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he is officially a free agent as he opted out of his contract officially on Friday.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... ts/wizards

Ji - you beat me to it...just came across the same WP article.

Not surprising in the least. I hope we can bargain with him and get his per-year salary down to an average of around 13-14 million per season, instead of the 6yr/120mil deal he wants. Use Jamison as reasoning. Use his injury problem as reasoning. Just don't sign him for 20mil per year. That's ridiculous.

oh great, now the stress begins...

he can re-sign with Wiz

You have Bird Rights

^^ Ji just likes to be dramatic.

he did not wait til the final day. such a straight-shooter, that arenas fellow.

miller31time wrote:Not surprising in the least. I hope we can bargain with him and get his per-year salary down to an average of around 13-14 million per season, instead of the 6yr/120mil deal he wants. Use Jamison as reasoning. Use his injury problem as reasoning. Just don't sign him for 20mil per year. That's ridiculous.

Even if he was fully healthy, I wouldn't give him max... He can't/doesn't play D, which already in itself is a great justification for not giving him that much...

We don't even NEED to give him the max. We can offer more than other teams. After a certain amount, Wiz would only be bidding against themselves.

NO MAX MONEY FOR GILBERT!

miller31time wrote:Not surprising in the least. I hope we can bargain with him and get his per-year salary down to an average of around 13-14 million per season, instead of the 6yr/120mil deal he wants. Use Jamison as reasoning. Use his injury problem as reasoning. Just don't sign him for 20mil per year. That's ridiculous.

Which is where he already is. We shouldn't go a dime over.

The whole idea of him getting a max contract never made sense to me.

I actually think GA is being kind of stupid here. For him, it would have been smart to play out his last year and try to get more after coming back healthy.

This could actually benefit us that he isn't being very smart. But if he is just going after more security coming off the knee, then I guess it's smart for him to get a longer contact. I just don't think he is going to get both a longer contract and one that pays more per year.

So if he knows he is going to be healthy, this was a bad move.

If he isn't going to be healthy, then us signing him long term is a bad move.

I'll bet the reason Arenas waited so long to opt out was that he was trying to see what Brand, Marion, and Baron Davis were gonna do. All three of those guys have early termination clauses, and if they were to exercise them, their respective teams would be in position to have substantial cap room.

Unfortunately for Arenas, he has a provision in his contract that states that he must opt out by June 20th (a master stroke by EG). Those other guys had until the deadline of June 30th.

Now Arenas is in the position where he has to hope some of those other stars opt out so there will be a potential bidding war. If none of those guys opt out, Arenas is left with just Memphis and Philadelphia as suitors. Neither of those teams particularly want a combo guard, and both have only $13M available - which is what Arenas would have been paid had he refrained from opting out in the first place.

gilbertgoes05 wrote:oh great, now the stress begins...

Yeah, but it ain't half as stressful as it would have been next offseason, when there would actually be more teams with $$$ to offer him. As it is now, he's coming off two seasons of knee problems and there's nobody else of note to offer him the max. So if we did sign him to the max it would be catastrophic, but I trust EG so I'm not sweating it (I'm only sweating this ridiculously hot weather. Ji, DO SOMETHING!)

nate33 wrote:

Now Arenas is in the position where he has to hope some of those other stars opt out so there will be a potential bidding war. If none of those guys opt out, Arenas is left with just Memphis and Philadelphia as suitors. Neither of those teams particularly want a combo guard, and both have only $13M available - which is what Arenas would have been paid had he refrained from opting out in the first place.

Nate, could you help me understand this above issue.

Why can't the owner in NY offer Gil 100/110/120 over 4 or 5 years. What ever he wants to pay. I'm just throwing out numbers, if the NY owner wants to pay the TAX what's stopping him from bidding on Gil?

I know the Wizards can offer the longest contract.

Gilbert is going to be on the Doc Walker show today on AM980

FreeBalling wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Nate, could you help me understand this above issue.

Why can't the owner in NY offer Gil 100/110/120 over 4 or 5 years. What ever he wants to pay. I'm just throwing out numbers, if the NY owner wants to pay the TAX what's stopping him from bidding on Gil?

I know the Wizards can offer the longest contract.

There are two "caps". There's a Salary Cap and there's a Luxury Tax Threshold.

The Salary Cap is at roughly $58M. If your team payroll is under the Salary Cap, you can spend as much money as you want on a free agent until you hit the salary cap number. A team with a payroll of $48M can spend $10M on a free agent. If your team payroll is over $58M, you must use a salary cap exemption to sign a free agent. The important salary cap exemptions are the Larry Bird Exemption - which permits a team to resign their own player for any amount up to a Max salary; and the Mid Level Exemption - which permits a team to spend up to $5.5M on any free agent. New York is well over the Salary Cap. They could only offer Arenas $5.5M. Indeed, only 3 teams are currently under the Salary Cap right now: Memphis, Philadelphia, and Seattle. The Clippers could get under the cap if they let Maggette and Brand walk.

The Luxury Tax threshold is at roughly $70M. The Luxury Tax is relevant only in regards to a franchise's profitability. It technically has nothing to do with the ability to sign free agents. If a team exceeds the luxury tax, they must pay into a general fund one dollar for every dollar they exceed the luxury tax. That money that is in the general fund ends up being refunded to all of the franchises at the end of the year, except those franchises who exceeded the luxtux. So by exceeding the luxtax, not only do you pay a dollar for dollar tax, you also miss out on the refund.

closg00 wrote:Gilbert is going to be on the Doc Walker show today on AM980

Any idea when? I'm listenin live now at 9:45 and don't know if I missed it...

NbdyBeatsTheWiz wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Any idea when? I'm listenin live now at 9:45 and don't know if I missed it...

They are trying to track Gil down.

Now that it's here, does anyone else kinda feel mad at Gilbert? I know it's a business and all, but I have to admit that I'm kinda hurt and disappointed in him. I feel more like "the hell with him, sign & trade him"!
Maybe that will change as time passes and I get used to this, but right now, I'm not feeling Gil at all.

tsvqt wrote:Now that it's here, does anyone else kinda feel mad at Gilbert? I know it's a business and all, but I have to admit that I'm kinda hurt and disappointed in him. I feel more like "the hell with him, sign & trade him"!
Maybe that will change as time passes and I get used to this, but right now, I'm not feeling Gil at all.

I'm trying real hard to withhold judgement until this plays out.

I can totally understand the idea that Arenas wants long-term security. It makes sense for him to opt out now and then resign for a long-term deal starting at roughly what he is paid now with perhaps a minor increase in salary. If that's how it plays out, and Arenas ends up resigning shortly after the kickoff date for free agency (July 9th), then I'll have no complaints.

This could get more frustrating if Arenas demands a max deal when nobody else in the league is prepared to pay him that much. If Arenas ends up holding out all summer and into next season, he'll have exhausted my good will toward him.