Aloha,
I been thinking about what would I do if I were to hard cap the Lakers. But if I were going to do that I would offer Rose the full non tax payer MLE. We would get a quality PG and have 10 mil more to play with. The following is my perfect moves after that. Note a few maybe a stretch but not out of the realm of possibility or pure fantasy.
Draft day deal Kuz and our 1st for Malik Beasley.
Salaries nearly wash.
If the reports are true and AD agrees to start at the 5, I would go after Nick Batum with the vet min and a chance to start.
Resign Alex and THT for 8 mil each.
Sign Melo, Morris, Wes, Buy into the 2nd round or sign a undrafted rookie. Hopefully a center.
If Batum declined I would offer same deal to Otto Porter jr , Snell or Craig. If they all turn us down I would go with Mo Harkless for depth.
PG Rose
SG Beasley
Sf Batum
PF LBJ
C AD
Reserves
Alex PG SG
THT PG, SG, SF
KCP SG, SF
Morris PF, SF
Melo PF
Wes SG
Gasol C
Undrafted or 2nd rounder.
One note I forgot. If we couldn’t get any of the SF I mentioned I would play THT there. He’s solid at 230. He’s not going to get bullied by taller small forward and he has that incredible 7’1” wingspan. That allows him to play taller.
Can’t wait for 2 weeks from now when we’ll finally have some actual facts to evaluate & scrutinize instead of all these wild-azz-guesses & speculation. We’ll know if Stein and his ‘Difference-making playmaker’ and AD at center stuff was actually real or pure bull-sheeeeit….lol. There’s more than 1 way to skin a cat and there are several scenarios that I think can get us deep into the playoffs (ANYBODY we put around AD & LBJ will get us through the regular season). I won’t try to predict which scenario is “best” nor how co-GMs Rich Paul & Pelinka will navigate the rest of summer….my Magic 8-Ball is still at the damn dry cleaners!!
Totally, the Bucks are going to be a problem for many years. Hard to see Phoenix not keeping it all together for the most part (don’t see another team making the $44 mil offer to CP3 while preserving the talent level around him). West is only gonna get tougher with the Warriors getting healthier. Lakers need to stick the landing this off season or that window is gonna shrink even more.
I’m into this scenario, not sure how available Malik will be. I think we need to have both defenders and pony generators off the bench. I’m very into resigning as many of our guys as possible, I’d love to figure out a way to S&T Dennis w/o hard capping.
Aloha Jamie, Dennis is an interesting case. Two teams seemed to have interest, the Knicks and Bulls. Both seemed to have turned their eyes to different players. The Knicks don’t need the the sign and trade, they have a lot of cap space. the Bulls would need to. i looked at their roster. There really isn’t anyone that they would give up that rings my bell. And I wouldn’t hard cap us for any of the Bulls free agents in a sign and trade. I think Dennis blew it. There are a lot of point guards available. I think he will sign for less then the Lakers offered him.
Me too, I have to wonder at what motivates Dennis: money? Role? Location? The issue with a S&T is that it requires a lot of agreement as opposed to trading him mid season under a deal that market for him dictates. I’m fascinated to see how this all plays out.
In regards to the Knicks you could still entice w/picks or what have you. But that’s the issue with the S&T, overly complex
I’ve been playing around with the luxury tax situation, specifically if we were to trade for Westbrook and the tax numbers are scary. LeBron, AD, and Russ alone exceed the luxury tax threshold and the apron, which means every players you add after those three will have a luxury tax attached. By the time you fill out the roster with minimum salaries, the tax for adding a fourth star to start could cost $20-30 million in taxes.
Basically, there are solid reasons why being hardcapped could be a smarter move. You get access to better prospects and get the full MLE. Those are two huge advantages. While you get hardcapped, you also don’t end up with being so far over the cap that you can’t make moves without incurring unreasonable taxes.