AROUND the NBA: Pat Bev Suspended 4 Games Next Season| PHX Fires Vogel

[DanSchwartzgan]

Do you put any stock in the thought that the difficulty in reaching a consensus argues for delaying any transactional pursuit?

Not really.  When's the last time we saw a deal coming in advance.  Just because we haven't thought of it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I'm going to throw out another name today.  It is partially about the player and partially about a cap illustration.  

Bojan is playing again (33 points last night).  Holmes plus Green for Bojan is in the sweet spot where Green's PP is satisfied.  The deal leaves Dallas just under the tax in 23/24 (almost as if they planned it that way).  It also saves $6.5mm off of the 24/25 cap (BB is only guaranteed $2mm, so you could save even more, but you wouldn't do that absent a major injury).  People can debate the on-court merits of turning Josh into an older, bigger more accomplished guy.  I'll simply say that Exum's emergence probably makes a crowded backcourt even more crowded.  Without Green, you'd have Luka/Kyrie/THJ/Exum as playoff rotation 'guards' (not to mention Seth and Hardy) and GWill/DJJ/Bojan/OMax as 'wings'.    

The money is the main thing I wanted to address.  The extra $6.5mm is meaningful in the effort to keep DJJ (or use some or all of the full MLE on someone else).  Loki mentioned being able to use the full MLE even when the team is a taxpaying team.  Yes, but then you are hard-capped if you do.  Spotrac has us at $172mm for 13 players next season ($172mm also happens to be the tax line).  Add in a minimum for the 14th player and you are about $5 million from the first apron.  The TP MLE is about that same $5 million.  So, as things currently stand we can only offer the TP-MLE as anything more would put us over the projected first Apron at $179.9mm.

But, if you do the cap lowering deal above you give yourself more flexibility under the apron. You are now about $11.5mm under. You've fallen back to 13 players again (in 24/25) and have to account for another minimum guy, but you are now something a hair over $9mm away from being hard-capped.  That extra room might be the difference between keeping and not keeping DJJ (or getting someone like Hartenstein in free agency).  Note that Curry is non-guaranteed next year, but you only pick up part of his $4mm salary if you waive him as you have to replace him with a minimum wage guy.  The point of all of this is any deal we might do before the TDL should be looked at from both an on-court standpoint in the current season and from a 24/25 cap standpoint if we believe keeping DJJ (or using a chunk of the MLE) is a priority.