Jay Pratt at blogabull.com says the Bulls will pay the luxury tax to keep him. http://www.blogabull.com/2015/1/9/7519295/jimmy-butler-max-contract-offseason-bulls If I were Jimmy, I'd consider taking a deal like Lu did, that would allow him to opt out and sign an even bigger contract after opting out after a year. A MAX deal even for 4 years after the TV contract revenues kick in may be worth more overall money than a MAX deal signed this summer. Thus the 5 year vs 4 year deal length may not matter at all. And we've seen Jimmy is willing to bet on himself. It also remains to be seen if Jimmy was offended by the Bulls offer. He's playing for a big contract, perhaps as if offended. "I'll show you!" My gut right now is 50-50. If we win the championship, I think he stays for at least one more season. If we don't win and the Bulls make cost saving moves to make room for his salary, I think he leaves. Is he solely about the money (which may not be relevant anyway), or is he about money and winning?
If you believe that Bulls management is committed to winning, you have little/no doubt about them keeping Butler. If you don't believe that Bulls' management is committed to winning, then you're 50-50 (at best). Pretty simple really.
I think the Bulls should make a full MAX offer. The question is whether Jimmy will sign it. It's not up to the Bulls. That's the simple part.
I keep hearing media types bemoaning that Butler's likely to get a max offer from some team. Those guys are completely clueless. If Butler is healthy, the Bulls will offer him a max contract with no more deliberation than they offered Rose his max extension. This said, what wouldn't surprise me is if Butler turns down a long-term max extension in favor of a shorter term max extension with a 3rd -year player option that would enable Butler to more quickly pocket his share of the new national TV money.
I think it's almost certain he gets competing MAX offers from other teams and the Bulls. While the Bulls' offer can be for longer term and bigger bumps, it may be irrelevant since any contract he signs could be smallish compared to MAX contracts a year later. This would make the longer and bigger bumps irrelevant. If he were offered a 4 year MAX deal with 1 year opt-out elsewhere, and he finds the city/team to be likable, he might bolt. There's not a thing that requires him to consider a Bulls offer, let alone sign it. No matter what that offer is. The Bulls had their chance to show him how they felt about him and they'll have to get past that.
Here's a scenario. He signs with the Knicks. They have enough cap space to sign him, keep Melo, and sign a few other quality FAs. Plus a draft pick close to the top of the draft. In fact, it looks like the Knicks will have $35M in cap space to spend. They could conceivably sign Jimmy and LeBron (if he opts out). Or Jimmy and: LMA, or Marc Gasol, Al Jefferson, Paul Millsap, Roy Hibbert... Plus Jahil Okafor. Plus cap space to sign guys to give the team depth (Dunleavy, Bellinelli, maybe even Lu).
If McDermott or Snell were lighting it up and Butler wasn't on the MVP list, then maybe they could think about letting him go. If he keeps playing like this there isn't a really good way to spin not paying him. Let's hope he doesn't hire BJ Armstrong as an agent after the deal is signed.
http://hangtime.blogs.nba.com/2015/01/09/report-bulls-will-offer-butler-the-max/ According to David Haugh of the Chicago Tribune, the Bulls are preparing to keep their versatile two-way guard at home as soon he hits the open market: “Internally, the Bulls are planning to take a proactive approach to contract negotiations with Butler next July and secure the shooting guard for a long-term spot alongside Derrick Rose. “They fully expect to sign Butler to a max deal next July before another team even gets involved to tempt him with an offer sheet, which the CBA says they can after the moratorium ends. They accept that the size of Butler’s contract will put the Bulls in position to pay the luxury tax, something Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf says he will do for a championship contender his team is.” Butler’s projected max salary is just under $16 million next season and the Bulls would be able to pay him more than $91 million over five years, compared to $67 million over four years by any other team. Though Reinsdorf has said he won’t let crossing the luxury tax line sway him from holding onto Butler, there’s still a good chance the Bulls won’t have to do that. For all the good play he’s turned and goodwill he’s built up, Taj Gibson is a candidate to be moved out as rookie Nikola Mirotic has demonstrated that he can handle the job in his first season.
From a deal breaker in the Melo acquisition to expendable just in a few months! Niko and Gibson have such different games / skillsets. Its hard to call them replacements.
The bolded is not true. After this season, Butler is a restricted free agent and the Bulls have the right to match any offer Butler may get from another team. Butler was a first-round pick and is in his 4th NBA season. Assuming Butler continues to be the player he's been so far this season, I'm not worried about him going elsewhere. Whether Bulls management make some other move in order to avoid paying the luxury tax is a separate issue.
My bad. he is an RFA. He would do best to sign a deal with another team with a 1 year opt out if he wants to leave the Bulls. Or play out his option. Either way, he's stuck for another season. No guarantee he wants to be here.
Stuck? WTF? As I said earlier in this thread, I agree that Butler could be looking for a "bridge" max deal to the truly big-money max deal whe the new TV money kicks in.
Just struck me as an odd choice of phrasing for someone like yourself who so badly wants the Bulls team to succeed.
The whole point of a CBA is to codify the rules of player-management relationships. Historically, player contracts in all sports have effectively made the players into slaves. Even in modern times, the players are slaves in the NBA for the length of their rookie deal, and then it's risky for them to become a UFA. Management has had a lot of leverage in the recent negotiations. So yeah, Jimmy is stuck. He had no choice what team to play for up until now, and next season as well. My use of "slavery" is consistent with its use in conjunction with the Reserve Clause in baseball, and the Curt Flood case. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reserve_clause http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curt_Flood Technically Flood wasn't a slave because he could choose to not play baseball at all, but he was in effect "owned" for his career by the team that obtained him without his consent.
