2020 Season/Offseason (FA/Trade) Speculation - the Season Resumes

[Weemsickew14]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, I think having a controllable rookie contract is more valuable to us right now. I think James Jones is happy with what we have at around pick 10.

[WeekapaugGroove]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, I think having a controllable rookie contract is more valuable to us right now. I think James Jones is happy with what we have at around pick 10.

It's also not possible to make that trade straight up given the suns cap situation.

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[BobbieL]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, I think having a controllable rookie contract is more valuable to us right now. I think James Jones is happy with what we have at around pick 10.

It's also not possible to make that trade straight up given the suns cap situation.

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I do not think I would trade the 10th for Gordon.

As for the idea about Bridges - GSW can call Toronto or Phoenix - I doubt either would trade Anonoby or Bridges.

I am on board with BPA at 10 - maybe a guard that can shoot a little

[NotACat]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

Probably not, given our current cap situation. And I really, really like Gordon. But keeping Oubre AND adding Gordon would likely be very tricky to make work. Also, With Cam and Bridges taking that next step in their progression, Having both Oubre AND Cam being relegated to a bench role so Gordon could start would be counterproductive to Cams' progress, And too expensive to be having Oubre come off the bench.

I would however do EITHER an Oubre for Gordon straight swap, OR Oubre for the 15th pick? Would either of those be intriguing for you?

I think I'd pass, not looking to get Oubre, trying to undercut the Spurs and Boston to secure Poku.

And I'm seeing people point out how acquiring AG impacts the situation with Baynes and Saric. What if it was AG for Kaminsky and 10? And wouldn't AG be a ++ version of Saric?

[bwgood77]

Read on Twitter

Good breakdown of the suns money situation.

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Pretty much what we've been talking about here, but nicely laid out the facts. So basically assuming we keep Saric and Carter, keeping Baynes only costs us about a million of spending money on free agents, providing Sarver is willing to spend it.

So there really isn't any reason not to keep Baynes unless we wants a long term contract.

I imagine these free agents may not mind doing one year deals and might prefer it, given the fact there are a lot more teams with cap space next summer. However, I guess with Baynes, given his age, he may want the security if someone offers him 3 years, and I guess with all these guys, they are unlikely to get much more than the MLE per year even if they wait a year anyway. I guess maybe Saric could if he shot lights out or something.

We just don't know what Baynes will ultimately value in his decision this fall. He might ring chase and have no interest in coming back or since he hasn't made a ton of money in his career he might simply go to the highest bidder with the most overall money. I'm interested in bringing him back but obviously there's a breaking point and I wouldn't want to go more than 1 maybe 2 years.

One thing I'm curious of is if Baynes agrees to a deal with another team right away does that automatically drop the suns to an under the cap team and they can't use the MLE. Or maybe a better question is can the suns actually use the MLE while Saric and Baynes are just cap holds or do they need actual contract with them before they can technically sign someone to the MLE?

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I seriously doubt you can use the MLE before you actually sign your own free agents. That sounds like circumventing rules. Ultimately I thinnk IVPointPlay (twitter account...I have no idea what that guy's real name is) is probably right that we will work as an under the cap team and use our cap space to get right to the cap....it saves Sarver money...at least $9 million and probably more....of course if Baynes leaves, we basically have to unless we pay Dario and Carter (or Baynes if one of them leaves) enough to get over the cap, which is extremely unlikely.

[bwoolf2]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

I think most here would. I think we would have to renounce free agents Saric and Baynes at least to clear the space to absorb AG though, which would sting and make some think twice about it. Personally I'd lean yes.

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Pre bubble I would have made that trade but not now, I think Cam gives you more shooting and is a lot better rebounder and defender than people thought, he is just a better fit in the starting lineup with Booker and Ayton than Gordon would be and he is only going to get better. I honestly just want to add some complimentary pieces and give this team another year to gel they made huge strides from last year and I can only see them taking another step forward. The only big move I would make is if somehow Giannis wanted out of Milwaukee and I would put a sign and trade package around Ayton for him.

[Weemsickew14]

Here is my off-season plan right now.

Draft: Take one of Haliburton, Bey, or Vassell at 10 and trade our next years pick lottery protected pick or something around those lines to acquire a pick around 14 (Boston maybe?) and select Jalen Smith from Maryland.

Free agency: Re-sign Carter, Dario, Payne, and use the MLE on a veteran guard like Augustin. After that i'd like to see us get a veteran big for depth purposes, someone like Baynes (loaded 1 year deal), Kyle O'Quinn, or Favors

Rotation going into next season:
Ricky/Augustin/Payne
Booker/Carter
Mikal/Oubre
Cam/Oubre/Dario/Smith
Ayton/Dario/Vet/Smith

With either Haliburton/Bey/Vassell as well

No cap flexibility lost at all and everyone comes back from last year with much improved depth. I think this is very realistic.

[bigfoot]

Sidery still dwelling in the past. Crying over what can't be changed is futile and waste of energy.

Ayton is a two way player cornerstone.

Soms fans should stop expecting him to be an aggressive and passionate personality like Embiid or Cousins or whomever.
He's quiet and has a passive demeanor that is his personality. Plenty of great players have that personality.

And to those who keep complaining he still doesn't get to the free throw line much... Yeah we get it. It's a weakness. But putting up 20/12 on limited or below average free throw attempt is a good sign... And it means it can only improve.

Now... Let's talk about how the Suns system and players still ignore using Ayton as an early shot clock entry point during offense? For the millionth time... He is still being used like a premium version of Capela... Again 20/12 as a finisher is a good sign and can only get better.

You guys need to watch Towns and Embiid more.... Both falling love with perimeter shots is actually a bad thing for their teams success more apparent with Towns... Godly numbers but bottom rung impact. He needs to let his team mates shine outside and he needs to dominate inside so his team has a balance system.

Suns becoming a well rounded team may actually just required Ayton to be 97% play like a traditional big man and dominate inside rather than shoot perimeter shots... Letting Booker and other wings take the role of perimeter scoring... Again... If it leads to team success then it's a no brainer.

Ayton is still a kid just look at how he behaves... You have to let him mature up and develop his hunger for wins and competitiveness as he gets older... Just like Booker did. It takes a few seasons to get that hunger.


Regarding Pick 10... Suns should trade for a proven rotation player.

And about Warriors shopping pick 2... Tell you what... This draft is very weak... At least based on the scouting I've read. So much so that if they ring and offer pick 2 for both Bridges and Johnson... I would hang up.... There isn't a surefire stud in the top 3 that the Suns should chase and trade key players for.

Ayton lacks a strong offensive game period. Three-quarters of his made field goal attempts are assisted. Sure he has an outside jumper and a developing three-point shot but those aren't going to improve his free throw attempts. Both his post-up and face-up games need huge improvement. You can complain about his teammates not getting him the ball but 90% of it is Ayton unwilling to work hard to get an early low-block position in his post-up game. His face-up game is weak because he either settles for a jump shot or passes the ball away. Most likely this is due to his immature ball-handling skills.

Honestly, the post-up and face-up play can come later in his career, Ayton just needs to become a monster pick-n-roll / pick-n-pop option for Booker, Rubio, Bridges, and Johnson. He's capable of pick-n-pop right now. His pick-n-roll is really weak and I attribute that to his lackadaisical playing style. It could be he's never been in really good shape and his cardio is wanting. In the bubble, he was beaten down the floor regularly by Boban and that just boggles my mind. If he's not going to be a bruiser type of center then he needs to lose weight and become more agile, speedier, and bouncy.

Edit: Obviously Ayton is 4-5 years away from being a finished product and will likely be a 20/12 guy for quite a few years. That's nothing to sneeze at. His major advantage over other centers is he can't be chased off the floor by bad matchups against guards when he is defending the pick and roll. He's really good at the 1-1 defense on the small guards that typically put big men through the wringer.

[bwgood77]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, we don't have the cap space without renouncing everyone.

[NotACat]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, we don't have the cap space without renouncing everyone.

Got that from the other responses, would including Kaminsky be enough for Phoenix to keep Baynes and Saric?

And what if you all were getting Dinwiddie instead of AG?

[bwgood77]

Here is my off-season plan right now.

Draft: Take one of Haliburton, Bey, or Vassell at 10 and trade our next years pick lottery protected pick or something around those lines to acquire a pick around 14 (Boston maybe?) and select Jalen Smith from Maryland.

Free agency: Re-sign Carter, Dario, Payne, and use the MLE on a veteran guard like Augustin. After that i'd like to see us get a veteran big for depth purposes, someone like Baynes (loaded 1 year deal), Kyle O'Quinn, or Favors

Rotation going into next season:
Ricky/Augustin/Payne
Booker/Carter
Mikal/Oubre
Cam/Oubre/Dario/Smith
Ayton/Dario/Vet/Smith

With either Haliburton/Bey/Vassell as well

No cap flexibility lost at all and everyone comes back from last year with much improved depth. I think this is very realistic.

If we don't bring back Baynes we don't have the MLE. We would likely have around $12 million total to spend, I think, but not sure if that is enough for a loaded 1 year deal to some big plus Augustin.

[Weemsickew14]

Here is my off-season plan right now.

Draft: Take one of Haliburton, Bey, or Vassell at 10 and trade our next years pick lottery protected pick or something around those lines to acquire a pick around 14 (Boston maybe?) and select Jalen Smith from Maryland.

Free agency: Re-sign Carter, Dario, Payne, and use the MLE on a veteran guard like Augustin. After that i'd like to see us get a veteran big for depth purposes, someone like Baynes (loaded 1 year deal), Kyle O'Quinn, or Favors

Rotation going into next season:
Ricky/Augustin/Payne
Booker/Carter
Mikal/Oubre
Cam/Oubre/Dario/Smith
Ayton/Dario/Vet/Smith

With either Haliburton/Bey/Vassell as well

No cap flexibility lost at all and everyone comes back from last year with much improved depth. I think this is very realistic.

If we don't bring back Baynes we don't have the MLE. We would likely have around $12 million total to spend, I think, but not sure if that is enough for a loaded 1 year deal to some big plus Augustin.

If that is the case, we should definitely bring back Baynes, and then throw the MLE at whichever guard James Jones likes the most (Augustine an example, but there are a lot of options)

[WeekapaugGroove]

Magic fan here, would you all trade 10 for AG straight up?

No, we don't have the cap space without renouncing everyone.

Got that from the other responses, would including Kaminsky be enough for Phoenix to keep Baynes and Saric?

And what if you all were getting Dinwiddie instead of AG?

No attaching Frank isn't enough for AG. Oubre going out would really be the only way to get AG.

Dinwiddie only makes around $11mil so there are some ways make a deal with the pick plus some filler for him. I'm a big Dinwiddie fan and would be open to something like that but I also kind of like the idea of having a nice cost controlled asset by using that pick and I like some of the prospects at 10 so I'd have to think about it.

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[darmani]

Pretty much what we've been talking about here, but nicely laid out the facts. So basically assuming we keep Saric and Carter, keeping Baynes only costs us about a million of spending money on free agents, providing Sarver is willing to spend it.

So there really isn't any reason not to keep Baynes unless we wants a long term contract.

I imagine these free agents may not mind doing one year deals and might prefer it, given the fact there are a lot more teams with cap space next summer. However, I guess with Baynes, given his age, he may want the security if someone offers him 3 years, and I guess with all these guys, they are unlikely to get much more than the MLE per year even if they wait a year anyway. I guess maybe Saric could if he shot lights out or something.

We just don't know what Baynes will ultimately value in his decision this fall. He might ring chase and have no interest in coming back or since he hasn't made a ton of money in his career he might simply go to the highest bidder with the most overall money. I'm interested in bringing him back but obviously there's a breaking point and I wouldn't want to go more than 1 maybe 2 years.

One thing I'm curious of is if Baynes agrees to a deal with another team right away does that automatically drop the suns to an under the cap team and they can't use the MLE. Or maybe a better question is can the suns actually use the MLE while Saric and Baynes are just cap holds or do they need actual contract with them before they can technically sign someone to the MLE?

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I seriously doubt you can use the MLE before you actually sign your own free agents. That sounds like circumventing rules. Ultimately I thinnk IVPointPlay (twitter account...I have no idea what that guy's real name is) is probably right that we will work as an under the cap team and use our cap space to get right to the cap....it saves Sarver money...at least $9 million and probably more....of course if Baynes leaves, we basically have to unless we pay Dario and Carter (or Baynes if one of them leaves) enough to get over the cap, which is extremely unlikely.

You absolutely can use the MLE before signing your own free agents. If later during the season you drop below the salary cap your cap space is lowered by the cap hold of unused MLE.

[bwgood77]

We just don't know what Baynes will ultimately value in his decision this fall. He might ring chase and have no interest in coming back or since he hasn't made a ton of money in his career he might simply go to the highest bidder with the most overall money. I'm interested in bringing him back but obviously there's a breaking point and I wouldn't want to go more than 1 maybe 2 years.

One thing I'm curious of is if Baynes agrees to a deal with another team right away does that automatically drop the suns to an under the cap team and they can't use the MLE. Or maybe a better question is can the suns actually use the MLE while Saric and Baynes are just cap holds or do they need actual contract with them before they can technically sign someone to the MLE?

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I seriously doubt you can use the MLE before you actually sign your own free agents. That sounds like circumventing rules. Ultimately I thinnk IVPointPlay (twitter account...I have no idea what that guy's real name is) is probably right that we will work as an under the cap team and use our cap space to get right to the cap....it saves Sarver money...at least $9 million and probably more....of course if Baynes leaves, we basically have to unless we pay Dario and Carter (or Baynes if one of them leaves) enough to get over the cap, which is extremely unlikely.

You absolutely can use the MLE before signing your own free agents. If later during the season you drop below the salary cap your cap space is lowered by the cap hold of unused MLE.

Well that statement was under the condition we ended up not signing Baynes and ended up under the cap in the offseason (before accounting for the MLE). You're saying we can use our full MLE and then not keep Baynes which would have made us an under the cap team?

[GoodBehavior]

Aron Baynes staying with the Suns is at best 50/50. It's more unlikely than likely that he stays put. Though there's hope. Clippers have expressed very high interest in Baynes in the past, and he fits them like a glove. Tough. Good Weather. Championship Ambition. Owner that's willing to pay... Clippers can also hide his deficiency with their incredible weak side help. It's going to be hard for Baynes to say No. And if the Clippers have a disappoint playoff run, I think he's good as gone.

I think backup center is something you have to really think about. Saric and that tall white guy who can't make a layup ... is not going to cut it.

[BobbieL]

Aron Baynes staying with the Suns is at best 50/50. It's more unlikely than likely that he stays put. Though there's hope. Clippers have expressed very high interest in Baynes in the past, and he fits them like a glove. Tough. Good Weather. Championship Ambition. Owner that's willing to pay... Clippers can also hide his deficiency with their incredible weak side help. It's going to be hard for Baynes to say No. And if the Clippers have a disappoint playoff run, I think he's good as gone.

I think backup center is something you have to really think about. Saric and that tall white guy who can't make a layup ... is not going to cut it.

I think it will be very intersting to see how the cap is affected as that will affect player transactions. This should affect all teams in one way or another. I get the Suns could go from a team with say 23m of cap space under certain scenarios and that number might go to 16m. But for teams over the cap, my guess the lux tax line will also be lower. Now a team like the Warriors - they won't care. But they also might be close to being hard capped. So its going to be interesting. Thats why Saric and Baynes might be back on one year deals with team options in year 2 because though its not fully guaranteed for two years - they might be getting say 130-140% for one year.

[darmani]

I seriously doubt you can use the MLE before you actually sign your own free agents. That sounds like circumventing rules. Ultimately I thinnk IVPointPlay (twitter account...I have no idea what that guy's real name is) is probably right that we will work as an under the cap team and use our cap space to get right to the cap....it saves Sarver money...at least $9 million and probably more....of course if Baynes leaves, we basically have to unless we pay Dario and Carter (or Baynes if one of them leaves) enough to get over the cap, which is extremely unlikely.

You absolutely can use the MLE before signing your own free agents. If later during the season you drop below the salary cap your cap space is lowered by the cap hold of unused MLE.

Well that statement was under the condition we ended up not signing Baynes and ended up under the cap in the offseason (before accounting for the MLE). You're saying we can use our full MLE and then not keep Baynes which would have made us an under the cap team?

Yes.

To illustrate how it works, here's a fictional example:
- the salary cap is $100M,
- MLE is $10M
- a team enters the off-season as an over the cap team with $70M in guaranteed contracts and $40M (4 players $10M each) in cap holds for their free agents,
- they sign a player for $6M using their MLE,
- 3 of their free agents sign contracts with new teams and 1 remains unsigned,
- at this point they are an under the cap team with $76M in guaranteed contracts, $10M cap hold for one remaining free agent and $4M cap hold for the unused portion of the MLE, which means they still can sign a player for $10M (100-76-10-4) and another player for $4M but they can't sign one player for $14M.

[bwgood77]

You absolutely can use the MLE before signing your own free agents. If later during the season you drop below the salary cap your cap space is lowered by the cap hold of unused MLE.

Well that statement was under the condition we ended up not signing Baynes and ended up under the cap in the offseason (before accounting for the MLE). You're saying we can use our full MLE and then not keep Baynes which would have made us an under the cap team?

Yes.

To illustrate how it works, here's a fictional example:
- the salary cap is $100M,
- MLE is $10M
- a team enters the off-season as an over the cap team with $70M in guaranteed contracts and $40M (4 players $10M each) in cap holds for their free agents,
- they sign a player for $6M using their MLE,
- 3 of their free agents sign contracts with new teams and 1 remains unsigned,
- at this point they are an under the cap team with $76M in guaranteed contracts, $10M cap hold for one remaining free agent and $4M cap hold for the unused portion of the MLE, which means they still can sign a player for $10M (100-76-10-4) and another player for $4M but they can't sign one player for $14M.

Oh, ok. So they just flip to an under the cap team and that MLE is more used as actual cap space. I was thinking WG was asking if we could go over the cap with the MLE in such a scenario, even if we didn't end up signing Baynes. Maybe in addition to the cap space we use when Baynes goes elsewhere.

[WeekapaugGroove]

Aron Baynes staying with the Suns is at best 50/50. It's more unlikely than likely that he stays put. Though there's hope. Clippers have expressed very high interest in Baynes in the past, and he fits them like a glove. Tough. Good Weather. Championship Ambition. Owner that's willing to pay... Clippers can also hide his deficiency with their incredible weak side help. It's going to be hard for Baynes to say No. And if the Clippers have a disappoint playoff run, I think he's good as gone.

I think backup center is something you have to really think about. Saric and that tall white guy who can't make a layup ... is not going to cut it.

Yeah I'd put Baynes staying at less than 50%. So many reasons he could leave. Maybe he wants to start, or chase a ring, or someone offers a 3-4 year full MLE and the suns are only offering 1 or 2 years.

I'd be fine with Saric as the primary backup C, I think he's a really tough matchup for a lot of backup Cs and so few backup Cs are actually good enough on O to make him pay for being a little smaller than them. Now the suns should add another true big C in this scenario for depth and certain matchups. Maybe a scrap heap vet like Mahimni or something.

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