Randy Foye

[...] In comparison, 36 such players have signed within those parameters in 2013. And in contrast to 2008, those names are often established quality role players who aren't quite stars and who rightly aren't being paid like it. At the top end, players like Monta Ellis, Jose Calderon, Brandon Jennings, Jarrett Jack, Jeff Teague and Carl Landry are all getting acceptable prices, perhaps $2 million annually less than they would have done five years ago. At the bottom end, established role players like Marreese Speights, Tony Allen and Chris Kaman are getting paid adequately for their useful role player production. And unlike in 2008, those deals like Kaman's are not too long. See also Greg Stiemsma, Tyler Hansbrough, Mike Dunleavy Jr, Dorell Wright and Randy Foye, none more than three years in length, some as short as one.

[T]he amnesty clause (that we're having to pretend will exist here, but which almost certainly will exist in some form) will further expand the range of available talents. A lot of decent players are going to become available, not because they can't play the game, but because they can't justify their contract. A lot of the candidates are obvious and inevitable, some perhaps less so. Here's a potential list:

- L.A. Clippers: Randy Foye and Ryan Gomes - As long as you don't play him as point guard - a position he simply does not "get" - Foye is not a bad player, as undersized 38% shooting two guards with mediocre jumpshots go. But Foye is also being paid $4,250,000 next season to do the work of someone being paid about half that. Meanwhile, Gomes is on the hook for $8 million over the next two seasons, and is coming off the back of a terrible season; a PER of 9.0 with ever-worsening rebounding. The Clippers still don't have an answer for their small forward hole, but Gomes definitely isn't it. (Maurice Williams, if he does not already, will have some trade value down the road and ought not be amnestied. Not when there are alternatives.)

None of this would have been necessary, however, were it not for the mismanagement that put the team into the situation. Forgetting for a moment the slightly amazing decision to give $110 million to a man who will play in only 47 out of 246 games in three seasons, let's take a second look at the Wizards' past draft. Regardless of what you think of Ricky Rubio - and for the record, you should think a LOT of Ricky Rubio - you must accept that having him is better than having a combination of Randy Foye and Mike Miller. Miller was always destined to be a one year rental, and Foye was not equal in calibre to a top five draft pick, even in a bad draft. He, too, may not come back. As a basketball decision, the Wizards appeared to decide that one year of Mike and Randy was better than four years of cheap production from a quality young player. As a basketball decision, it was wrong.

What that Rubio trade really did was shift the non-expiring contract of Darius Songaila. That was the prize, the purpose if you will, the reason why the best returning player for a #5 pick was only Randy Foye. In much the same way that double double machine (and ShamSports.com fantasy league mainstay) Brendan Haywood was just gifted away purely to facilitate getting out from under DeShawn Stevenson's final season of guaranteed money, the subtle switching of Darius, Etan Thomas and Stewie for Foye and Miller relieved the Wizards of Songaila's $4,818,000 salary for next season. Combine that with the fact that a combination of Foye and Miller cost $13,356,718, whereas keeping the three traded players would have cost $13,426,140 (assuming the #5 pick had not been signed), and you can see what they did there. They saved money. Congratulations, I guess.