I think if they do this deal, then signing the BG scoring replacement is the plan for 2010. Not sure I'd give up a season and a half to do it though. Although BG apparently was willing to sign a smaller deal in the end, so maybe he takes an even slightly smaller one to stay in a big market with a preexisting rabid, raving BG fanbase. I'd be for that. A rotation of Rose, BG and Hinrich backing both up for 30+ minutes per night is workable IMHO. Then you can plunk down some cash in 2010 for Amare or Bosh and all of a sudden you've got the making of a legitimate contender.
Based on some of the new stuff coming out from K.C. Johnson and Sam Smith, the Bulls strategy seems to be to morph the old core (Gordon, Hinrich, Deng, Nocioni) with Derrick Rose into a championship team. It appears that Paxson is still very adverse to trading any of the old core. I wouldn't be shocked if the Bulls were trying to do something like this: Larry Hughes for David Lee, Jared Jefferies, contract filler Drew Gooden and Joakim Noah or Tyrus Thomas for Chris Kaman. It doesn't seem like that bad of a plan, and it makes apparent that the we can't go into the luxury tax talk was just negotiating bullshit. This would essentially give us the Pistons model, but with a star. Good players at all positions, a solid bench, but one player, Rose, would be the star. Gordon wouldn't have to change his role much at all, as the big men in our offense already get plenty of opportunities. Just having competent players like Kaman/Lee will allow those opportunities to be converted more efficiently. But taking a top 3 backcourt combo in the lead, and putting them with good players at all other positions and bench positions, I could see the team being competitive. Not an overwhelming championship contender, but definitely being one. --------- Also, K.C. Johnson seems to think that Ben Gordon will sign for around $40 million, with the Bulls next season. This seems a little asinine to me. Miami, presumably, could offer more than that, over 5 years, even with their stupid acquisitions. He cites the economy for the reason why Gordon's value would be driven down to $40 million (and also the reaosn why Gordon tried to accept the deal at the last minute). If a player like Gordon's value is being driven down to $40 million over 6 years, despite having a career year. This is $6.7 million per a year. This is assinine, because the estimated MLE would give him $7.1 million a year. Johnson should probably be reprimanded for saying something as dumb as that. In addition to that, if Ben Gordon is in fact having his value pushed down to that, then the entire NBA is coming down with him, as is the MLE and salary cap, which will completely destroy everything being talked about regarding 2010 free agency. 2010 free agency is being discussed using an estimated $64 million salary cap. For Johnson's prediction for Gordon to happen, the salary cap will not only have to stall, but shrink, and shrink significantly...which doesn't seem to be the case.
I don't think it's ever happened before, but we may really see a drop in the BRI component of the CBA. People less willing to spend money in general aren't going to buy as many jerseys and other things that contribute royalty income to the league and teams. So say it does go down. The Bulls are close enough to LT just keeping players at the current contract numbers and the current BRI. If BRI goes down, do the Bulls magically become over the next LT threshold? League-wide, the ramifications could be interesting too. Teams might use an extra roster spot for D-League material players at low salaries or not fill the spots at all.
BRI would have to go down by a whole lot to put the Bulls over the tax. If it did go down I could see them letting Gordon and Gooden walk, but by doing that they'd probably be fine. They've got about $56M guaranteed for next year, plus another $4-5M for draft picks and minimum salary guys they'd have to fill in. So say $61M That gives them about $10M before they hit the current luxury tax threshold of $71M. So it'd have to fall by a pretty substantial amount to get into that problem. It could happen, but it'd be unprecedented. I'd also guess that if they "rule" they put in place disadvantaged a really large number of teams, the league might attempt a quick reconsideration of the rule. Like, if 2/3 of the league is paying the tax and strapped for cash, I'd imagine they might have the votes to try to turn off the tax for the year. Or something like that.
Are they considering signing Gordon for $10M? They're at the current threshold before considering Gooden or draft picks or minimum salary guys...
I'm not following you... But yeah, they'll have about $61M in salary once you include draft picks and required roster filler. Then they have Gordon and Gooden who aren't considered in that total who are UFAs with Bird rights. There's also Simmons and Gray who are RFAs who aren't considered in the total, but who I don't care about. They can probably sign one of those guys, but not both if the cap and tax limits don't do anything crazy. Probably, not certainly by any stretch. So, as we know, they really need to reclaim some of the unproductive salary they're paying to Hughes, Nocioni and Hinrich.
Now imagine if the Bulls had signed Gordon to the ~$10M deal that was supposed to be on the table. They'd be royally screwed.
