But honestly that really doesn't make sense. If everyone and their mothers knew OKC would match any max offers, then why not wait it out and get even more max from OKC? Presto got Pritchslapped like Denny suggested. OLC knew their only threat was Blazers to pick him up for max. They gambled and lost.
Basically, in the end, they met in the middle. Presti was daring Kanter to get that offer. He did. No big deal.
Blazers are damned if they do, damned if they don't with you guys. There's no one else that wouldn't have been there after the three days were up. Why not put pressure on a division opponent and force them to potentially weaken themselves later in the season. Not to mention Kanter is now untradeable for them now. With the offer sheet he gets a no trade clause, has a trade kicker, and now pretty much will only be tradeable in the second year of trh deal and it would have to be to a team that HE wants. A nice strategic movie by NO, and one I'm sure a lot of the NBA was hoping he would do.
So we can agree that we were hardly played right? In fact, Olshey made the cheap skate come up and pay the kitty to play ball. Good for him!
It was definitely a risk, and I get that Kanter may not be the best locker room guy...but what's wrong with adding a 23 year old center who puts up stats? AT WORST, he's a talent we could trade next off-season to a team who misses out on a big FA. It was a risk, but the downside to me just wasn't as big as some of you are making it out to be. It's not like he's injury prone and we would have been saddled with a contract we could never move.
I agree with what are you are saying. But I still can't shake the feeling I had thinking that Kanter making so much more money than the rest of the team was going to be an issue, UNLESS he was "one of the boys". If his teammates liked him, then they would be happy for him, knowing their time would come. But if he rubbed people the wrong way and didn't give max effort for his max contract......then it would have been ugly. Normally I wouldn't worry, but something about him made me believe it would have been a disaster. It will be interesting to follow how he gets along with Durant and Westbrook now that he has been paid.
No this is incorrect. Its the same scenario as Jeremy Lin and Omer Asik. We can offer a $25 million three year contract that hits our cap as 8/8/8 but if Houston matched it would hit their cap as 5/5/15. They can match any offer. Not sure if its smart to pay a second round pick $25 million though. Perhaps we're trying to wait this one out and hope they give Josh Smith their MLE. If they do that we could give KJ a much smaller offer they can't match.
Thank you Lord for not delivering a 23 year old 7' center who averaged 19/11 with a 25 PER to us. Whew, we really dodged a bullet on that one.
I don't get some people in this forum. They are glad we signed Aminu (can't shoot - 8Mil'), Davis (injury prone and only put decent numbers on A BAD team - 7Mil') and Harkless (Bad shooting, didn't make it ON A BAD TEAM - 2Mil'). It's ok for you to pay 17 Million$ for 3 scrubs but it's so horrible to pay the same amount for an excellent offensive center who put up the same numbers as LMA did at his age.
I'm indifferent on the matching but I'm interested in a) why you're looking solely at offense and b) why you are either not drawing logical conclusions from stats or are not bringing up ones that seem to have bearing. One could easily say the following (from your quote): "They are glad we signed Aminu (stud on-the-ball defender at 4 positions, 13-14 PER), Davis (uh, put up a 20 PER with the 5th-best O-rtg in the league while missing 3, 19, 1 and 0--23 total games in the last 4 years--Kanter's missed 21) and Harkless COMBINED for the same price as a guy who couldn't put up numbers on 3 years' worth of bad teams, is probably the worst statistical defender in the NBA and whose team traded him for a protected 1st 2 years from now, a 2nd and filler. The hyperbole doesn't make your point for you. I'd be happy to help you "get" why some like Aminu and Davis. For the Record, Ed Davis also put up a slightly lower PER and higher rebounding rates, Box +/-, VORP and blocks/36 to LMA at the same age.
One word for you: Ceiling. Kanter is already putting GREAT offensive numbers, all he needs to do in order to be an all-star caliber player is improve his defense and he just turned 23. I remember how LMA and Randolph looked on defense at 22-23 so it doesn't concern me all that much. Kanter is a better asset no matter how you spin it, Portland and OKC offered him a max contract because he has high value on the market, how much of an asset is a SF who can't shoot or a no-moves PF ? who chased these dudes with max money? Those stats for Davis and Aminu are nice, but they will never be starters or 6th men for a contender and you can't even trade them for a starter in this league, they are just placeholders.
That may be true. However, consider what 15% trade kicker means. It does unbalance the in/out for salary purposes. But 115% (salary + kicker) is less than the 150% (125% if above the cap) allowed to be received in trade. The kicker doesn't affect OKC in any trade scenario.
First, you don't know what Davis or Aminu can be traded for. An injured Martell Webster brought back the 16th pick. Kanter was traded for a protected first 3 drafts down the road. We got a starting center for a 2nd. What's the going rate for 3-and-D guys? Wes just got the max, and he's coming off Achilles'. I have a hard time believing that it's tougher to teach a magnificent, on-the-ball, 4-position defensive stud 28% 3pt shooter to make 37% than it is to teach a 7ft guys who is possibly the worst defensive center in NBA history to become average at D. But maybe that's where we disagree. And why, if you think that Davis won't even be a 6th-man for a contender, did you not use stats or rationale other than "he's injury-prone" to explain that, when he's missed 2 more games in the last 4 years than Kanter has? Why not bring up his shooting or his offense or his rebounding or his defense? Oh, yeah, because on almost all those accounts he's as efficient (or better!) as Kanter is.
