Tribe Busts Through the Cellar Door
June 10, 2009“You Can’t Handle The Truth!”
June 10, 2009As fans of the Cavaliers, we tend to selectively choose what rumors we want to believe. It helps further our beliefs that we will one day win a championship. Colin Cowherd hints that Chris Bosh should play in Cleveland? Where do we sign? Cavs to offer Rasheed Wallace $10 million per year? Oh, heck no.
While the former fantasy still exists, Brian Windhorst has come to the rescue on the latter with his latest analysis of said rumors. Perpetuated by SLAMOnline, we were confronted with the sheer terror of not only offering eight figures to Rasheed Wallace, but also the thoughts of having Zach Randolph as a fall-back plan.
On the first portion, Windhorst retorts with the following:
A report from Slam Magazine, a New York-based basketball publication, on Monday said the Cavs have opened negotiations with Pistons free agent center Rasheed Wallace on a two-year contract at $10 million per season. This is impossible and illegal; the Cavs do not have salary cap space to sign any player to a $10 million contract and any talks cannot begin until July 1.
It is likely the Cavs will contact Wallace at that time, as he’s probably going to be on their list of free agent targets. But he will not get a $10 million contract from the Cavs or likely any team in the NBA.
[Wipes sweat from forehead]
Most fans knew that the team could not legally deal with Wallace at this stage of the game. And we also knew that the team did not have the financial capability of offering that much money to ‘Sheed. However, knowing that this was not even a consideration (perhaps involving the dumping of salary to another team to facilitate said deal) is quite a relief.
And about that whole Zach Randolph nightmare:
The other part of the report said the Cavs would be interested in a “sign-and-trade” deal for Zach Randolph of the Los Angeles Clippers. Randolph is not a free agent, so calling it a sign-and-trade situation would seem to invalidate the entire report. When you consider the misinformation on the Cavs’ cap position, the report seems even more off base.
Now, realistically, the Cavaliers could do a “sign-and-trade” for the abovementioned Wallace. Randolph would have to be a straight deal, forcing the Cavaliers to take on his current salary ($33 million over the next two years). But as Brian reiterates, of all of the big men on the Clippers, Randolph would be the last on the Cavaliers’ “want list.”
Marcus Camby was targeted this past season. Chris Kaman could also be relocated, especially with Blake Griffin on the horizon. DeAndre Jordan is a very cheap answer in the middle given his upside. But Randolph is not exactly highly coveted by anyone; consider the fact that Portland wanted to get rid of him simply so he would not be a negative impact on Brandon Roy.
So, Cavs fans, feel free to rest easy for now. And if you want to continue dreaming of a Cavaliers jersey with “Bosh” on the back, I won’t be the one to stop you. Bryan Colangelo, on the other hand, may be a different story.
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Latest Cavaliers rumors improbable at best, impossible at worst [Cleveland.com]
Noooooooooooo! [WFNY]
13 Comments
Cleveland needs more Bosh!
I don’t know if I would say Windhorst came to the rescue. We wrote about this 5 days ago.
I linked to your piece. I know we mentioned not wanting him, and shot down his ability to defend Howard. We didn’t discuss the contract-based stuff… Unless I’m missing something.
Does anyone think its interesting that we are on the other side of the “2010” fence with Bosh? The grass is certainly greener when you are talking about taking somone else’s guy.
It really is going to be tough for the Cavs to sign anybody this off-season outside of their silly salary cap exceptions. People need to stop getting all hyped about all of these rumors.
regarding lebron, bosh, wade, or whoever in 2010, i still just dont see any of them voluntarily taking millions and millions of less guaranteed money by signing elsewhere. maybe its a sign and trade situation once it gets to that point, but i just dont see any of them leaving all those millions on the table. more importantly, i dont see their agents letting them leave all those millions on the table.
BW aknowledges that the cavs will probably negotiate with ‘Sheed as soon as they are allowed to and for less money!! And I say YES YES and YES. I’m sure Sheed still has gas left in the tank and he could be the link before the ’10 off-season and the push for CB4.
But heck if Danny can agree to terms with the jazz to get boozer or the clips to get kaman…DO IT
@ mike – That’s a REALLY good point, and unfortunately for us, one that applies maybe the most to Bosh, who couldn’t make up the difference with endorsement deals and the like. Remember that Shaq is really the only guy to ditch his team to sign as a FA elsewhere, but he was already iconic in a way that Bosh is not.
if zach randolph comes within a mile of our franchise I’m done with sports all together.
ron artest please
amc – shaq is the ONLY player ever to turn down a max offer from his team with bird rights for a lower max offer elsewhere. that is it – and shaq had said from the beginning that he was leaving for the lakers. there was never any doubt about it. i dont get why all the national analysts ignore this and just assume that now all of a sudden all these guys will just turn down all that guaranteed money to go elsewhere for a considerable amount of less money. its HUGE money at stake – not just a few million. even if you can make up the difference in endorsements – which is a big if even for lebron considering the current economy – to me, you would have to far exceed that difference via endorsements in order to justify the risk you are taking. i dont see agents letting that happen. i can pretty much say i will be shocked if any of those guys turn down a max offer for less money elsewhere.
look at it like this – if you as a player really dont want to be there (lets say toronto), then why not take the max offer from toronto and then let the agent pull all the right strings to get you traded where you want to go in a year or so? then you get where you want AND get your max money. thats a more realistic scenario to me.
@11
Signing and then “pulling all the right strings to get traded” means that the team you’re going to has to give up assets to acquire you. As a free agent, you’re merely adding to what they already possess. If you have championship aspirations, the latter is likely the more beneficial choice in that regard.
to #12 – thats true, but youre still getting your biggest max deal. it happens alot. ray allen did it and ended up in boston. thats why michael redd took his max offer from the bucks rather than coming to cleveland.