Trading a Retiring Player

[shrink]

I was recently discussing what would happen if the Cav's traded Eric Snow, and I realized I have a lot of these issues jumbled up in my mind, and I was hoping someone could help me straighten them out. Snow's body is shot, and he put his papers in for retirement, but he's still a one-year expiring contract which would have some trade value on the right team. Here are my questions:

1. If he's retiring because of a medical reason, do the Cavs get an injury exception to use to get another player?

2. Can you even trade a player if the NBA accepts his retirement papers? I assume the answer is "yes" since Aaron McKie was given a new contract and traded, but perhaps he never officially retired?

3. Snow would be traded after he was injured. Does his insurance transfer to the next team?

4. Since his contract is only one-year, this doesn't apply here, but if he had a Darius Miles-length contract, what defines whether the NBA simply excuses the salary from their cap?


I think I'm confusing injuries and retirement, and perhaps seeing a difference if the first causes the latter. Thanks to anyone who can straighten me out.

[Three34]

Only the team for whom the player was playing when the injury occured can get the salary cap reprieve. This was a rule brought in after that Terrell Brandon nonsense.

[Dekko1]

I was recently discussing what would happen if the Cav's traded Eric Snow, and I realized I have a lot of these issues jumbled up in my mind, and I was hoping someone could help me straighten them out. Snow's body is shot, and he put his papers in for retirement, but he's still a one-year expiring contract which would have some trade value on the right team.

Snow has apparently not filed retirement papers, this Danny Ferry quote is from two days ago:
"Unfortunately Eric is a difficult position with his knee," Ferry said. "He is a professional and part of this team but still requires continual medical attention going into the new season. We may not have clarity on his situation in terms of his health and the financial component for many months."
http://www.cleveland.com/cavs/index.ssf/2008/08/nba_insider_new_cav_williams_k.html

Here are my questions:
1. If he's retiring because of a medical reason, do the Cavs get an injury exception to use to get another player?

If a player officially retires for any reason no exception is rewarded. If he is just judged by the league doctor out for the season then they could apply for a Disabled exception.

2. Can you even trade a player if the NBA accepts his retirement papers?
I assume the answer is "yes" since Aaron McKie was given a new contract and traded, but perhaps he never officially retired?

I think the answer is no with the reason you gave getting around it.
Many are only semi-retired not officially. The team retains any free agent Bird/Early Bird rights on those but they also have a cap hold if they are FAs and not renounced.
But the idea of just collecting checks with being trade 'fixes' is iffy, if they are not going to come back and play the league sometimes turns those trades down as circumvention.
McKie was actually being an assistant coach but with no contract or compensation, so the lakers actually traded away another team's coach...

3. Snow would be traded after he was injured. Does his insurance transfer to the next team?

The insurance is for the length of the contract, that the contract can be transferred should not effect that and they would be paying the 80% after 41 games missed...unless he comes back and plays.

4. Since his contract is only one-year, this doesn't apply here, but if he had a Darius Miles-length contract, what defines whether the NBA simply excuses the salary from their cap?

A team has to apply for the cap relief following a full year after the injury, it has to be approved by the league/NBPA independent doctor, and the players rights have to be waived.
With more than one year left on the contract the cap relief has to be applied for each year and the league doctor has to again declare the player is disabled.
If they play 10 games with any other NBA team then they go back on the original team's cap no matter what the doctor says.
Larry thinks this last part might looked at. Seems to me they should be restricted free agents for this case until their contract is up, or the team just be given the cap relief with no qualifier since they have to waive them.

I think I'm confusing injuries and retirement, and perhaps seeing a difference if the first causes the latter. Thanks to anyone who can straighten me out.

There are rules for disabled 'active' players mainly for a replacement for the first season injured with the exception to go over the cap to sign a replacement player, but the injured players stays on the cap.
There are plain officially and unofficially retired players which stay on the cap for any compensation paid distributed for the length of the original contract, no matter when the actual money is paid.
And there is the disability retirement for a career ending injury rule which can only happen a year after the injury.

Snow in this case is just an ending contract for trade purposes that I can see. The right for a disabled player exception is not transferred if he is traded, it can only be applied for by the team they were on at the time of the injury.

[Dekko1]

Henry Abbott had an interesting post about the McKie situation and not quite retired players are listed:

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-30-10/Aaron-McKie-is-Not-the-Only-NBA-Coach-Who-Could-Get-Traded.html

Aaron McKie is Not the Only NBA Coach Who Could Get Traded

February 4, 2008 4:03 PM

This time last week, Aaron McKie was an unpaid assistant coach for the Philadelphia 76ers (although he is still making money from his last contract as a player).

Then McKie was traded from the Los Angeles Lakers to the Memphis Grizzlies.

What?

Even better, now he's going to get a chance to be that rarest of things, a player/assistant coach. And for his troubles, he'll reportedly make an additional $750,000 or so.

Not bad!

But how did that happen?

McKie was included in the deal to make the salary cap numbers work. The Lakers could have renounced McKie, but instead -- as teams often do -- held onto his rights. Sometimes the rights to retired players can come in handy, and the cost of keeping them is only some salary cap inflexibility.

A free agent like McKie stays on the books as a "cap hold" until he re-signs with his own team, signs with another team, or is renounced. UPDATE: These players are not under contract and are typically not paid (exception: McKie, and all those bought out under the one-time amnesty rule). But they have not been renounced either -- it's like the team has a right of first refusal to their playing services if they want to come back. And that right costs the team a little bit of space under the salary cap. Teams that are trying to maximize cap space to sign free agents typically will renounce these guys. But in the meantime, they hang around on the books.

This allows a team, like the Lakers with Aaron McKie, to use that player in a trade, instead of a player on their current roster.

Some of the names might surprise you -- like current Raptors head coach Sam Mitchell, who could in theory be traded by Minnesota. (Based on a conversation I just had with the league office, for the league to approve such a trade, the NBA would have to be satisfied that Mitchell's contract with the Raptors was completley resolved -- bought out, terminated etc. -- and that whichever team was acquiring Mitchell was doing so to get him to play basketball for them. They frown on retired players moving around on paper just to satisfy the collective bargaining agreement.)

Here is a list of some other "Aaron McKies" that are on the books and eligible to be traded, even though most have retired. Some have big cap holds, and could have big new contracts without becoming difficult-to-trade "base year compensation" players. That means they could become part of big trades.

High Salary
Chicago P.J. Brown ($8,560,000)
Dallas Keith Van Horn ($15,694,250)
Indiana Rik Smits ($12,250,000)
Minnesota Latrell Sprewell ($14,625,000)

Medium Salary
Boston Roshown McLeod
Chicago Michael Sweetney
Detroit Victor Alexander, Dale Davis, Don Reid
Golden State Calbert Cheaney
Houston Maciej Lampe, Jake Tsakalidis
Indiana Zan Tabak
LA Lakers Ron Harper, Karl Malone, Shammond Williams
New Orleans Marc Jackson
Philadelphia Rodney Rogers
Phoenix Jalen Rose
Portland Voshon Leonard, Detlef Schrempf
Sacramento Vitaly Potapenko, Brent Price, Corliss Williamson
Seattle Danny Fortson
Utah Greg Ostertag
Washington Anthony Peeler

Minimum Salary
Boston Dana Barros, Grant Long
Dallas Vernon Maxwell, Johnny Newman, Walt Williams, Kevin Willis
Denver Wesley Person
Detroit Tony Delk, Danny Manning
Indiana Tyus Edney, Tim Hardaway, Terry Mills, LaSalle Thompson
LA Lakers Horace Grant, Mitch Richmond, John Salley, Brian Shaw
Miami Shandon Anderson, Christian Laettner, Gary Payton, John Wallace, Zhi-zhi Wang
Minnesota Oliver Miller, Sam Mitchell
New Jersey Travis Best, Hubert Davis, Sherman Douglas, Gheorghe Muresan
New York Kelvin Cato, Andrew Lang, Felton Spencer, Bruno Sundov
Philadelphia Rick Mahorn, Derrick McKey
Portland Chris Dudley
San Antonio Glenn Robinson, Nick Van Exel
Washington Chris Whitney

[FGump]

There is a big problem in this discussion, which is the muddled use of terminology ...in particular, the use of the word "retired" (retiring, retirement).

In the real world, our view of "retirement" is a situation where a person voluntarily stops working. And therefore stops receiving new compensation (other than deferred money, set asides for retirement, etc)

But in the NBA, they toss the term around in all sorts of random ways.

The biggest confusion arises when Player X has gotten to the point in his career that he can't play a lick anymore, but he isn't really "impaired" (other than from age and suckiness) and still has a fully guaranteed contract. Yes he probably has a few aches and pains, because that's the nature of athletics, but he doesn't really have something like a knee that bends sideways or a shoulder he can't lift over his head anymore or a foot he can't walk on. So for PR purposes, the team and player create this glorious dog-and-pony show where they say "Player X is retiring" - when in actuality what is going on is that he sucks and is going to go home to his couch to free up a roster spot, while still getting full pay for the duration of his guaranteed contract.