Why You Will See Blazers Traded This Year
一篇寫的不錯的薪資分析，也點到拿Webster+#13換Barbosa對薪資空間的好處
不過薪資狀況要到選秀完後才會大致明朗化，所以看看就好
有興趣的可以了解一下目前拓荒者的薪資狀況
文章太長，恕不翻譯 汗(￣口￣)!!
http://www.blazersedge.com/2008/6/23/556872/why-you-will-see-blazers-t
As I've read the comments in various posts a recurring theme has come up,
which can be summarized thusly:
"We have some good, young, talented players with potential we're not completely
sure of yet. The team seems to be headed in the right direction though.
Let's take one more year to figure out what we've got. Let these guys gel
together and see what happens."
It's a good thought, and if you're just thinking chemistry and potential it
makes a ton of sense. Unfortunately a couple of NBA practicalities are going
to make that approach nearly impossible to take. I touched on the reason
why about midway through the Leandro Barbosa post below, but I want to give
this subject its own post so it's clear.
The big bugaboo when it comes to keeping many of our young players is the
salary cap. The summer of 2009 is going to be critical to Portland if they
have any hopes of utilizing the salary cap flexibility they've worked to
create. Next summer brings the perfect confluence: the Blazers have several
contracts in flux and their young superstars are all still under rookie salary
scale and don't cost much. 2009-10 is the only time those two things will
be true and thus the only time that window will be open.
If you don't know why the window is so short, the answer is simple: Brandon
Roy and Lamarcus Aldridge. 2009-10 will be their fourth year in the league.
Normal procedure is for a fourth-year player to receive a qualifying offer,
perhaps becoming a restricted free agent at the end of the season. (More about
that in a minute.) This isn't going to happen with players the caliber of
Roy and Aldridge. The Blazers will want to lock them up early. The young
stars' agents will want the same. That means one or both getting huge, long
contracts which obliterate the normal qualifying offer amount…along similar
lines as Dwyane Wade and Carmelo Anthony last off-season. Those two contracts
are going to chomp up the Blazers' salary cap. As if that weren't enough,
Greg Oden will come due one year later. After that, provided things go well,
you can pretty much kiss cap space goodbye for the next decade. The opportunity
afforded Portland in the summer of 2009-10 is unprecedented in franchise
history and will not come around again soon.
For those who doubt the efficacy of cap space, remember that signing potential
free agents is only one of its uses. It also opens up whole new universes on
the trade front. With significant cap space you have the ability to trade
away and take back players you never dreamed of when you were over the cap.
You also become an attractive third trading partner for other teams that want
to execute Base Year Compensation deals and need somewhere to send a player
for free. It’s not unheard of for GM’s who are under the cap to get phone
calls saying (literally), "Please take my player for nothing!" You don't get
All-Stars that way, of course, but it's not beyond the realm of possibility
to get a solid veteran or James Jones-type player without giving up any assets
but the salary slot.
Either via trade or free agent signing, preserving cap flexibility next summer
represents the best chance by far for the Blazers to add targeted, veteran
pieces to complete their lineup if that is their desire. That's the bottom
line.
How does that affect player movement this year? The key lies in understand-
ing…
two numbers,
four contracts,
and one salary cap rule.
The two numbers are $30 million and $56 million.
$30 million is a rough approximation, give or take a million or two, of the
salaries the Blazers will be committed to next summer, provided they retain
this year's #13 pick and don't make any trades. That number represents the
contracts of Greg Oden, Joel Przybilla, Lamarcus Aldridge, Travis Outlaw,
Brandon Roy, Sergio Rodriguez, Rudy Fernandez, and the #13 pick. You can add
a little bit for a 2009 draft pick or if you think Koponen will make the team,
for instance, but basically that's solid.
$56 million is a conservative guess at the likely salary cap figure that year,
again give or take a couple million. (We're free to do that because, as
you're going to see in a minute, it's not going to matter.)
Obviously the $26 million difference between those two numbers appears to leave
the Blazers in great shape. Just as obviously there are names missing from
that list of contracts above. James Jones' contract expires just before
summer and for these purposes I'm assuming he won't be re-signed. The remain-
ing four contracts at issue are Steve Blake, Martell Webster, Channing Frye,
and Jarrett Jack.
Steve Blake is different than the other three. His contract is worth $4.9
million in 2009-10 but it is a team option. The decision with him is pretty
simple. If we want him back we pay him the money and it's added to our cap,
thus making $35 million committed. If not we release him and retain the cap
space.
The other three are not so simple. Martell, Channing, and Jarrett will have
just completed their fourth year in the league. This brings up a situation
which I described fully in last Friday's post and I will summarize here.
Basically four things can happen with them:
1. The Blazers can renounce those players, say goodbye to them at the end of
the 2009 season, and take no cap hit at all.
2. The Blazers can sign them to a new contract if the two parties can come to
terms. In that case their new salary counts against the cap.
3+4. The Blazers can make a qualifying offer for one more year of the player's
services. The player then has a choice:
--They can accept the qualifying offer, play out the one extra season (2009-
10), and then become an unrestricted free agent, able to go wherever they wish
on the open market.
--They can reject the qualifying offer and spend the summer of 2009 trying to
negotiate the best deal they can around the league. The Blazers would have
the right to match any offer they got and thus retain the player. The Blazers
could also refuse to match the offer and let the player go. This is that
Restricted Free Agency thing you hear so much about.
An important thing to remember here is that unless they choose to renounce the
player outright (Option 1 above) the Blazers cannot control which of these
options comes to pass. They are the player's choice. The Blazers cannot force
a player to negotiate a new deal (Option 2). They cannot force a player to
take a qualifying offer instead of spending the summer as a Restricted Free
Agent (Options 3 + 4). The only choice directly in the team's control is to
cut or not cut.
This is where that salary cap rule comes in. To preserve the sanctity of the
cap the league doesn’t want teams to go out and sign a bunch of regular free
agents and then come back and sign its own Restricted Free Agents to huge
contracts, possibly exceeding the cap limit in the process. To prevent this
they've instituted a rule. A team's Restricted Free Agents place a hold on
cap space equal to 300% of their past year's salary. This is just like the
hold that goes on your credit card at a hotel. It doesn't have anything to
do with what you will spend. It's inflated to account for everything you might
spend. As long as your Restricted Free Agent remains unsigned, cap space
equal to 300% of his past year's salary is tied up. You cannot spend it on
free agents or use it in trade.
This is where the rubber hits the road. If the Blazers let those three players
get into next summer unsigned, if those players and their agents decide it's
in their best interests to become Restricted Free Agents (again a choice
outside of Portland's control), those players' cap space footprint balloons.
Here are the specific numbers:
Martell Webster-- Current Salary $3.8 million Cap Space Hold $11.4 million
Channing Frye-- Current Salary $3.2 million Cap Space Hold $9.6 million
Jarrett Jack-- Current Salary $2.0 million Cap Space Hold $6.0 million
Total Cap Space Hold = $27 million
Best-Case Scenario Cap Space Available Summer 2009 = $26 million
Even in the best-case scenario for cap flexibility--not re-signing James Jones
and not exercising Steve Blake's option year--the holds take up ALL of our cap
space. Nothing is left. Of course this would only last until these players
were signed by us or another team, then the excess hold would disappear. But
teams are often reluctant to sign offer sheets for Restricted Free Agents for
fear they will just be matched. That makes the process s…l…o…w. Also keep
in mind that rival teams will not be eager to free up Portland's cap space by
rushing to resolve its contracts in limbo. It could easily take all summer to
finalize a deal. We'd miss the prime of the free agent signing period for
sure, plus whatever trade opportunities came up during that time. Our already
-short window would be cut even shorter. Clearly it's not in the Blazers' best
interests to let things get to this point.
Keep in mind our original question: Why can't we just take a year to evaluate,
let these guys gel, and then see what we have? This pretty much answers it.
For these three players, at least, the freedom to evaluate and guess about
potential is passing quickly. We're out of time. The Blazers are going to have
to make some decisions about them very soon: cut, offer to re-sign, or trade?
I am not privy to the team's war councils, of course, but I'd say cutting any
of these players is an unlikely option. All are assets, all have value, and
you don't want to abandon that without compensation.
It's also unlikely that all three players would accept one-year qualifying
offers. This would certainly alleviate Portland's 2009 cap issues but it's
generally unsatisfactory. From the team's point of view if the guy is a key
piece you don't want him becoming an unrestricted free agent after 2010 and
risk losing him. From the player's and agent's point of view you want to have
a longer-term contract for security. The exception to this would be if you
thought you were going to have a breakout season, but realistically will any
of these guys have the opportunity to do that in Portland? Perhaps one of the
three would take this option, but all three? Doubt it. Besides--and don't
forget this--letting it get to the qualifying offer stage exposes the Blazers
fully to the risk of them rejecting those offers, becoming Restricted Free
Agents, and swamping our cap in the summer. If Portland isn't sure the players
are going to accept the qualifying offers it cannot make them…at least not
with all three.
Whether any or all of the three will be offered--or would accept--new contracts
before the qualifying offers become an issue depends on the Blazers' evalua-
tion of them and their evaluation of their prospects here. How much do you
trust them? How much do they want to play here? How much money do they want?
All three are in similar positions. They're young. They have enough talent
to know they have a possible career in this league but none of them has been
consistent yet. Each one is playing behind people--either in the rotation or
in terms of shots--that the team appears to bank on more. What will it take
to get these guys to sign under those conditions? Will the Blazers be willing
to pay enough? Will these guys want to wear Portland's uniform enough? Do
we know enough about them and how they fit in our plans to make a long-term
decision now? Granted none of these questions are as up-in-the-air as they
appear from our outside point of view. Nevertheless they are still up in the
air. In the end it also seems unlikely that the Blazers would sign all three
to long-term contracts or that all three would accept.
Put this all together and you understand why you're going to see one or more
of these guys traded this year. One of them might get a new contract, but not
all three. One of them might accept a one-year qualifying offer, but not all
three. One of them may become a Restricted Free Agent, but not all three.
And if you're thinking, “Why not one of each?” it's equally doubtful that
the Blazers will look at all three and say, “These guys are so intrinsic to
our plans and we trust their fidelity so much that we have to take the risk of
retaining all of them by these various means.” There may not be anything
negative about the players. Instead the Blazers may just see an opportunity
to get some solid, experienced help and solid, bankable contracts rather than
having to take the gamble of answering questions like the ones posed here.
It's certain that they'll be valuing security over risk when it comes to
protecting their cap situation next summer and that will chart the course as
much as anything.
Whenever a trade is mentioned people start worrying about the cap space rami-
fications, as if every contract we take on that doesn't expire next summer
costs us space. It's actually the contrary. Using last week's rumors as an
example, trading Martell Webster and the #13 pick for a veteran who will make
$5.3 million in 2008-09 would be a complete wash salary-wise. The two amounts
are equal. But come the summer of 2009-10 that veteran we traded for would
still be making around $5.3 million, maybe with a small raise, and that's all
the cap space he would take. An unsigned Martell and the #13 pick will take
up $13 million until Martell puts his signature on a piece of paper. It would
be far better for us during our most critical cap flexibility juncture to have
a long-running contract the amount of Martell Webster's than to have Martell's
short-term contract uncertainty hanging over our heads.
Whether it's in Thursday's draft, during pre-season, or in the middle of the
season itself you're going to see some Blazers moved before the trading dead-
line next February. These will almost certainly include some of the young guys
that people want to see more of like Martell, Channing, and Jarrett. The
course isn't decided by chemistry, loyalty, or potential alone. It's also
determined by the rules of the game you're playing. In this case the rules
pretty much dictate some of these players, or maybe all of them, will be moved.
It's still anybody's guess which ones, where, and for whom.
--
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