Raptors Salary Cap Situation (and planning for the future)

[DanH]

Oh good. Would it be full bird rights for drafted players and resigned RFAs, but not for UFAs? Thanks for the help btw.

Player rights are based on term with the team (or term in which the player only changed teams via trade, not free agency).

So we have had Biyombo and Scola for only one year, and they signed via free agency, so we have only their player rights.

James Johnson signed via FA two years ago, so he gets early Bird Rights.

DeMar has been with the team for at least three years, so we have his full Bird Rights.

Biyombo's a great example. If he was to sign a one year deal with us using the mid-level and become a free agent again the following summer, he'll have two consecutive years with the team. So he'd then have his early Bird Rights with us, just like JJ does now.

Similarly, when we traded for Lowry, he had less than three years left on his deal. But because he was traded, the earlier portion of his contract essentially came with him, meaning he had three years of service with the team in spite of him getting traded to us partway through that deal. That allowed us to use his full Bird Rights to sign him to the deal he is on now.

[JawsGT]

We have Powell signed to a 3 year deal. Once it is up, we will have his full Bird Rights and his RFA rights, so we can match any offer made to him and can offer him up to the maximum salary and 5 years.

Oh good. Would it be full bird rights for drafted players and resigned RFAs, but not for UFAs? Thanks for the help btw.

[DanH]

Will we find ourselves in a similar situation down the road with Norm Powell?

We have Powell signed to a 3 year deal. Once it is up, we will have his full Bird Rights and his RFA rights, so we can match any offer made to him and can offer him up to the maximum salary and 5 years.

[JawsGT]

Will we find ourselves in a similar situation down the road with Norm Powell?

[DanH]

Oops, double post.

[DanH]

dang, so even if we were to free up cap space somehow, we couldn't offer Biz a fair deal eh? Not hung up on Biz, just trying to understand how this works.

No, if we have cap space, we can offer it to any free agent, even our own.

The rights to a player allow you to ignore whether you have cap room or not, up to a limit (the limits I posted above). So if we have cap room we certainly can use it on Biz. But, for example, we can offer DeMar the max even if we are way over the cap, because of those rights we have for him. So with Biz, we can offer him a 3M per year deal even if we are way over the cap. But to offer more we need an exception or cap space to do so.

[JawsGT]

We have Biz's rights, and Scola's. But just their player rights, not Bird or Early Bird rights (require 3 and 2 years of service, respectively). So we can offer a 4 year deal, but only at a very slight raise over their current salary (so essentially can offer each of them 3M per year).

James Johnson has his Early Bird rights, so we can offer a 4 year deal at 1.75 times his current salary, so just under 5M.

DeRozan has his full Bird Rights, so we can offer 5 years at the max salary.

If you want to offer any of those first three more than those amounts, you need another exception (like the MLE) or cap space to do so.

Short answer, yes, the reason the team will likely not stay together is that Biz and possibly Scola will want more money than we can offer them to come back.

dang, so even if we were to free up cap space somehow, we couldn't offer Biz a fair deal eh? Not hung up on Biz, just trying to understand how this works.

[DanH]

Dan, is the only reason we cannot keep this present team together is we have no rights to Biz if he opts out?

We have Biz's rights, and Scola's. But just their player rights, not Bird or Early Bird rights (require 3 and 2 years of service, respectively). So we can offer a 4 year deal, but only at a very slight raise over their current salary (so essentially can offer each of them 3M per year).

James Johnson has his Early Bird rights, so we can offer a 4 year deal at 1.75 times his current salary, so just under 5M.

DeRozan has his full Bird Rights, so we can offer 5 years at the max salary.

If you want to offer any of those first three more than those amounts, you need another exception (like the MLE) or cap space to do so.

Short answer, yes, the reason the team will likely not stay together is that Biz and possibly Scola will want more money than we can offer them to come back.

[JawsGT]

Dan, is the only reason we cannot keep this present team together is we have no rights to Biz if he opts out?

[DanH]

Yeah, just under 6M.

[Axel]

Depends on who comes back.

Assuming DeMar comes back, with his cap hold on the books, we might be able to clear a couple million in cap room (so essentially none at all since the MLE might as well be used instead) by letting everyone else walk, if the cap comes in high (92M is the latest guess I saw). But might as well just use the MLE and stay over the cap.

If DeMar walks, we could have a little under 20M to spend.

And MLE is project at ~$6M?

[DanH]

Dan, what's are current FA spending options?

Depends on who comes back.

Assuming DeMar comes back, with his cap hold on the books, we might be able to clear a couple million in cap room (so essentially none at all since the MLE might as well be used instead) by letting everyone else walk, if the cap comes in high (92M is the latest guess I saw). But might as well just use the MLE and stay over the cap.

If DeMar walks, we could have a little under 20M to spend.

[Axel]

Dan, what's are current FA spending options?

[Raptor Jesus]

Lowry's deal has no incentives in it.

DeRozan's has incentives, several unknown ones and one that seems to be for making the all-star game for 50k, all told they total 600k.

I don't believe any other player on the team has incentives in their deal.

Cool thanks.

[DanH]

Interesting. Thanks for that very clear elucidation.

If I'm following, then given no immediate (or any) All-NBA Team nominations for Lowry if any incentive is built in to his contract then it would not affect cap as it would be listed as unlikely? And any All-Star incentive will count as he was an All-Star last year and thus would be listed as likely?

Lowry's deal has no incentives in it.

DeRozan's has incentives, several unknown ones and one that seems to be for making the all-star game for 50k, all told they total 600k.

I don't believe any other player on the team has incentives in their deal.