Everything Off Season

[G__Deane]

It's going to be a long 3.5 months of off season and there could be reasonably significant changes in Raptorland....or very little.
So I thought we should have a place to discuss all things off-season rather than in a game or playoff thread.

Free agents are:

Marc Gasol, unrestricted FA
Serge Ibaka, unrestricted FA
Fred Van Vleet, unrestricted FA
Rondae Hollis Jefferson unrestricted FA

• Chris Boucher (restricted)
• Malcolm Miller (restricted)
• Stanley Johnson (player)
• Oshae Brissett (restricted)

Can anyone definitively tell me how it works if either Marc's 25M or Serge's 23M come off the books? Do you theoretically have that value to add to the roster? The whole bird rights, vet minimum and mid level exemptions etc escape me in how they related to the cap.

Who needs to go and who can we bring in? I think we need a bit of a shake up and it could be in the starters.
If Marc goes, who is available to break this starting roster. Do we just move Serge and Boucher up? Nah....
If Serge goes, is there an impactful "6th man" out there as a FA?

Or does anything have to come via trade?

How do we begin to shape this team around Pascal, FVV and OG, keeping in mind the ultimate prize in Giannis?

[G__Deane]

DanH explained a bit of the cap ramification on another thread

Yeah, the NBA uses a soft cap. So if you are just re-signing your own free agents, the cap is kind of irrelevant. You can go over it to sign players you have the rights to.

But if you want to sign another team’s free agent, you need to be under the cap. Or have an exception to the cap (such as the mid level exception, or MLE, worth about the average salary for one over-the-cap signing). But for a real difference maker you tend to need cap room. Well, you might say, why not just use your cap space first on a free agent, and then since you are allowed to go over the cap for players you own the rights to, sign them after. Well, the NBA obviously doesn’t want that to be allowed, so each of your own free agents is assigned a cap hold, a temporary cap hit that sits on your books so long as you have the rights to that player. The value of the hold is based on an assumed raise from the previous season salary. You can get rid of that hold any time by waiving your rights to re-sign that player and go over the cap. Or by signing them, at which point their actual salary replaces their hold.

This summer, technically, FVV, Gasol, Ibaka, Boucher and RHJ all have cap holds that will sit on the Raps books. But those take them way beyond 122M. I suspect the value above was based on just FVV and Boucher’s cap holds (which means we’d be assuming that the Raptors do not want to re-sign the other FAs) or on an assumed salary for them, plus some amount for our first round pick and empty roster spots (they have cap holds too).

Long story short, if all we want to do is re-sign players, we don’t have to worry about the cap, this year anyway. It’s more long term planning that ties our hands on who we can give deals with term to. This year, however, if they did try to re-sign everyone, the danger would be paying luxury tax, which they will not want to do.

[planetmars]

DanH can do a much better job than me at this but.. let me give it a stab...


One of my favourite tools is:
http://shamsports.com/capulator

You can play GM with that tool. Use it, learn from it. Will make you understand the cap a lot more.

There is also Larry Coon's website which tries to explain everything:
http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm


Every team is given a salary cap. Right now the estimate is $117M but may and probably will go down because of COVID. And it might not reduce that much as they will probably do some kind of cap smoothing as opposed to a huge drop in one year (the reverse of the situation that helped the Warriors get KD).

Each free agent on a team has an imaginary cap hold. This is put on the books as part of your cap if you plan to use that player's Bird Rights to resign them. The imaginary cap hold is determined based on their last year's salary.

Fred who made $9.3M in 2019-2020 has a cap hold of $17.7M for 2020-2021. If we want to bring him back at a value greater than $17.7M it would be prudent to keep his cap hold.

If you drop Marc and Serge and all other free agent cap holds (like RHJ, Miller, Boucher, and ex players like Bebe, De Colo, Freeland, etc). And keep just Fred's cap hold. Then also keep Stanley's player option (that's up to him not us, and we should assume he's keeping it). That gives a salary cap of $120.9M. That is above the $117M estimated cap and therefore makes us intelligible to use the salary cap to get a free agent.

Raptors cap is still high because of Siakam's extension. Lowry's last year on his deal. And Fred's cap hold.

Now, because the NBA has a soft cap and not a hard cap like the NHL.. teams are given exceptions to sign players even though they are playing above the salary cap. The most notable is the mid-level exception or MLE. There are different forms of this exception. And it depends on if you are above the cap, below the cap or above the apron (which is about $6M below the luxury tax line).

Because the Raptors are above the salary cap, but well below the apron (assuming the cap stays at $117M), the will get the full mid-level exception which is about $9.9M.

There are other exceptions too like the bi-annual exception. This is about $3.9M.

These are the two exceptions we probably get to bring in a free agent. Definitely not enough for a guy making $20M+ like DeMar DeRozan. Of course if the cap drops significantly we might be around the apron and therefore our mid-level exception drops significantly and we may not get the bi-annual exception to use anymore.

If we want a significant upgrade in talent that will come through a trade not through free agency this off season. For example via a sign and trade with Serge. We can use his bird rights to resign him and then trade him. We'll lose some exceptions that way though but it might be another way of getting talent if we don't like anyone in free agency.

[golden]

I'd imagine both Serge and Boucher are high on the Rockets wish list: rim protection + rebounding + floor spacing.

You look at Boucher's overall 3P% and it's only 32%, but that's deceiving. The more minutes he got, the better he shot (44%, 3P) & played overall - just outstanding numbers and a positive impact on winning.



Boucher just needs the security of a defined role and consistent minutes and to be allowed to play through his mistakes... like FVV, but Nurse is pretty tough on his bench guys. Some team will probably pick him up for cheap and he'll breakout like Christian Wood.

https://www.basketball-reference.com...01/splits/2020

[inthepaint]

Good Sunday morning thread.

I like FVV, I'm not as low as some are on him after this series, I think he could be the PG of the future after father time catches up with Lowry. That said, I also think a team like the Bulls, Knicks or Pistons will offer him a great combination of cash and term on the contract, which is what he should be looking for at this stage of his career, as well as the keys to the team. A combination that if we were to match would undermine our team building flexibility for 2021 summer and beyond. So I can see him gone.

I thank Gasol for what he did for this team in 2019, but given the changes in his offence game and the fact he will be getting close to 37 by the time of the next playoffs, I think he'll be walking into the sunset, or looking at the vet minimum on a contending team (like his brother Pau at the end of his run). Rondae will also be gone as well, he will be looking for a team where he can get some playoffs minutes and up his value.

Serge, like FVV, will also generate interest in the market in terms of cash and term, so the FVV rational applies to him too. He's actually closer to Fred's age than he is to Gasol's. That said, there are a couple of things that make me think Serge might end up staying:

--In terms of roster balance, that will be shaping up to be a position of need for us
--We will need a C that can run a good bread-and butter pick and roll with Lowry, and that can ideally shoot the 3, roll, pop, rebound and protect the rim. Serge is not perfect but he ticks all these boxes, has already chemistry with Lowry and knows the system and team culture well.
--He loves Toronto, and also has a great locker room presence and positive influence on the young guys (notably OG and TD). He would probably be amenable to a shorter 1yr deal with good $ (like we did for Lowry), which is what we need to maintain our options open for the 2021 free agency. FVV on the other hand will certainly be looking for long term and $$.

If it shakes out that way, we'd be looking at starting lineup of Lowry-Norm-OG-Siakam-Ibaka (with guys like TD, Thomas, Boucher plus the draft gems we're gonna get off the bench). That's a pretty competitive and balanced lineup that would probably win a lot of games. IMO, this roster would:

1. Keep the team winning and relevant, thereby appealing to free agents
2. Be balanced with length, athleticism, inside/drive presence, shooting an defence switchabiltiy
3. Finally provide some consistent minutes and role to Norm in his natural SG position, so we can truly see what we have in him in his contract year
4. Provide meaningful minutes to guys like TD/Thomas/Boucher off the bench, so they can properly develop and increase their value to the team (like they did to FVV on his 2nd yr - the 'bench mob' year)
5. Keep the books clean and flexible for team building via trades and free agency after next season.

[Ebonhawke]

I'm going to be curious to see how many trades there are this off-season that involve 2020 draft picks - because of COVID, there's likely to be a wider valuation of a particular player (because they didn't play this spring).

[bertarapsfan]

I'm going to be curious to see how many trades there are this off-season that involve 2020 draft picks - because of COVID, there's likely to be a wider valuation of a particular player (because they didn't play this spring).

I think there is speculation that some of the teams who really got hit hard losing that ticket revenue may actually look to be selling their picks. Lots of those bottom feeders/ bad markets operate on thin margains and may look to sell pick for a couple mil here and there to try and get some of that back.

[Ebonhawke]

I think there is speculation that some of the teams who really got hit hard losing that ticket revenue may actually look to be selling their picks. Lots of those bottom feeders/ bad markets operate on thin margains and may look to sell pick for a couple mil here and there to try and get some of that back.

And that's part of the intrigue surrounding this year's Draft: If you're a team like Phoenix, with the #10 pick, and want to say, trade that pick to the Blazers for #16 and cash - the Suns might not get any takers, because the Blazers might not want give up the additional asset (cash) for a guy that they think will still likely be on the board at #16 anyways. Or the converse might be true - because teams might not have any idea of what other team's valuations of players / draft boards look like, there might be more of those type of deals - just because teams' paranoia of not getting 'their guy'.

It also makes some other deals.. interesting. Let's say the Knicks approach the Raptors with a package that includes Barrett and the #8 pick in this year's draft for Fred's rights. Because there wasn't really a college season this year, it means there's less of a 'book' by Raptors scouts on players that might be available at #8 - so if you're Masai do you pull a trigger on a deal, where one of the key pieces is an unknown?

[007]

I really hope Boucher is re-signed

[DanH]

And that's part of the intrigue surrounding this year's Draft: If you're a team like Phoenix, with the #10 pick, and want to say, trade that pick to the Blazers for #16 and cash - the Suns might not get any takers, because the Blazers might not want give up the additional asset (cash) for a guy that they think will still likely be on the board at #16 anyways. Or the converse might be true - because teams might not have any idea of what other team's valuations of players / draft boards look like, there might be more of those type of deals - just because teams' paranoia of not getting 'their guy'.

It also makes some other deals.. interesting. Let's say the Knicks approach the Raptors with a package that includes Barrett and the #8 pick in this year's draft for Fred's rights. Because there wasn't really a college season this year, it means there's less of a 'book' by Raptors scouts on players that might be available at #8 - so if you're Masai do you pull a trigger on a deal, where one of the key pieces is an unknown?

You can’t trade a UFA’s rights. FYI.

[DanH]

I really hope Boucher is re-signed

He barely played, so his market might be really limited. If so, and the Raps can get him to sign a 2 year deal near the minimum, they’d love that, as it provides them at least a little C depth with that position being such an unknown going forward. Then sign Gasol as your nominal low minutes starter, play Boucher half of every game to see what he can do to establish whether he can be part of the pitch in 2021, and give Hernandez some minutes with the bench to see if he can be a rotation piece in the NBA.

But if he has a market, if teams are willing to toss him 5M a year, I don’t know that the Raps would want that on their books before he proves he can really contribute.

[golden]

He barely played, so his market might be really limited. If so, and the Raps can get him to sign a 2 year deal near the minimum, they’d love that, as it provides them at least a little C depth with that position being such an unknown going forward. Then sign Gasol as your nominal low minutes starter, play Boucher half of every game to see what he can do to establish whether he can be part of the pitch in 2021, and give Hernandez some minutes with the bench to see if he can be a rotation piece in the NBA.

But if he has a market, if teams are willing to toss him 5M a year, I don’t know that the Raps would want that on their books before he proves he can really contribute.

Boucher will have a market. I was surprised to hear a few of the commentators, like SVG, talking him up pretty big. You really think that $5m an overpay?

[LJ2]

Boston started a guy I never heard of at C and did well enough to get past teams with big C's in Embiid and Gasol. Maybe we need to rethink how we man that spot. Boucher maybe is the future??

[planetmars]

Boston started a guy I never heard of at C and did well enough to get past teams with big C's in Embiid and Gasol. Maybe we need to rethink how we man that spot. Boucher maybe is the future??

Theis like Fred, Terrence and Matt was an undrafted signing for them. Sometimes you can get really good players that way. Theis did play behind Horford though last year before he got pushed to the starting unit.

Boucher could have a little something in him to be able to start big games.. but he'll need Nurse's trust. Not sure if he has that.

[golden]

Theis like Fred, Terrence and Matt was an undrafted signing for them. Sometimes you can get really good players that way. Theis did play behind Horford though last year before he got pushed to the starting unit.

Boucher could have a little something in him to be able to start big games.. but he'll need Nurse's trust. Not sure if he has that.

Nurse excess loyalty / trust issues was a double-edge sword.

It feels like it was a season-long theme where Nurse had made his mind up going into the season that he was only going to roll with the 6 guys + OG who contributed to the championship run. That mindset started right out of training camp. I wonder if there was a little bit of ego in there, kind of like "hey, we're gonna prove it wasn't just Kawhi". Conversely, he was a hard-ass on any of the newcomers getting significant minutes or consistent roles.

With Siakam struggling, one of the keys in the Celtics series was their energy guys (i.e. Smart, Theis, Williams) stepping up and making hustle plays vs. our tired starters. Nurse kept our 3 really good hustle guys on the bench (Boucher, RHJ, TD). They might have made a difference, if for nothing else, than to give our starters tired legs an extended break.