Messages

991

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 12:58:31 PM »

I know people hate Gordon, and I know he's not a great defender, but with the size we'll have at 3/4/5 (Thad, Brand, Dalembert starting with Speights and Smith off the bench), I think you can get away with a smaller 2 guard, especially if he's such a good half court offensive player. 

I know Gordon's BETTER but if you are going to go with a smaller 2 guard - isn't louis williams a cheaper easier to get version?

With Gordon you might want to go the route of starting a defensive-minded role player with some size at SG, with Gordon coming into the game early on off the bench.  Sort of like a Marc Iavaroni for the backcourt.

More importantly, now that we are at least rumored players for both Brand and Smith, who is your preference with Brand getting the max of our cap room and Smith getting the max available for a 4 year player?

Absent the achilles issue I would be all over Brand as my number one choice.  I wonder if Brand's visit here the other day included a physical of any kind, at least as regards the heel.  I definitely go back and forth between the two at this point.

992

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 12:25:05 PM »

Just to clarify- we can't make the same offer to Smith as we could to Brand.  As a 4 year player, Smith's salsry next year cannot go above about 13M (the max.)

I had not looked up the numbers, but I was hoping that was the case.  I presume a front loading sign-on bonus is not a way around the allowable max and that the total max is the same no matter how it is paid out.

993

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 12:17:57 PM »

Miller lobbying Brand?

Wow.

Miller actually speaking.  WOW.

Actually, if Miller was targeting the Clips as a likely destination to play with Brand, then the Baron Davis signing may have pushed Miller back towards us.

I am a little concerned that if Brand says no we will be overpaying for Smith.  This is a double problem because the Smith signing would seem to set the market for Iggy, whereas Brand and Iggy aren't really as comparable to create a benchmark.

994

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 10:32:34 AM »

Wow... I'm slightly speechless. The Brand rumors don't shock and as Jasner and SF76 have said, there's a good chance Brand is playing us. What is interesting is the straight up dumping of Carney, Booth, and I assume Utah's pick for nothing. If this works and Stefanski gets Brand or Smith... then it will be worth it. However, if he strikes out and we end up with nothing from this gained cap room then Ed will have just given away Korver, Carney, and Booth (who cares) and left this team with a huge need for a shooter when he had one.

This is the fun of being a GM.  If Stefanski does not go all out to get Brand or Smith he will be accused of being another typical Philly GM hwo doesn't really try hard enough to build a winner.  if he does go all out and fails, then he's an idiot, even if the chips were stacked against him by BK (Brand) and the CBA (Smith) all along.  So far he seems to be taking calculated risks, trading fringe players and role players (essentially Carney and Korver), to greatly improve our chances of signing a big name FA.  At worst we retain the cap space we paid for with players and can use it down the road.  He has not touched the higher end core of the team yet, only players who are of the type that can generally be acquired later at reasonable prices.

995

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: The state of Philadelphia Sports Radio

« on: July 08, 2008, 10:25:48 AM »

The nice thing about the Sixers being active this summer is that I can more easily ignore the Phillies downward slide, hopefully until they can actually turn it around.

BTW, here in the beautiful capitol city of PA we have a choice of a FoxSports station or a recently switched SportingNews Radio station.  The hosts on the SportingNews station almost seem like they were hired as bad actors out of central casting to play stereotypically bad sports news anchors and talk show hosts.  They are absolutely horrendous.  A complete lack of sports knowledge and the constant schtick of taking unpopular positions just to argue with idiot callers, and then pretend that this somehow makes their hosts seem relevant and controversial, rather than just moronic.  That station was an ESPN radio affiliate until recently and sad to say I actually miss ESPN on the radio now.

996

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 10:14:41 AM »

Not to nit-pik, but only teams over the salary cap get the MLE...  Teams under the salary cap do not get the MLE...  The sixers are under the cap and therefore do not get the mid-level exception...

http://www.sportscity.com/NBA/Salary-Cap/

If they did, we could be looking at over $20M in capspace which is not the case...

The 11-12 million already that has been floating about this summer implies that the exceptions are renounced.  That # includes the renounced MLE.  As tk is saying, it's really semantics, as if you're under the cap by more than the exceptions, you're going to want to renounce it, it always happens, and it's essentially you not getting the MLE.  but it is a two step process, you get the MLE, you renounce the MLE.  This is done so you can't use your cap space then use the MLE.

They probably don't have to formally renounce them until they need to use them, kind of like renouncing players with cap holds for the same purpose.  But given the way the CBA is set up, that would be simply a formality.  It is all cap space, before the exceptions are renounced it is chopped up cap space, after they are renounced it is one big heaping pile of cap space.

997

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Tracking Free Agency

« on: July 08, 2008, 10:00:40 AM »

This nervous waiting for FA news......SUCKS!!!  That is all.

998

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 09:56:18 AM »

I believe that's all accurate except number #3...  Philly doesn't have a MLE, so they can't renounce it...  They would renounce the trade exception and combine it with their available cap space (roughly $11.5M) to have 14-15M in cap space...

They get all of the exceptions, including the MLE, but since they have to renounce it to use it the effect is the same.

999

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Summer League

« on: July 08, 2008, 09:49:26 AM »

Hahaha....no what I meant was he's holding his summer league appearance hostage....like it matters if he's at the Summer league

How soon you forget that he is the Shaq of the Thomas Mac.   He is the stuff of Summer League legend.  he is...

the white John Salmons with bad hair. 

1000

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 09:44:11 AM »

Based on my reading of the CBA and the CBA FAQ's is that we would receive a trade exception in the amount of Carney and Booth's combined salaries.  For one year we could accept that amount of salary back in a trade even if we are over the cap without matching those salaries on their way out.  The exception counts against our cap.  To use some or all of it on Brand or Smith, we would have to renounce the exception and gain the pure cap space.  No double dipping (cap space plus trade exception) allowed.

1001

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 09:36:22 AM »

20.  How do exceptions count against the cap?  Does being under the cap always mean that a team has room to sign free agents?  Do teams ever lose their exceptions?

If a team is below the cap, then their Disabled Player, Bi-Annual, Mid-Level and/or Traded Player exceptions are added to their team salary, and the league treats the team as though they are over the cap.  This is to prevent a loophole, in a manner similar to free agent amounts (see question numbers 29, 30, 31, 32).  A team can't act like they're under the cap and sign free agents using cap room, and then use their Disabled Player, Bi-Annual, Mid-Level and/or Traded Player exceptions.  Consequently, the exceptions are added to their team salary (putting the team over the cap) if the team is under the cap and adding the exceptions puts them over the cap.  If a team is already over the cap, then the exceptions are not added to their team salary.  There would be no point in doing so, since there is no cap room for signing free agents.
So it is not true that being under the cap necessarily means a team has room to sign free agents.  For example, assume the cap is $49.5 million, and a team has $43 million committed to salaries.  They also have a Mid-Level exception for $5 million and a Traded Player exception for $5.5 million.  Even though their salaries put them $6.5 million under the cap, their exceptions are added to their salaries, putting them at $53.5 million, or $4 million over the cap.  So they actually have no cap room to sign free agents, and must instead use their exceptions.

Teams have the option of renouncing their exceptions in order to claim the cap room.  So in the example above, if the team renounced their Traded Player and Mid-Level exceptions, then the $10.5 million is taken off their team salary, which then totals $43 million, leaving them with $6.5 million of cap room which can then be used to sign free agent(s).

1002

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 08:06:25 AM »

I always hate to give up draft choices, but this is win-win:

1.  Helps us to be competitive for Brand, though I still have my doubts.  We should know what Brand will do by tommorrow.  If that fails, then...

2.  It helps us sweeten our offer tommorrow for Josh Smith just a little (I would not add another $2 million per to our offer, but maybe a couple hundred thousand) and allows us to do the rumored deal where get Knight/Deandre Jordan from the Clips.  Even if that fails...

3.  We pull off the Knight/Jordan deal anyway and have essentially traded Carney, Booth and Utah's first rounder for a promising young big with a low cap number in Jordan and a veteran PG in Knight with an expiring contract that won't eat up future cap space.  It also makes Miller more of a legitimate trade piece now or down the road at the deadline and does not screw with our future cap space.  If that is the worst case scenario, it is a good deal.

1003

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Brand?

« on: July 08, 2008, 12:15:49 AM »

I was just checking the main free agency thread to see if anyone had posted this story, I thought it was an old one I had somehow missed.  I'm not sure moving Carney alone gives us enough space to make a difference with Brand, but what the hey let's try.

If Brand doesn't bite, then moving Carney would allow us to possibly make essentially the same offer we planned to Smith and to take back Jodan/Knight from the Clips to help them retain Brand from GS.  Maybe that is the real Carney/Clips connection to this story.

1004

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Tracking Free Agency

« on: July 07, 2008, 11:08:53 PM »

He's just speculating like us at this point and rightfully so... I mean, how can anyone in the Sixers' FO really know what they are going to do until after Atlanta matches for HWMNBN.

Let's say ATL doesn't match, do we call it a summer at that point??

We have a lot of bigs at that point, Sammy, two Smiths, Evans, Speights and Cal.  We might see Jason Smith or Evans move at some point, maybe after the summer.  Calvin Booth, sixth big man on the depth chart, seventh if you count Thad, sounds about right for him.

1005

Philadelphia 76ers / Re: Tracking Free Agency

« on: July 07, 2008, 10:40:12 PM »

TGP - where did Blount come from in your post?

I saw that and was afraid to even ask.  Blount has a way scarier contract than good old Cal.