Looking ahead

[riverman]

Kanter might be easier then you think by resigning him he feels safe in Oregon.

I certainly hope so...if Chief walks or we don't match his bird rights, I'd offer him Chief's current money.

 

[Pinwheel1]

https://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/...n-the-trail-blazers-rotation-next-season.html

Where does he see himself as a starter, as a power forward or center?

“Not sure. Right now I think it’s good for the team that I can play a little bit of both, but obviously to get to that starting position it’s going to have to be one or the other. I think if I do put on a little more weight I think that five position will be a good spot for me. I like playing the five personally because I’m involved in everything, especially defensively — almost all the pick-and-rolls are with the five man, I like to be involved defensively and impacting the ball and stuff. Personally I would like to play a five but we’ll see.”

I go back and fourth on this. I want him to be at PF because I want him to fit next to Nurk. But I agree with Zach, he is more involved when he is at center.
But if he does gain weight and he can fill in at center until Nurk is healthy and that is where he wants to play....maybe we do not sign Kanter. We trade Meyers (Who I think has value even at 11 million per) and our first for cap space. ET would be optimal to trade but a little harder without taking back a contract. Then we sign Hood instead.

 

[hoopsjock]

https://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/...n-the-trail-blazers-rotation-next-season.html

Where does he see himself as a starter, as a power forward or center?

“Not sure. Right now I think it’s good for the team that I can play a little bit of both, but obviously to get to that starting position it’s going to have to be one or the other. I think if I do put on a little more weight I think that five position will be a good spot for me. I like playing the five personally because I’m involved in everything, especially defensively — almost all the pick-and-rolls are with the five man, I like to be involved defensively and impacting the ball and stuff. Personally I would like to play a five but we’ll see.”

I go back and fourth on this. I want him to be at PF because I want him to fit next to Nurk. But I agree with Zach, he is more involved when he is at center.
But if he does gain weight and he can fill in at center until Nurk is healthy and that is where he wants to play....maybe we do not sign Kanter. We trade Meyers (Who I think has value even at 11 million per) and our first for cap space. ET would be optimal to trade but a little harder without taking back a contract. Then we sign Hood instead.

The problem is that Stotts seemingly refused to give the Collins/Nurk pairing much of a chance to see how it would work. I still don't understand why he wouldn't go to that more throughout the season.

 

[B-Roy]

Zach has always looked better as a 5 to me. When he’s playing 4 he’s often out on the perimeter guarding some stretch 4. That’s not his strength.

 

[B-Roy]

I certainly hope so...if Chief walks or we don't match his bird rights, I'd offer him Chief's current money.

We cannot offer Kanter (or Hood) more than the tax-MLE which is about 5.5 million. And even then we can only sign one of them.

 

[hoopsjock]

We cannot offer Kanter (or Hood) more than the tax-MLE which is about 5.5 million. And even then we can only sign one of them.

We can offer Hood $4.15 million. Kanter is either minimum, MLE, or nothing.

 

[Pinwheel1]

We can offer Hood $4.15 million. Kanter is either minimum, MLE, or nothing.

And if we trade Meyers and our 1st for a 2nd? Is that enough for the larger MLE? How much cap do we have to clear for the 9 mil MLE?

 

[B-Roy]

We can offer Hood $4.15 million. Kanter is either minimum, MLE, or nothing.

Pretty sure we can also offer the 5.5 to Hood. But you’re right we can offer the min MLE to Kanter and 4.15 to Hood. A preposterous contract but maybe he loves us.

 

[Fez Hammersticks]

Targets:

Josh Hart
Josh Okogie
Frank Ntilikina

 

[BigGameDamian]

 

[hoopsjock]

Pretty sure we can also offer the 5.5 to Hood. But you’re right we can offer the min MLE to Kanter and 4.15 to Hood. A preposterous contract but maybe he loves us.

Yes, I was more replying the the part where you said we could only sign one.

And if we trade Meyers and our 1st for a 2nd? Is that enough for the larger MLE? How much cap do we have to clear for the 9 mil MLE?

No team has cap space at the draft to do this. I doubt a team would agree to use up cap space on a trade like this before free agency starts either. More likely we'd have to offer a 2020 1st to clear a contract to teams that strike out in free agency.

Answering your question is tricky though. Using the Full-MLE gets us hard capped. The hard capped amount is going to be roughly $138 million (numbers are based off a $109 million salary cap so could change if that number is different).

Blazers currently have $126,000,152 in guaranteed salaries with 10 of the 14 roster spots covered.

The Full-MLE is expected to be $9,426,000. So lets say we signed Hood or Kanter to that. Our new guaranteed salary would be $135,426,152 with 11 guys.

The minimum contract is expected to be $897,158. If we signed the remaining 3 players to minimum contracts the 3 would add up to $2,691,474. That would make our total guaranteed salary at $138,117,626. Depending on what the final numbers are that may be just BARELY doable or just barely too much without any trades. We could only keep one of Kanter, Hood, or Curry for that amount and the other 2 of those three plus Aminu and Layman would all have to be renounced and gone. We'd basically have to sign 3 undrafted rookie free agents as the final 3 players. Plus we'd only have 14 players and if someone else besides Nurk got hurt we'd be pretty screwed. Even in trades we'd have to bring back less than going out.

So back to answering your question, trading Meyers or Harkless without anything coming back clears up plenty of space. We could probably re-sign Aminu and/or Layman with that savings or use the Bi-Annual Exception ($3,619,000) to bring in another free agent. We'd still be hard capped we'd just have more room.

Of course if Kanter just signed the Tax-MLE and Hood the $4.15 million then we can go as far over the cap as Jody would allow us to.

 

[BonesJones]

In WCF Game 4 Meyers attempted 6 and made 5 swish3s, and Steph attempted 7 and made 5 swish3s. QED.

So because Meyers got 6 off in one half, against a defense leaving him wide open, you think he can shoot 12 a game even though Steoh Curry, the guy with the best ability to get his 3pt shot off, cant even do that?

Lol.

 

[TorturedBlazerFan]

The problem is that Stotts seemingly refused to give the Collins/Nurk pairing much of a chance to see how it would work. I still don't understand why he wouldn't go to that more throughout the season.

I was calling for that like all season. I have reservations about Zach, but whether he thinks he’s a center or not I actually think he is best when he’s got a bigger play out there with him.

 

[swish3]

So because Meyers got 6 off in one half, against a defense leaving him wide open, you think he can shoot 12 a game even though Steoh Curry, the guy with the best ability to get his 3pt shot off, cant even do that?

Lol.

The point is that in the first half alone, Meyers scored 5 of 6 vs Steph shooting 5 of 7. That was because in the 1st half, Dame passed to Meyers on the arc and he was making 83.3%. If Dame, CJ, and Rodney had continued to pass to Meyers who was open on the arc in the 2nd half, the additional 6 swish3 attempts and scoring another 15 points was possible, and might have won the game!

For this season, Basketball-reference shows that Steph attempted a maximum of 20 and Klay attempted a maximum of 13 swish3 attempts in one game.

Edit. And Dame attempted 18 and CJ attempted 14 swish3s in one game.

 

[Wizard Mentor]

The point is that in the first half alone, Meyers scored 5 of 6 vs Steph shooting 5 of 7. That was because in the 1st half, Dame passed to Meyers on the arc and he was making 83.3%. If Dame, CJ, and Rodney had continued to pass to Meyers who was open on the arc in the 2nd half, the additional 6 swish3 attempts and scoring another 15 points was possible, and might have won the game!

For this season, Basketball-reference shows that Steph attempted a maximum of 20 and Klay attempted a maximum of 13 swish3 attempts in one game.

Edit. And Dame attempted 18 and CJ attempted 14 swish3s in one game.

@BonesJones I hope you have more stamina than I do dealing with these idiotic posts.

 

[BonesJones]

The point is that in the first half alone, Meyers scored 5 of 6 vs Steph shooting 5 of 7. That was because in the 1st half, Dame passed to Meyers on the arc and he was making 83.3%. If Dame, CJ, and Rodney had continued to pass to Meyers who was open on the arc in the 2nd half, the additional 6 swish3 attempts and scoring another 15 points was possible, and might have won the game!

For this season, Basketball-reference shows that Steph attempted a maximum of 20 and Klay attempted a maximum of 13 swish3 attempts in one game.

Edit. And Dame attempted 18 and CJ attempted 14 swish3s in one game.

The point is that Meyers shot 3s at a volume that isnt sustainable over a larger sample size. If you have a mmbag of 10 red marbles and 10 blue marbles, drawing a red marble once doesnt mean you should expect to be able to draw a red marble every single time. If the maximum drawn in a row is 5 reds, then you shouldnt expect to be able to average 5 reds in a row every time you decide to draw 5 red marbles.

The point is that Meyers cant average 12 3pt attempts per game on a night-in, night-out basis, because not even Steph can... even though Steph has the ability to get up a much higher volume of 3s than Meyers because of his range, quick release, and ability to shoot off the dribble.

 

[PtldPlatypus]

...why are you posting a Dan Marang tweet?

Ignoring the source, do you agree with him that Meyers/Collins/pick would be an overpay for Aaron Gordon?

 

[BonesJones]

Ignoring the source, do you agree with him that Meyers/Collins/pick would be an overpay for Aaron Gordon?

It's just funny because nobody would post my Tweets in here. Nobody would post your Tweets in here. Thats essentially the same thing.

And no, I wouldnt do that. Collins is almost as good as Gordon and has more room for growth. Hes also much cheaper at the moment. I wouldnt trade Collins for him straight up.

 

[PtldPlatypus]

It's just funny because nobody would post my teeets in here.

Someone in here would have to follow you first.

Technically, Marang is now a media member, appearing on NBCSNW and being paid to cover the Blazers, so his tweets probably are given a tad more weight than yours or mine. But I understand where you're coming from.

Personally, if I have an interesting/relevant thought about the Blazers, I'm going to post it in here before I tweet it. If I have an interesting tweet about the Blazers, I'll probably post it in here before anyone else can anyway.

 

[hoopsjock]

Ignoring the source, do you agree with him that Meyers/Collins/pick would be an overpay for Aaron Gordon?

I wouldn't do that. Heck I would probably hesitate to trade ET and our 1st for Gordon. Okay, that might be an exaggeration but should tell you how little I think of Gordon.

 

[UKRAINEFAN]

It's just funny because nobody would post my teeets in here.

That would definitely not be funny if someone posted a picture of your "teeets" in here.

 

[BigGameDamian]

 

[Strenuus]

The point is that in the first half alone, Meyers scored 5 of 6 vs Steph shooting 5 of 7. That was because in the 1st half, Dame passed to Meyers on the arc and he was making 83.3%. If Dame, CJ, and Rodney had continued to pass to Meyers who was open on the arc in the 2nd half, the additional 6 swish3 attempts and scoring another 15 points was possible, and might have won the game!

For this season, Basketball-reference shows that Steph attempted a maximum of 20 and Klay attempted a maximum of 13 swish3 attempts in one game.

Edit. And Dame attempted 18 and CJ attempted 14 swish3s in one game.

So you just proved his point.

 

[BonesJones]

Someone in here would have to follow you first.

Technically, Marang is now a media member, appearing on NBCSNW and being paid to cover the Blazers, so his tweets probably are given a tad more weight than yours or mine. But I understand where you're coming from.

Personally, if I have an interesting/relevant thought about the Blazers, I'm going to post it in here before I tweet it. If I have an interesting tweet about the Blazers, I'll probably post it in here before anyone else can anyway.

They shouldnt be. He has no more qualification than you or me outside of (maybe) being able to articulate and hes able to formulate articles well. But basketball-wise? No more qualified than us.

I can't wait until he comes in here to blast me because I didn't say he's more special than everyone.

 

[swish3]

So you just proved his point.

No Strenuus, and your refusal to face facts is glaring! For each of the 20, 13, 18, and 14 attempts that I quoted from BBall-ref, those swish3 attempts are >12/game.

In the 1st half of WCF Game 4, Meyers was better than Steph in swish3s. In the Jan 30 Jazz win, Meyers outplayed defensive MVP Rudy Gobert. Meyers deserves recognition and I applaud him. We can beat GSW if we can continue the game plan executed in the 1st half to continue in the 2nd half, in other words, keep feeding the hot hand.

 

[BonesJones]

No Strenuus, and your refusal to face facts is glaring! For each of the 20, 13, 18, and 14 attempts that I quoted from BBall-ref, those swish3 attempts are >12/game.

In the 1st half of WCF Game 4, Meyers was better than Steph in swish3s. In the Jan 30 Jazz win, Meyers outplayed defensive MVP Rudy Gobert. Meyers deserves recognition and I applaud him. We can beat GSW if we can continue the game plan executed in the 1st half to continue in the 2nd half, in other words, keep feeding the hot hand.

Read.
My.
Post.

 

[BonesJones]

Targets:

Josh Hart
Josh Okogie
Frank Ntilikina

Meh
Bleh
Ew

 

[wizenheimer]

Yes, I was more replying the the part where you said we could only sign one.


No team has cap space at the draft to do this. I doubt a team would agree to use up cap space on a trade like this before free agency starts either. More likely we'd have to offer a 2020 1st to clear a contract to teams that strike out in free agency.

Answering your question is tricky though. Using the Full-MLE gets us hard capped. The hard capped amount is going to be roughly $138 million (numbers are based off a $109 million salary cap so could change if that number is different).

Blazers currently have $126,000,152 in guaranteed salaries with 10 of the 14 roster spots covered.

The Full-MLE is expected to be $9,426,000. So lets say we signed Hood or Kanter to that. Our new guaranteed salary would be $135,426,152 with 11 guys.

The minimum contract is expected to be $897,158. If we signed the remaining 3 players to minimum contracts the 3 would add up to $2,691,474. That would make our total guaranteed salary at $138,117,626. Depending on what the final numbers are that may be just BARELY doable or just barely too much without any trades. We could only keep one of Kanter, Hood, or Curry for that amount and the other 2 of those three plus Aminu and Layman would all have to be renounced and gone. We'd basically have to sign 3 undrafted rookie free agents as the final 3 players. Plus we'd only have 14 players and if someone else besides Nurk got hurt we'd be pretty screwed. Even in trades we'd have to bring back less than going out.

So back to answering your question, trading Meyers or Harkless without anything coming back clears up plenty of space. We could probably re-sign Aminu and/or Layman with that savings or use the Bi-Annual Exception ($3,619,000) to bring in another free agent. We'd still be hard capped we'd just have more room.

Of course if Kanter just signed the Tax-MLE and Hood the $4.15 million then we can go as far over the cap as Jody would allow us to.

you probably know more about the CBA than I do, but I have a few questions about what you posted there

* start with the Blazers at 126M in guarantees. What I read has been that Nurkic had received his 1.25M bonus. The thresholds were Portland winning 50 games and Nurkic playing in 70 games. Those were considered "unlikely" this season. But because both thresholds were passed this season, those bonuses with be considered "likely" next season and count against the cap; meaning 127.2M guaranteed. Am I missing something?

* I thought there was a CBA provision that if a team gets hard-capped, they were allowed to carry a roster of only 12 players?

* the 890K minimum salary....isn't that only for players who haven't played in the NBA?...like 2nd round picks and un-drafted players with no NBA games?

regardless of all that, I can't see how Portland can take the risk of using the full-MLE unless they dump a big chunk of salary. And the scenario you described where the Blazers were right at the limit doesn't account for Aminu and Layman

by the way, Dallas will have about 13M in cap-space at the time of the draft. Turner + 2019 1st for Courtney Lee? Drops 6M off of the guarantees; still not enough to comfortably use the full-MLE. I'd also wonder if Dallas would be interested in Meyers + 1st for a TPE. But Olshey is probably planning on extending Meyers...again

 

[hoopsjock]

* start with the Blazers at 126M in guarantees. What I read has been that Nurkic had received his 1.25M bonus. The thresholds were Portland winning 50 games and Nurkic playing in 70 games. Those were considered "unlikely" this season. But because both thresholds were passed this season, those bonuses with be considered "likely" next season and count against the cap; meaning 127.2M guaranteed. Am I missing something?

My math didn't account for that but I believe Harkless' bonus would go back to being unlikely ($500,000) which also wasn't accounted for, so that negates a portion of it making me off by about $750,000. Although if you are hard capped you might have to turn all bonuses from unlikely to likely no matter how unrealistic they are. I'm unclear of that though as it can be really confusing trying to decipher the terminology in the CBA.

* I thought there was a CBA provision that if a team gets hard-capped, they were allowed to carry a roster of only 12 players?

I'm not 100% sure but I think in the new CBA you have to carry 14 unless you just made a trade in which case you have 2 weeks to get back to 14. The roster holds only account for 12 players. Besides, with Nurk's injury it's unrealistic to have only 12 on the roster.

* the 890K minimum salary....isn't that only for players who haven't played in the NBA?...like 2nd round picks and un-drafted players with no NBA games?

Correct. Although there is another confusing part of the CBA here in which minimum salary is different for years of service but the difference is paid by the NBA I believe. I think it still counts towards the cap as the full amount though (which doesn't make sense to me). I don't know, ha ha, but that's why I put in my post undrafted free agents.

regardless of all that, I can't see how Portland can take the risk of using the full-MLE unless they dump a big chunk of salary. And the scenario you described where the Blazers were right at the limit doesn't account for Aminu and Layman

Yeah, I mentioned we'd have to renounce Aminu and Layman. I think my post paints a pretty dim outlook if the Full-MLE was used without clearing cap room but it was more just a basis of what would need to be done if we were to use it.

by the way, Dallas will have about 13M in cap-space at the time of the draft. Turner + 2019 1st for Courtney Lee? Drops 6M off of the guarantees; still not enough to comfortably use the full-MLE. I'd also wonder if Dallas would be interested in Meyers + 1st for a TPE. But Olshey is probably planning on extending Meyers...again

I wouldn't be too upset with a trades like that but despite the flood of expiring contracts for next season, I am still holding out hope that between having $41.4 million in expirings and perhaps a willingness to include draft picks that we can still pull off a big trade that other teams would be unwilling to consider. I don't want to get hard capped unless we somehow cleared a crazy amount of space and weren't in any danger of paying tax.

you probably know more about the CBA than I do, but I have a few questions about what you posted there

That's not true, you seem pretty knowledgeable about the CBA. I used to read it for fun but haven't really had a chance to memorize the latest one so I get caught thinking about rules from the previous one.

You should play in our mock off season! It's a lot of fun!
http://www.sportstwo.com/threads/rip-city-two-2019-mock-off-season.345040/

 

[wizenheimer]

My math didn't account for that but I believe Harkless' bonus would go back to being unlikely ($500,000) which also wasn't accounted for, so that negates a portion of it making me off by about $750,000. Although if you are hard capped you might have to turn all bonuses from unlikely to likely no matter how unrealistic they are. I'm unclear of that though as it can be really confusing trying to decipher the terminology in the CBA.


I'm not 100% sure but I think in the new CBA you have to carry 14 unless you just made a trade in which case you have 2 weeks to get back to 14. The roster holds only account for 12 players. Besides, with Nurk's injury it's unrealistic to have only 12 on the roster.


Correct. Although there is another confusing part of the CBA here in which minimum salary is different for years of service but the difference is paid by the NBA I believe. I think it still counts towards the cap as the full amount though (which doesn't make sense to me). I don't know, ha ha, but that's why I put in my post undrafted free agents.


Yeah, I mentioned we'd have to renounce Aminu and Layman. I think my post paints a pretty dim outlook if the Full-MLE was used without clearing cap room but it was more just a basis of what would need to be done if we were to use it.


I wouldn't be too upset with a trades like that but despite the flood of expiring contracts for next season, I am still holding out hope that between having $41.4 million in expirings and perhaps a willingness to include draft picks that we can still pull off a big trade that other teams would be unwilling to consider. I don't want to get hard capped unless we somehow cleared a crazy amount of space and weren't in any danger of paying tax.


That's not true, you seem pretty knowledgeable about the CBA. I used to read it for fun but haven't really had a chance to memorize the latest one so I get caught thinking about rules from the previous one.

You should play in our mock off season! It's a lot of fun!
http://www.sportstwo.com/threads/rip-city-two-2019-mock-off-season.345040/

to some of your points:

"When a player has been in the NBA for three or more seasons, and is playing under a one-year, 10-day or Rest-of-Season contract at the minimum salary, the league reimburses the team for part of his salary -- any amount above the minimum salary for a two-year veteran. For example, the minimum salary for a two-year veteran in 2017-18 is $1,471,382, so for a ten-year veteran, with a minimum salary of $2,328,652, the league would reimburse the team $857,270. Only the two-year minimum salary is included in the team salary, not the player's full salary. They do this so teams won't shy away from signing older veterans simply because they are more expensive than younger veterans."

http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q22


the 2nd year minimum will be a shade under 1.6M this season. Considering Portland's tax situation this is an important consideration. I think that's a factor in using the 25th pick because it could have a significantly bigger impact on the cap than a vet minimum deal. I'm thinking that because:

"There is a special procedure in place to phase-in a 45% increase to the rookie salary scales for the 2017-18 through 2019-20 seasons (15% per year over three years). There is a "baseline" scale for 2017-18 that does not include the 15% increase used for the actual 2017-18 rookie scale. For 2018-19 they first apply the percentage change in the salary cap from 2017-18 (as described above) to the 2017-18 baseline scale to create the 2018-19 baseline scale, and then they increase all resulting amounts by 30% to create the actual rookie scale. For 2019-20 they repeat the process, starting with the baseline scale for 2018-19, applying the cap percentage increase or decrease to create the 2019-20 baseline scale, and then applying a 45% increase to create the 2019-20 rookie scale."

http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q47

the baseline 2018-19 rookie scale for the 25th pick is $1,468,400. Cap is increasing by about 8% so the starting 2019-20 baseline for the 25th pick is about 1.586M. Applying the 45% to that bumps the new baseline to 2.3M. And if Portland gives the customary 120% bump allowed to scale, that 1st year salary for the 25th pick could be 2.76M. I'm half-convinced I'm doing something worng there because that seems high. But I do remember reading that the 3rd year of those rookie scale bumps were going to spike really high. If that number is close, a vet could cost a million less than a rookie and you know what you're getting with a vet. And a million less in salary could mean 2-3M less in tax