OK. Honestly, you're crazy. I don't even know what the hell you're talking about. Airplanes? WTF? -Pop
There was a time when no one thought airplanes could be built, but time has proven them wrong. There was a time (right now) when no one thought the Blazers could land LeBron James in the 2010 off-season. Time will prove them right.
Ahhhhhh. Got it. Original poster is still crazy. I sincerely hope KP is not putting his eggs in this basket. -Pop
Heh, no, I doubt it, since it's impossible. Portland won't have cap space in 2010. Unless James wants to sign for the MLE? Hope KP isn't putting his eggs in THAT basket.
Well, technically if we renounce certain players and sign FA's and make trades to load our roster with contracts that expire before at the 2010 offseason, we could be in the race. But let's hope that's not our plan. -Pop
You do this by 1.) Renouncing Roy and Aldridge. Their cap holds will crumble any chance at max money, an extension will as well. 2.) Trade the rest of the team for expirings.
The only possible scenario that I can come up with for this to happen would be if LeBron told the Cavs he's leaving for sure in 2010, that he would consider signing an extension if the Cavs will orchestrate a sign-and-trade to the Blazers, and the Cavs agreed that getting some of our young talent is better than getting left with nothing after James walks. In other words, Peewee Herman has better odds of having Angelina Jolie wanting to leave Brad Pitt and shack up with him.
Actually, I kinda did. And in 2010 the best we can hope for is that we trade Joel for an expiring contract and don't sign anybody this FA period. We sign Roy to an extension starting at 12M, and LMA at 11M. Going into FA 2010, we'd be at 41.0M committed salary (assuming PetKo and Freeland come over, renouncing Sergio and 2.4M in holds for the 2 late 1st rounders in 2009 and 2010). Cap will probably be around 52M, and LBJ can only get 30% of the cap as a max salary. So he's stuck at a max salary of 15.2M. We can't give him that. The cap would need to be 58.5M. That way, LBJ's max salary starts at 17.5, and we'd have 41M committed. From what Stern says, it's not looking good. And if the cap is that low, LBJ would be kind of dumb to give up 17.2M in 2010-11 for 15.2M, right? Why not wait a year and let the cap go up?
i don't think he can sign an extension before summer 2010 without costing himself 10s of millions. in principal if he wanted to come here we could sign/trade IN summer 2010, but we'd have to semi-gut the team to make it worth it for the cavs.
