Trade & FA 2023-24: Stein-Ingram Trade Inevitable| LAL Want Lebron Back On Any Terms

[F Gump]

There is some confusion about new CBA "aggregation" rules regarding Ayton on another board.  It was suggested that after 7/1/23, Ayton can't be traded with multiple players coming back.  This is not a concern for 2023.  It is a second apron thing, but it doesn't start until the 24/25 season.

In that season, if you are over the second apron, you can't aggregate up or down (can't turn two players into one in a trade and can't turn one into two).  That is a big deal because not only are you competitively punished for spending that much, but you have few avenues to fix your mistake.  But again, a 24 thing, not a 23 thing.  If they really were relatively close to an Ayton trade that included Holmes we know:

1. All the positioning about new coach looking forward to working with him is BS.
2. This was after the drafting of Lively (or we wouldn't have had Holmes to trade).

I did the match and with Irving at $40mm to start, we cross the first apron if we don't include McGee as outgoing (not by much though, so it could be fixed by fine tuning Kyrie down a bit more (though we don't even know if $40mm is a real thing or not).  If McGee is outgoing, then we can have the N-TP MLE.  In fact, there are a few extra dollars to give to Kyrie or use in a trade spread with Bullock outgoing or use to keep a 15th player on the roster.

Clock is ticking on Reggie.  If you don't pick up his guarantee, it has a similar impact to trading McGee if you don't S/W him.  You have to account for dead money and a minimum slot to replace him.  But with Irving at $40mm, 14 spots and Reggie just straight waived, I have us at $169mm.  We will have moved off of two wings in THJ and Reggie, but we only need one and the MLE can provide that.

Thanks for the explanation.

One clarification - from what I understand about the no-aggregation rule, it is only a team over Apron 2 that cannot aggregate. "Beginning on the day after the last day of the 2023-24 Regular Season, teams [over Apron 2] will be unable to use a TPE generated by aggregating the Salaries of multiple Traded Players."

So a team over Apron 2 can receive more players than they send, just so long as no aggregation by them is involved.