDER 30
2) Plays in a position that the team needs (ie. not PF, PG, likely not C)
3) Matching contracts/reasonable length/reasonable salary
4) Team looking to rebuild by shedding contracts

I can think of VC and Gasol in the last 4 years traded for expirings.

Let's cross our fingers that we strike gold too.

maybe Toronto can offer Memphis Rasho, Garbo and Dixon for Mike Miller and Darko. We'd have to invoke the trade rule, since we'd be getting more back in salary, but it would significantly upgrade us all around, and give Memphis two expirings for next year, allowing them to pursue more free agents the following summer and an expiring this year in Dixon

maybe, we can even throw in a 1st in 2009 to give Memphis some incentive for making this trade, talent-wise.

we'd upgrade our talent and Memphis would have more to work with via cap space.

No way Memphis gives up Darko and Mike Miller. They just signed Darko, and they'll have to use their cap space on someone. Why would they want to pay Rasho and Garbo instead of Darko? Whoever they pick up with their cap space will not be better than Miller/Darko. They might give up Miller for cap space, but they're going to need a lot more for two of their starters.

If you resign Calderon to a big deal, you won't be able to trade away your $20 million in expiring for players who have longer contracts without stepping into the luxury tax level.

I'm no so sure the Raptors are going to be willing to pay all that tax, and miss out on Millions of tax $ coming from other teams.

Forget free-agency. Besides Steve Nash, what free agent star has signed with another team and made a big difference in the standing of that team? Joe Johnson? TMac? Ben Wallace? Rashard Lewis? The only other example I can think of is Shaq signing with the Lakers.

Expiring contracts are important for teams looking to avoid the lux tax or unload a disgruntled or unproductive star with a long contract. They are tradeable assets but with TJ, Bosh and Calderon, we will not have significant cap space for at least a few years.

The Duke wrote:Uh ... wheather or not Bargs is playing good or not ... you dont settle for turning ur expiring contracts into just role players... you go for high quality talent...

I meant in the case of letting the contracts expire and being 10-15 mil under the cap during free agency. Barg's development should have an impact of whether that money goes to one big name or to multiple role players.

You use expirings, to acquire a guy who is good, but puts you in cap hell. End of story.

Bad teams get enough space to acquire talent, and then I guess there is the rare Marion/Banks for Shaq deal...although it doesn't help Miami financially in any way as Banks sucks and Marion will most likely re-up for at least the 17 million he is already making.

I would love for the Raptors to find a way to bring in a guy like Kirilenko with their expirings. Not necessarily him, but someone of his ilk.

GWgw wrote:Forget free-agency. Besides Steve Nash, what free agent star has signed with another team and made a big difference in the standing of that team? Joe Johnson? TMac? Ben Wallace? Rashard Lewis? The only other example I can think of is Shaq signing with the Lakers.

Billups signed as a FA with Detroit, won a finals MVP and led them to 6 straight Eastern Conference Finals appearances.

Ben Wallace was basically recruited as a FA and helped Detroit too.

Same can be said for Dice, who is a key starter for one of the top teams in the NBA.

Althought I'd love to see him sign a 2 year extension, I can see AP being traded next year... would hate to see that.