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Nate, what are the ramifications for the increased cap?

I was just looking at the numbers myself. Nate can confirm, but I'm seeing that of we decline Howard's option and do not offer any tenders, we'll be looking at having $28M in cap space BEFORE taking into account the salary of our first round pick. If you add in the pick and Foye's qualifying offer, we're probably down to about $20M.

The max cap space was 18 million with a 54 million dollar cap. So it will be around 20 million with the cap at 56 million.

It means the teams for BYOD will be slightly less motivated. However potential contender like Utah and San Antonio would likely still be very interested in getting rid of Richard Jefferson and possibly AK47. If the Wizards dump Ross they can probably keep Livingston and maybe Josh Howard.

It means the Wizards could make an offer to Rudy Gay and have cap space to either add a mid level free agent or keep 2 or 3 of the Wizard's free agents.

Here's some raw numbers (give or take a few 100k). If we renounce everyone but Livingston & Singleton. Looks like it's between $20-$21 million in raw space if we get the 6th pick. If we luck up and get the number #1 pick, we'd have approximately $19 million in raw space.

verbal8 wrote:It means the teams for BYOD will be slightly less motivated.

Not necessarily. I think we need to start looking at teams that were going to have cap space above the MLE but not enough to really make a splash (maybe in the $8-10M range). They would now be a minor BOYD deal away from being able to offer somebody a max contract, and that could change their whole approach to the offseason.

I think this opens more doors, rather than closes them.

^ Byron Russell opted out of a bigger option year, so anything is possible.

If you look at the numbers, Ross would only lose about $100k if he opted out and then signed a minimum salary deal somewhere else. If EG tells him he won't have a role here next season because we're rebuilding, it might make sense to him to opt out and try to sign on with a contender. Maybe Dallas will pick him back up.

It's certainly a possibility IMO.

LyricalRico wrote:^ Byron Russell opted out of a bigger option year, so anything is possible.

If you look at the numbers, Ross would only lose about $100k if he opted out and then signed a minimum salary deal somewhere else. If EG tells him he won't have a role here next season because we're rebuilding, it might make sense to him to opt out and try to sign on with a contender. Maybe Dallas will pick him back up.

It's certainly a possibility IMO.

Ross already said he wasn't opting-out. Next year will be his last in the NBA.

LyricalRico wrote:^ Byron Russell opted out of a bigger option year, so anything is possible.

If you look at the numbers, Ross would only lose about $100k if he opted out and then signed a minimum salary deal somewhere else. If EG tells him he won't have a role here next season because we're rebuilding, it might make sense to him to opt out and try to sign on with a contender. Maybe Dallas will pick him back up.

It's certainly a possibility IMO.

Maybe we could buy him out for $100K.

It doesn't really matter much. Even if he left, we'd still have to account for a salary of $474K for his roster spot. Cutting his $1.14M salary would only shave $640K off of our cap figure. Frankly, I don't mind having a few crafty vets at the end of the bench when the rest of the team figures to be so young. At least Ross will make the youngsters work in practice to score on him.

Ross also serves a useful niche role as a defender to come in during offense/defense substitutions. If we're going to have a veteran 12th man, it's best to have a specialist who does one thing better than anybody else on the team. Ross is a better perimeter defender than anybody on the team. (He sucks horribly at everything else, however.)

verbal8 wrote:It means the teams for BYOD will be slightly less motivated.

Hmm, I'm not familiar with the "Bring Your Own Dead" strategy - can you elaborate?

LyricalRico wrote:

verbal8 wrote:It means the teams for BYOD will be slightly less motivated.

Not necessarily. I think we need to start looking at teams that were going to have cap space above the MLE but not enough to really make a splash (maybe in the $8-10M range). They would now be a minor BOYD deal away from being able to offer somebody a max contract, and that could change their whole approach to the offseason.

I think this opens more doors, rather than closes them.

I was thinking Chicago. I don't know their exact situation, but with Rose and Noah already as foundation guys and Deng as a solid role player, I think that's a very attractice spot for Joe Johnson, Bosh, Wade, etc. They may *really* want to move Hinrich.

Would they take Cleveland's pick in exchange for Hinrich, their pick and Mil's pick? Hinrich's not worth his contract, but he's solid and is a good culture change guy. He can play alongside any of Gil, Nick and Livingston.

I guess that move would be a massive gambel on their part. They'd likley entertain Hinrich plus one pick, but the second's probably too rich.

fishercob wrote:

LyricalRico wrote:Not necessarily. I think we need to start looking at teams that were going to have cap space above the MLE but not enough to really make a splash (maybe in the $8-10M range). They would now be a minor BOYD deal away from being able to offer somebody a max contract, and that could change their whole approach to the offseason.

I think this opens more doors, rather than closes them.

I was thinking Chicago. I don't know their exact situation, but with Rose and Noah already as foundation guys and Deng as a solid role player, I think that's a very attractice spot for Joe Johnson, Bosh, Wade, etc. They may *really* want to move Hinrich.

Would they take Cleveland's pick in exchange for Hinrich, their pick and Mil's pick? Hinrich's not worth his contract, but he's solid and is a good culture change guy. He can play alongside any of Gil, Nick and Livingston.

I guess that move would be a massive gambel on their part. They'd likley entertain Hinrich plus one pick, but the second's probably too rich.

FYI - The Bulls don't have two picks. They agreed to swap picks with MIL as part of the Salmons trade. It was a big advantage to MIL at the time because CHI looked like a sure lotto team. Now that the Bulls are in the playoffs, the Bucks essentially took on Salmons extra year to move up two spots in the draft.

Still, something like Ross+30 for Hinrich+17 could work well for both teams. Chicago would then have enough cap space (about $34M) to sign two max free agents. That cap space plus their existing cornerstones would make them the #1 FA landing spot in 2010 IMO.

The Wiz would then be a Livingston signing away from having a pretty complete backcourt IMO and could use that mid-first on a prospect at whatever position we don't fill with the lotto pick. And we'd still have another $10M (give or take) in cap space to continue to make or facilitate deals.

The Wiz would then be a Livingston signing away from having a pretty complete backcourt IMO and could use that mid-first on a prospect at whatever position we don't fill with the lotto pick. And we'd still have another $10M (give or take) in cap space to continue to make or facilitate deals.