How many teams could face the luxury tax? I mean out of the hoopshype ranking of team salaries (taking into account some of the player salaries aren't calculated into the total yet), the Warriors seem to be in the middle of the pack. Also I thought luxury tax was higher like in the 70 mils. If we are in danger I just hope Cohan does whatever it takes to at least get the team over the hump by taking a hit. Nobody wants to play well for two years and then suck for another 10 years by dumping talent because of the reluctance to pay luxury tax. So while Dunleavy and Murphy arguably have really good skills the team needs to win as well as some major holes, we need to figure out what pieces will work better long term to give our team balance and won't be a drag on our team salary at the same time. Be like the Spurs or Pistons (manage that team salary!)
The Warriors are okay for now. How guys play in a full season of "new look" warriors ball will shape the end of the year decisions. We might move before then-but not a "dump" where we lose talent to get rid of a contract. Murphy is 6-11 and at least is good for 15 pt,10+ boards. We won't replace that in the 06 draft,and there are few guys apt to be on the trade block able to replace that. Elsewhere I saw a trade proposed, Raptors give Arrujo and Eric Williams for Dunleavy...and a lot of Raptor fans were not happy with that,hough they certainly got the best in that one. Point is,Dunleavy has not really established a lot of market value. If so,one result is we don't get as much as we'd want in any trade. Second result,nobody is bidding high at free agent time. Add up all that and my sense is-as it stands now-Dunleavy re-signs at a rather modest price tag
Luxury tax line usually hover over 10-15 mils over the caproom, and I do remeber reading that luxury tax line is 62 mils for this year. Sure, we all want Cuban like owner, who dump all those money for the success of the team. But there are only few owners in the league, who will do so. Majority owners will pay around luxury tax line, and it's GM's duty to manage the money, not owner's responsibility to spend accordingly. Many fans blamed Cohan for the 12 years of failure, and he certainly deserved load of blames, when it comes to the basketball decision making. However, when it comes to the spending, he rarely shy about dumping money. Once Murphy's contract counts, we will be around 10th in payroll, and if we add any extention of Dunleavy, Pietrus, Zarko, or Biedrins, we will hit around top 5 payroll. If we get into financial trouble, entire blame should go to Mullin, especially with his last year's 200 mils spending. For Dunleavy, I would love to see him signing 6 mils per year deal, and I do think that would be adaquate for his talent and potential. However, I just don't see him signing that low, barring from major collapse next season. It's most likely that Dunleavy will finish nicely with Davis. And, he will be 25 years year old. Those two combinations are enough to fatch big contract. However, the situation gets worse. His agent will clearly bring up how much Simmon, Mobley and other FAs received including Richardson and Murphy. Also, Mullin loves Dunleavy, and I seriously doubt that Mullin will let Dunleavy go, even if his demand goes out of control. At this point, I have to predict that Dunleavy will sign 9 mils pear year for next 6 years, and we are forced to trade Pietrus. Trading Murphy is clearly a dilemma. In one hand, Murphy is our best rebounder, and when he was injured, our rebounding was really pathatic. Also, since the expectation is the highest in last 12 years, we need to get a help as much as possible. If this team failed to meet the expectation, and Mullin dumps Murphy for salary purpose, Mullin will be crucified for making 'bad' trades. In other hand, salary crisis is coming, and it's coming fast. If we don't do something now, we will be in very very ugly situation, where we have to give away our young players for nothing. Warriors will be OK this season, but we will face salary problem next season, which we have no idea whether we can fit in Dunleavy's extention or not without paying a luxury tax. We will definitely face the crisis after 07 season, and our biggest problem is that none of our big contracts end before 09 season. Therefore, Mullin has to make very hard decisions to choose players from our current roster while managing the team to be successful, because our current situation just can't last more than a year. If Mullin can pull something good from this situation, he will be known as a saviour, and if he can't, he will be known as a teaser...
Clearly Mullin should have seen this financial situation coming as soon as he signed those fat contracts... What was he preparing for with that kind of unpopular spending? Maybe he felt the 200 mil was justified as long as the team was climbing over that hump into the right direction. I wonder what his plans are now to get rid of the excess fat now that our core players are coming into their own. Could have been it wasn't Mullin's intention to sign Jrich or Murphy or Foyle or or Fisher for that much, but he gambled and did anyway since he thought he was making a playoff roster? After all, it's hard to gain leverage for free agents when the team has no identity and no recent success in making the playoffs. You tend to have to overpay to get noticed. I still think we got to role with Baron and Jrich because they are our best chance at landing a good big man. A good big man would want to play on a team with shooters, a great pure point guard and a playmaking shooting guard. We're ripe for landing a disgruntled allstar big man for a reasonable price or attracting one via sign and trade. Now if we can just trim the payroll and keep our talent or replace it with something similar.
I think that Murphy and JRich he figured one would break out, he could trade the other. Then you get 1 at a gamble. If they both flop then you just hope that on a losing team, one would at least get stats enough to be moved. Fisher, I still don't get that signing. Foyle still could be a managable signing. Moving a Center that can play defense shouldn't be too hard (as long as he doesn't get hurt badly).
