Mo Williams Saga

[NuggetsWY]

Traded for him to release him so they can save money on salary-cap floor? Except that the only penalty is they have to give the amount below the floor to their players; so they basically are willing to pay Williams so they don't have to pay their players. Have I got that right?

Then they released him to take advantage of the whole loophole but Philadelphia claimed him so Denver doesn't get the salary they intended to claim. Philadelphia does because they waived Williams.

So now Denver resigns Williams, supposedly with no intention of playing him because we certainly don't need him. So the intention is to waive him again? Then, if another team claims him off waivers we don't get to claim his salary so when team #2 waives him, we'll resign him again?

Am I the only one that thinks our front office is playing a stupid game here? Reward our players with the precious salary-cap floor dollars already. Williams only makes $2.2m and we are $9.9m under the floor. What's the big deal here? Or am I just so obtuse that I'm missing something?

[TunaFish]

Doesn't make a lot of sense if you want the cap hold to begin with. Can Williams still play? Probably not.

[The Rebel]

I think Williams is out for the year after waiting so long to have knee surgery last summer. Cabs fans know all about it though.

[tstrick33]

Yeah Mo is in Texas coaching a High School team or something with his son. We did get $600k from ATL in cash and somehow got $500k from avoiding a fine I believe. In the end the Nuggets profit $1.1M because this weird loophole which in the end is pretty smart on our FO to notice this.

[RRFB]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think they're saving even more than that. Williams' full $2.2M salary goes on our books (assuming no one claims him off waivers again), but because the season is half over, the Nuggets are only responsible for paying half of that. Factor in the $650k ATL gave, and the Nuggets are saving nearly $2M.

I agree that the whole thing seems petty but we all know the Kroenke's run their teams like a business, and a couple million dollars is still a lot of money even if you already have billions. I can't say I'm surprised. But from what I've read, it sounds unlikely that 76ers re-claim him, and the new CBA won't allow this to happen in future years.