Don’t use TPE before July 1, offer full MLE to Tyreke Evans in a 3 years, $25M deal and secure him as our starting wing.
We need both SF and PF.
Targets for PF:
Markieff Morris - makes $8.6M next season so can be had with the $13M TPE. We would probably need to add a sweetener but Washington need saving from cap hell so maybe not much. Maybe agree to also take Jodie Meeks with the trade exception, that saves them $13M and send them a second round pick. Should be good. They would be then able to use full MLE on a longer deal (Kieff expires next year) and still not pay tax.
Thaddeus Young - fits under TPE this season but not next so would need to be acquired via trade with his $13.7M salary. We’d need to send Meyers, Layman and Swanigan but that wouldn’t do the deal. Maybe send them Meyers, Aminu and a first round protected pick - they get a replacement for the next year and additional incentive of the pick and we get rid of 1 year of Meyers deal.
Khris Middleton - he’s more of a 3 but could well provide scoring, energy and defense at 4. We do not really have the assets to get him in a simple way but we can offer several incentives: take Snell’s behemoth contract with TPE in a separate deal (that’s around $11M a year for THREE more season), offer them Aminu and Harkless for Middleton plus throw in a first round pick. That saves them about $10M next year, saves them $11M in the next two as well and saves them from luxury tax. A first round pick is an asset they can use to offload Dellavedova for example and then they’d have tons of money in FA to surround Giannis with talent.