The Juan Carlos Navarro Experience
April 29th, 2008
After the completion of the Grizzlies’s second consecutive poor season, Spanish guard Juan Carlos Navarro immediately returned to his native Spain. Immediately. And why wouldn’t he? A free agent this offseason, Navarro has been roundly stiffed by Memphis, who have managed to mismanage his situation rather spectacularly, in the way that only they know how. Let’s recap: 1: Memphis traded a protected first rounder to Washington for the draft rights to Navarro. 2: They then sign Darko Milicic to a big deal, taking up most of their cap space. 3: Then, the Grizzlies completely inexplicably sign Casey Jacobsen and Andre Brown to minimum salary deals before completing negotiations with Navarro, as well as sign Mike Conley to his rookie deal (thus making his cap number 120% of the scale, not the 100% that was billed before he signed.) As a result, they were left with only just above the minimum left from their cap room to give Navarro ($538,050), after he had already sealed his buyout with Barcelona. Navarro, as a result, had to take the only offer that Memphis could give him – one made unnecessarily poor by those inconsequential Jacobsen and Brown signings – and wound up playing for an overall financial loss last season. Memphis then sucked all year, and also traded away Juan’s mate, Pau Gasol. In the end, Navarro left Europe to come to the NBA, where he was treated with less money, less minutes, less acclaim, less wins, and less friends than he had just left his native country for. So no, I shouldn’t imagine that he’s entirely sold on the idea of coming back.
2008 NBA Offseason Preview: Charlotte Bobcats
April 18th, 2008
The second in a new series of posts detailing teams financial outlooks for the upcoming free agency period, what cap room they have, what exceptions, what draft slots, etc. Should be fascinatingly fascinating, if you’re easily pleased. No information is 100% guaranteed accurate, but unless you’re privy to hitherto unknown information, or just better at this than I am (highly possible), then it’s probably more accurate than you’ve seen before. To be completed in an order best described as “Random”. Charlotte Bobcats Currently Committed Salary, 2008/09: Jason Richardson – $12,222,221 Gerald Wallace – $9,500,000 Nazr Mohammed – $6,049,400 Matt Carroll – $5,050,000 Adam Morrison – $4,159,200 Raymond Felton – $4,148,715 Sean May – $2,661,026 Jared Dudley – $1,222,320 Total: $45,012,882 Team options: Othella Harrington – $2,552,000 (no chance) Jermareo Davidson – $711,517 (probable) Total including options: $48,276,399 Unrestricted Free Agents: Derek Anderson (cap hold – $1,001,793) Earl Boykins (cap hold – $924,732) Restricted Free Agents: Emeka Okafor (qualifying offer – $7,082,635, cap hold – $13,568,268) Ryan Hollins (qualifying offer – $972,581, cap hold – $893,693) Draft picks: First round: 8th pick, subject to lottery results. (Cap hold – $2,002,600) Second round: 38th pick (no cap hold) Cap room/exceptions: None, unless they renounce Okafor….which they won’t. MLE and BAE, no trade exceptions. Depth chart if you take all the free agents away: PG – Felton SG – Richardson, Carroll SF – Dudley, Morrison PF – Wallace, May C – Mohammed Sensible things to do: Re-sign Okafor, but don’t overpay – let him find out how weak the market is the hard way. Get better backup guards, and whose presence the coach won’t hold against Felton. Keep Hollins or Davidson, but not really both because there’s not much point. Pray for a rainout.
2008 NBA Offseason Preview: Chicago Bulls
April 17th, 2008
The first in a new series of posts detailing teams financial outlooks for the upcoming free agency period, what cap room they have, what exceptions, what draft slots, etc. Should be fascinatingly fascinating, if you’re easily pleased. No information is 100% guaranteed accurate, but unless you’re privy to hitherto unknown information, or just better at this than I am (highly possible), then it’s probably more accurate than you’ve seen before.. To be completed in an order best described as “Random”. Chicago Bulls Currently Committed Salary, 2008/09: Larry Hughes – $12,827,676* Kirk Hinrich – $10,250,000* Andres Nocioni – $8,000,000 Drew Gooden – $7,151,183 Tyrus Thomas – $3,749,880 Joakim Noah – $2,295,480 Thabo Sefolosha – $1,931,160 Cedric Simmons – $1,742,760 Aaron Gray – $711,517 JamesOn Curry – $711,517 (not fully guaranteed) Total: $49,371,173 (* = has incentives. Hughes’s salary listed WITHOUT incentives, that are dependent on win totals, and thus won’t be considered likely. Hinrich’s salary listed WITH incentives, which probably won’t be considered likely either.) Unrestricted Free Agents: Shannon Brown (cap hold – $1,116,960) Chris Duhon (cap hold – $6,496,000) Restricted Free Agents: Ben Gordon (qualifying offer – $6,404,749, cap hold – $14,645,007) Luol Deng (qualifying offer – $4,452,574, cap hold – $9,961,017) Demtris Nichols (qualifying offer – $886,517, cap hold – $512,596) Draft picks: First round: 9th pick, subject to lottery results. (Cap hold – $1,840,800) Second round: 39th pick (no cap hold) Cap room/exceptions: Nada room, MLE, BAE, and a $5,205,000 trade exception. Mario Austin: Is brilliant. Depth chart if you take all the free agents away: PG – Hinrich, Curry SG – Hughes, Sefolosha SF – Nocioni, Sefolosha PF – Gooden, Thomas, Simmons C – Noah, Gray Sensible things to do: Let Chris Duhon go. Gas Larry Hughes. Don’t […]
Do NBA Players Ever Actually Accept Their Qualifying Offers?
April 16th, 2008
If your team didn’t agree to an extension with its starlet young player this past offseason – such as is the case with the Atlanta duo of Josh Childress and Josh Smith, the Chicago duo of Luol Deng and Ben Gordon, amongst others – then you’ve probably experienced a modicum of conversation as to whether that player will take the one-year qualifying offer this offseason rather than the security of a long-term deal, leaving the distinct possibility that your team will lose a key player and important asset, for nothing in return. Talk of this possibility happening is particularly widespread in the case of Gordon, who hasn’t done much to deny it. Let me try and set your mind at rest – it’s really not that likely. Or rather, it should be really unlikely. It might happen, but history suggests that it shouldn’t. This is a list of all the rookie scale players to have accepted the fifth-year qualifying offer in recent times, and how that went for them. Melvin Ely Season before free agency: 9.8 points, 4.9 rebounds, 51% shooting Season spent on Qualifying Offer: 3.0 points, 1.8 rebounds, 36% shooting Season after that: 3.9 points, 2.8 rebounds, 47% shooting Melvin Ely has had one year of average NBA production in seven attempts. That one season was, conveniently, the final one of his rookie contract. Never justifying his draft position, that one year gave Ely the chance to make a bit of money, especially given that it was probably his only other chance at a multi-year contract. (Ely was 28 at the time, after joining the league at age 24. Ely took Charlotte’s one year QO of $3,308,615 (which may or may not have been the only contract that they offered) in preference to taking Phoenix’s multi-year offer, […]
The only bits worth keeping from the long-deleted 2008 Where Are They Now series
April 14th, 2008
Andrei Fetisov is the ultimate “who the hell”. A draft choice by the Bucks back in the dark ages of 1994, Andrei never made it to the NBA. Given that he’s now 36 years old and retired, the dream is probably dead. Still, the Bucks do still own his rights, for he hasn’t been retired for long enough yet for them to lose them. This is worth elaborating on, actually. You’re probably wondering, why are Milwaukee keeping onto his rights, when they have no intention of signing him at any point? Well, the answer is that they’re using him for his trade value. That probably seems like a stupid statement, given that the draft rights who will never join the league have about as much use as a chocolate teapot. But it’s not about the value of the rights per se: it’s more of a technical issue. In trades, both teams have to give up something. What that something is, is up to them. A player, pick, or cash are options. But sometimes, they don’t want to (or can’t) give those things up. So they have to give up at least something, even if only as a token gesture. That’s where these draft rights become useful. They can act as the “something” given up in a trade. A team can give up the draft rights to a player as their outgoing half of a trade, and add in nothing more if they so wish (or are so able). That may sound like it’s farfetched, and would never happen. Yet it does. It’s rare, but it does occasionally happen. For example, when Peja Stojakovic left Indiana to sign with New Orleans, Indiana asked New Orleans – with a cash incentive to convince New Orleans to help them – to make the […]
