http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-4 ... Cloud.html
Remember the NBA's escrow system? Basically, reported amounts for player salaries are not precisely the amounts they get. Instead, a percentage of every player salary is held aside, in escrow. At the end of the year, the league tallies up how much players made as a percentage of the league's "basketball-related income."
If the basketball-related income was high, then the players get their money back.
If the basketball-related income was low, then the owners get a mulligan on some of what they agreed to pay the players.
The result, is a pretty good recession buster for the owners. At the moment there's nearly $205 million in the escrow account. $194 million of that, according to the memo, will be distributed equally to the 30 teams on July 29 -- meaning each team gets $6,467,847 in cash. The rest goes towards benefits (a long story), meaning teams will also each be spared $363,087 they would have been expected to contribute for next year.
Does that mean players like Roy might, in light of that, sign a shorter deal to get to free agency sooner? (In free agency, players have the ability to make even more.) It's certainly possible.
The other 23 teams, however, each get 1/30th of that money back, in cash. That means the 23 teams not listed above are each about to get $2,911,756, which is not a bad little shot in the arm.
