Yes, it's a steep price for Crabbe at 17-17.5. Yes, it will probably be similarly steep for Harkless or Leonard. The reason why it's important that we hold onto this players is because they have value. They can be trade assets. We also have guys on very cheap contracts. Guys like Vonleh, Plumlee, Davis, and Aminu. In the new NBA, we will continue to see guys like Bazemore, Turner, and even Crabbe pulling down contracts that would have been unheard of a year or two ago. We need to get over this idea. To many teams, Allen Crabbe is worthy of a starting role. That means he has value. That means we can trade Crabbe to a team that needs a starting shooting guard and in return we might be able to acquire a player of need. One of the problems with our roster is that we don't have good contract filler. If we retain these players, we will. Example - Brooklyn was rumored to be interested in Crabbe. Brooklyn has also been rumored from time to time to be willing to trade Lopez. One of the problems was that Lopez makes 21 million next season. If Allen Crabbe is making 17.5, and Plumlee is around 2.3 million, guess what..... we can match that contract MUCH easier now. Crabbe+Plumlee for Lopez. That's just one example. I think it's a horrible idea to let young assets like Crabbe or Harkless walk away for nothing, when we can clearly use these guys to acquire other assets of need.
I agree, if players are signing crazy deals left and right and they don't fit in with their new teams down the road we will need players to trade. Can't trade all your picks and cash every time.
When did Crabbe become starter material? I think he's a good player off the bench but a starter? I just don't see it.
Well, he has started for the Blazers before..... and his numbers were pretty damn good. Some of our best lineups included Crabbe last season. And if teams are truly interested in offering a contract in the ballpark of 17-17.5 million per year, then I'm guessing they think he's starter material as well.
Agreed. I wanted us to let Meyers walk but just sign him and use as a trade later on. Same with crabbe. If moe improves, I could see him as a blazer for a long time. People keep complaining about the turner deal and yeah our cap space will suck but obviously free agency doesn't get us shit and if we resign our guys then we have a lot of options down the road in trades
Let this year pass, by 2017-18 situation will be more stable. Right now teams are going crazy overboard with these contracts and what you'll see in 2-3 years is a lot of franchises with unmovable contracts, $17.5M is not the price you pay for a back up even with $107M cap next year, it's what you pay for a first team player. Between Crabbe, McCollum and Lillard we'd be paying around $80M for our backcourt alone which is absolutely nuts. The same goes for many contracts signed by teams this offseason, it happens just because everyone suddenly has loads of money to spend, additional money on top of $70M everyone had adjusted to prior to last season. Another jump in cap next year will not be as significant and the one after will be even smaller. If you're left with $20M - $30M of cap space in 2017 or even better 2018, you will be able to get some great deals. Right now there's zero value in the market.
Well tanking teams like Philadelphia will be happy with current situation. They got people like Okafor, Embiid and Simmons making very little, only Noel will be up for renewal next year and probably with crazy price as well so they may as well trade him now - if they did trade him for Boston's pick and got Dunn, they'd have another player on rookie level contract. Throw in players like Luwawu, Korkmaz and Saric and you're looking at having 6-7 players making less than $30M total, and some of them could have an impact in the next 1-2 years. It's virtually impossible right now to fill a roster with good players at serviceable salaries. Teams like Nets who have almost zero players at reasonable salary and have to replace half of their roster right now have an impossible task and will have to fill their squad with average/below average players at $10M a year minimum. That's seriously dreadful. I mean, Ryan Anderson will be making $20M a year - increase of salary cap or not, this is still nearly 25% of team limit. That's horrendous. It reminds me of Premier League which funnily also got a huge collective TV deal which bumped up the prices, in football it'll also steady but will not adjust like it should in basketball. There's no way that even with $107M salary cap teams will be handing out these contracts. It'll steady down.
I agree, which is why it really bugs me we didn't make a Cole Aldrich "value" signing, that IMO will be a terrific trade asset for a guy who at worst is a very solid backup C and could develop into more - I mean 3 yrs 22 mil - a friggin steal and at a position we need a good defender at
yeah, so its probably worth it for the Blazers to use capspace if they want and fail everywhere else for a serviceable guy like Monroe who only has 2 yrs left and can opt out next summer (he likely will) - keep some of these deals shorter for more flexibility
Brooklyn is not going to trade Lopez now. They're building round him. Remember, they don't have their pick for next year (and it's not protected) so they have no incentive to tank. And the only way you trade Brook Lopez for our two RFAs is if you're seriously tanking.
I agree with the OP. We ain't gettin no needle moving free agents. We ain't got no decent cap space in the foreseeable future. We ain't got no lottery picks in our foreseeable future. We will only improve this team through trade. We need trade assets. No decent player should be allowed off this island, except in trade. Sign them up Mr Olshey.
With Horford in Bos I think we should make an offer for Sullinger who is an RFA, even moreso if Durant goes there
I agree with the OP, unless Neil knows of a couple of players who teams want to dump for cap space. (Or a cheap contract and cap space.) Monroe could be that option as pointed out. More than likely signing and trading them next summer is the best scenario, but again I am sure Neil has been on the phone and would know if there are any other options. I think we will know if he does not match a Crabbe offer.
Durant signing with GSW is ANOTHER reason why we need to keep our young guys. Gotta build for the future yo.
