Post by Lazy Pete on Oct 4, 2016 13:55:36 GMT -6
Based on the discussion in shout yesterday, I decided to go through the rosters and identify the most likely candidates on each roster for an amnesty waiver, similar to what was done after the NBA lockout in 2012.
Some brief rules: Each team has 1 contract they can completely wipe off the slate. The player cannot be on a rookie contract, and must have more than 1 year remaining. I am basing the years remaining on the current year (even though the season is basically over) because if I didn't, then the number of amnesties would be even fewer. If a team does not have an obvious amnesty candidate, I am allowing them to amnesty one decision in their recent past.
Credentials: Former staffer for Sen. Lindsey Graham aka Sen. Grahamnesty
Oklahoma City Thunder: Trey Burke PG 28 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $0 $0 $0 $26,000,000
Sim league can be a cruel mistress, and you have to think with your head and not your heart. Burke is a sentimental favorite for Geebs, but with two young PGs on the roster and Burke locked in for 4 more seasons, he gets amnesthized.
Denver Nuggets: Bucky Bockhorn SF 27 $12,500,000 $14,062,500 $15,625,000 $17,187,500 $18,750,000 $20,312,500 $21,875,000 $120,312,500
The easiest call so far. Bankz has been vacant for the better part of 2 seasons, but took a brief break from his hiatus to sign one of the uglier contracts in recent memory. Bucky showed some promise early on but never really improved much and seems to have really fallen off the last couple years. The Nuggets get a mulligan on a deal that poses a big threat for their future development.
Houston Rockets: Patrick Ewing's SC and RC in Jumping
Ward is a recent returnee to the league and has quite the reputation from 2.0. He's hit the ground running again and turned the Rockets into a formidable team without breaking a sweat. However, I don't know if things went differently in the olden days, but nowadays we know that jumping, particularly for a big man, is quite possibly the worst upgrade out there. Ewing is probably maxed in a lot of categories, but there must've been something that could've been more helpful to his development than this. I've been in the league for over 2 years and this is the first time I've ever seen anyone use this upgrade.
Minnesota Timberwolves: Sim Dump's prime
The Timberwolves have quietly been chugging along for about a decade, making a move here or there and falling somewhere between the 4-8 range in the West. Sadly, they've done this during one of the longest stretches of PG brilliance in the league, with Sim Dump racking up all-star appearances, all-league honors, and a couple MVPs for good measure. Ayyoe somehow spent the entirety of Sim Dump's prime with a team that was above average even as the West declined, but never found that move to take the team to contender status. Let's give him another try.
San Antonio Spurs: Derrick Rose PG 31 $6,655,000 $7,320,500 $8,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $21,975,500
Victor made a pretty good move by absorbing Rose's salary to take on Noel, but his roster is full of PGs and this one is unnecessarily eating into the salary cap. Rose packs his bags and heads to the Knicks, where he declares his team to be a super team and then bricks enough jumpers to make Eric regret busting him in the first place.
Kansas City Kings: Brandon Knight PG 32 $22,750,000 $24,500,000 $26,250,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $73,500,000
There are a few different ways this one could go, as I think Gminski and Hoyle probably deserve it more. But Knight makes the big bucks, and 2poor seems pretty set on undoing the last holdover from the 20s administration. Commissioner 20s appoints Knight as his head replay official in Simcaucas, NJ, where he overturns between 3 and 4 calls a game for the rest of his career.
Utah Jazz: Obinna Ekezie C 34 $17,500,000 $18,750,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $0 $36,250,000
Ekezie is not bad and only has a little bit left on the contract, which was an amnesty-worthy deal from day 1. SPL finally finishes out the series of bad contracts he took on when he first blew up his roster and gets out of purgatory.
Pacific
Vancouver Grizzlies: The Julius Randle FA
Druce was probably smart to deny that he allegedly accused Commissioner 20s of failing to enter his bid for Randle. It will be easier to uncover the truth without the full weight of the Commissioner's office leaning on people to be quiet. Either way, Andrew Luck would probably appreciate it if Randle had stayed in Vancouver.
Golden State Warriors: Vernie Norrilsen PF/C 53 $8,000,000 $8,200,000 $8,410,000 $8,630,500 $8,862,025 $9,105,126 $0 $51,207,651
Taco went on a spending spree last year and somehow ended up with six year deals for a pair of big men that are now firmly overpaid. In order to shed both, the Warriors take a team trip to visit the Hadron Collider in Switzerland.
Los Angeles Clippers: Anthony Davis over Damian Lillard
This is not to say that the Clippers should be disappointed with their rookie big man. He made 1st team all-league, for cripes sake! But as I mentioned in my previous article, this league is about perimeter talent over all else, and Lillard looks like the real deal. There's not really much else for the Clippers, who are now guided by the steady hand of Yawn.
Los Angeles Lakers: Kobe Maggette C 29 $12,912,656 $13,905,937 $14,899,218 $0 $0 $0 $0 $41,717,811
One of the most impactful uses of the amnesty, as Tyler has a couple years until the cap gets pretty tight on his Lakers. This will ease the worry of salary concerns when it comes time to resign Prince and Robert Strong, and ensure that Eric is never proven right about his Karasev trade. Also, the Lakers amnestied Kobe, which is just fun to see.
Phoenix Suns: Brook Lopez C 31 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $44,000,000
The Suns don't really need to cut Brook loose, but they seemed to play well with the defensive bigs lineup and $11 mil a year is a lot to pay a back-up. If they wanted to free up some more space, Brook would be the one to go.
Portland Trailblazers: Tobias Harris SF 32 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $52,000,000
"It would spice up the league!"
Seattle SuperSonics: Guy Rodgers PG 27 $3,600,000 $3,600,000 $3,600,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $10,800,000
Guy is neither good nor bad. He is vanilla ice-cream. He is a 50 degree day. Instead of VORP, we calculate VOGR. All of this is to say, Guy is a perfectly average point guard signed to a team trying to lose. He will likely be on the decline whenever Seattle is ready to compete, and all he serves to do right now is win a few games and hurt lottery odds. He just can't help it, that's who he is. For letting his normal Guy flag fly, he gets the amnesty axe.
What did we learn today?
For starters, there really aren't that many bad contracts in the league. Maybe we just happen to be sitting in a nice little window between the end of some bad ones and the start of some others, or maybe people are more selective over who they splurge on. There aren't many guys signed to true mid-level deals, and those that are tend to be under market value.
The teams that stand to gain the most from this, in my opinion, would be the Blazers, Nuggets, Lakers, Bucks and maybe Bulls. There were several choices where I am confident the team wouldn't use their amnesty, in addition to those that I couldn't even find one option.
Would this help "spice things up"?
Not likely. Of the teams most likely to free up cap space, the amnesty would mostly help them avoid the hard cap. Very few teams would gain enough dollars to create a free agency bonanza, and most of the guys who would hit the market probably wouldn't draw any interest from those with cap space anyway. As we saw from last year with Koufos, teams with cap are content to pass on older players regardless of how much value they might have.
Some brief rules: Each team has 1 contract they can completely wipe off the slate. The player cannot be on a rookie contract, and must have more than 1 year remaining. I am basing the years remaining on the current year (even though the season is basically over) because if I didn't, then the number of amnesties would be even fewer. If a team does not have an obvious amnesty candidate, I am allowing them to amnesty one decision in their recent past.
Credentials: Former staffer for Sen. Lindsey Graham aka Sen. Grahamnesty
Midwest
Oklahoma City Thunder: Trey Burke PG 28 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $6,500,000 $0 $0 $0 $26,000,000Sim league can be a cruel mistress, and you have to think with your head and not your heart. Burke is a sentimental favorite for Geebs, but with two young PGs on the roster and Burke locked in for 4 more seasons, he gets amnesthized.
Denver Nuggets: Bucky Bockhorn SF 27 $12,500,000 $14,062,500 $15,625,000 $17,187,500 $18,750,000 $20,312,500 $21,875,000 $120,312,500The easiest call so far. Bankz has been vacant for the better part of 2 seasons, but took a brief break from his hiatus to sign one of the uglier contracts in recent memory. Bucky showed some promise early on but never really improved much and seems to have really fallen off the last couple years. The Nuggets get a mulligan on a deal that poses a big threat for their future development.
Houston Rockets: Patrick Ewing's SC and RC in JumpingWard is a recent returnee to the league and has quite the reputation from 2.0. He's hit the ground running again and turned the Rockets into a formidable team without breaking a sweat. However, I don't know if things went differently in the olden days, but nowadays we know that jumping, particularly for a big man, is quite possibly the worst upgrade out there. Ewing is probably maxed in a lot of categories, but there must've been something that could've been more helpful to his development than this. I've been in the league for over 2 years and this is the first time I've ever seen anyone use this upgrade.
Minnesota Timberwolves: Sim Dump's primeThe Timberwolves have quietly been chugging along for about a decade, making a move here or there and falling somewhere between the 4-8 range in the West. Sadly, they've done this during one of the longest stretches of PG brilliance in the league, with Sim Dump racking up all-star appearances, all-league honors, and a couple MVPs for good measure. Ayyoe somehow spent the entirety of Sim Dump's prime with a team that was above average even as the West declined, but never found that move to take the team to contender status. Let's give him another try.
San Antonio Spurs: Derrick Rose PG 31 $6,655,000 $7,320,500 $8,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $21,975,500Victor made a pretty good move by absorbing Rose's salary to take on Noel, but his roster is full of PGs and this one is unnecessarily eating into the salary cap. Rose packs his bags and heads to the Knicks, where he declares his team to be a super team and then bricks enough jumpers to make Eric regret busting him in the first place.
Kansas City Kings: Brandon Knight PG 32 $22,750,000 $24,500,000 $26,250,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $73,500,000There are a few different ways this one could go, as I think Gminski and Hoyle probably deserve it more. But Knight makes the big bucks, and 2poor seems pretty set on undoing the last holdover from the 20s administration. Commissioner 20s appoints Knight as his head replay official in Simcaucas, NJ, where he overturns between 3 and 4 calls a game for the rest of his career.
Utah Jazz: Obinna Ekezie C 34 $17,500,000 $18,750,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $0 $36,250,000Ekezie is not bad and only has a little bit left on the contract, which was an amnesty-worthy deal from day 1. SPL finally finishes out the series of bad contracts he took on when he first blew up his roster and gets out of purgatory.
Pacific
Vancouver Grizzlies: The Julius Randle FADruce was probably smart to deny that he allegedly accused Commissioner 20s of failing to enter his bid for Randle. It will be easier to uncover the truth without the full weight of the Commissioner's office leaning on people to be quiet. Either way, Andrew Luck would probably appreciate it if Randle had stayed in Vancouver.
Golden State Warriors: Vernie Norrilsen PF/C 53 $8,000,000 $8,200,000 $8,410,000 $8,630,500 $8,862,025 $9,105,126 $0 $51,207,651Taco went on a spending spree last year and somehow ended up with six year deals for a pair of big men that are now firmly overpaid. In order to shed both, the Warriors take a team trip to visit the Hadron Collider in Switzerland.
Los Angeles Clippers: Anthony Davis over Damian LillardThis is not to say that the Clippers should be disappointed with their rookie big man. He made 1st team all-league, for cripes sake! But as I mentioned in my previous article, this league is about perimeter talent over all else, and Lillard looks like the real deal. There's not really much else for the Clippers, who are now guided by the steady hand of Yawn.
Los Angeles Lakers: Kobe Maggette C 29 $12,912,656 $13,905,937 $14,899,218 $0 $0 $0 $0 $41,717,811One of the most impactful uses of the amnesty, as Tyler has a couple years until the cap gets pretty tight on his Lakers. This will ease the worry of salary concerns when it comes time to resign Prince and Robert Strong, and ensure that Eric is never proven right about his Karasev trade. Also, the Lakers amnestied Kobe, which is just fun to see.
Phoenix Suns: Brook Lopez C 31 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $11,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $44,000,000The Suns don't really need to cut Brook loose, but they seemed to play well with the defensive bigs lineup and $11 mil a year is a lot to pay a back-up. If they wanted to free up some more space, Brook would be the one to go.
Portland Trailblazers: Tobias Harris SF 32 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $13,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $52,000,000"It would spice up the league!"
Seattle SuperSonics: Guy Rodgers PG 27 $3,600,000 $3,600,000 $3,600,000 $0 $0 $0 $0 $10,800,000Guy is neither good nor bad. He is vanilla ice-cream. He is a 50 degree day. Instead of VORP, we calculate VOGR. All of this is to say, Guy is a perfectly average point guard signed to a team trying to lose. He will likely be on the decline whenever Seattle is ready to compete, and all he serves to do right now is win a few games and hurt lottery odds. He just can't help it, that's who he is. For letting his normal Guy flag fly, he gets the amnesty axe.
What did we learn today?
For starters, there really aren't that many bad contracts in the league. Maybe we just happen to be sitting in a nice little window between the end of some bad ones and the start of some others, or maybe people are more selective over who they splurge on. There aren't many guys signed to true mid-level deals, and those that are tend to be under market value.
The teams that stand to gain the most from this, in my opinion, would be the Blazers, Nuggets, Lakers, Bucks and maybe Bulls. There were several choices where I am confident the team wouldn't use their amnesty, in addition to those that I couldn't even find one option.
Would this help "spice things up"?
Not likely. Of the teams most likely to free up cap space, the amnesty would mostly help them avoid the hard cap. Very few teams would gain enough dollars to create a free agency bonanza, and most of the guys who would hit the market probably wouldn't draw any interest from those with cap space anyway. As we saw from last year with Koufos, teams with cap are content to pass on older players regardless of how much value they might have.
