NBA Free Agency

I couldn't really wait any longer to blog about the NBA Free Agency period starting in roughly about 1 day and 6 hours from the time I finish this post. Like any good economics class I guess let's start with what will be what teams can spend. $56.1 million dollars, numerically $56,100,000 without going into the NBA luxury tax. Now we all know the teams in the past who have been reluctant to go into the tax so we really won't get into that. However, as you can see below the top five in total player payroll have at least been making the playoffs the last few seasons.




1. Dallas Mavericks $85,828,850
2. Los Angeles Lakers $83,938,202
3. Orlando Magic $79,677,182
4. Denver Nuggets $74,976,074
5. Cleveland Cavaliers $69,152,524
6. San Antonio Spurs $67,606,328
7. New Orleans Hornets $66,381,918
8. Indiana Pacers $65,558,674
9. Philadelphia 76ers $63,444,338
10. Boston Celtics $63,326,049
11. Phoenix Suns $60,754,630
12. Charlotte Bobcats $59,536,980
13. Houston Rockets $58,094,278
14. Golden State Warriors $55,404,765
15. Detroit Pistons $54,951,801
16. Utah Jazz $54,790,979
17. Portland Trail Blazers $49,595,378
18. Oklahoma City Thunder $49,063,550
19. Milwaukee Bucks $48,810,398
20. Atlanta Hawks $47,630,214
21. Memphis Grizzlies $47,295,900
22. Toronto Raptors $46,326,150
23. Sacramento Kings $35,599,100
24. Minnesota Timberwolves $35,710,205
25. Los Angeles Clippers $33,578,349
26. Chicago Bulls $31,861,826
27. Washington Wizards $29,183,101
28. Miami Heat $27,598,483
29. New Jersey Nets $22,711,940
30. New York Knicks $18,637,293

Now if we were to assume that many of these teams will relatively stay the same with their payroll, 13 of the 30 teams would be over the salary cap and would have to start paying the luxury tax. For those of you unfamiliar with that tax it is any dollar amount over the cap which if you take our $56.1 million dollars we started with is that cap.

According to the way things broke down in recent years the contracts for players can be as follows. The maximum amount of money a player can sign for is contingent on the number of years that player has played and the total of the salary cap. The maximum salary of a player with 6 or fewer years of experience is $9,000,000 or 25% of the total salary cap (2009-10: $14,472,500). For a player with 7–9 years of experience, the maximum is $11,000,000 or 30% of the cap (2009-10: $17,310,000), and for a player with 10+ years of experience, the maximum is $14,000,000 or 35% of the cap (2008-2009: $20,195,000).

So let's take a look at Lebron James, $63,000,000, is the total amount of money he made for the life of his previous contract, his salary for the 2008 season was just under 6 million, their entire payroll was just under 63 million that season, which means that the King commanded about a one-fifth of his teams' money. Now the Cavaliers if they were to sign Lebron would now have to pay at least the 9 million or 25% of the team's salary. Based on what the Cavaliers total salary was 2009-10, $69,152,524 that would mean Lebron would now be making according to the most recent data available $17,288,131 at the most.

Based on last years numbers the teams that have that kind of money to spend that James would want to go to are the Knicks, Nets, Bulls, Heat, and Clippers.

This would be no different for any other big name free agent coming up. Of course the team has to be willing to make the offer.


Now for those of you who live in my home state I will go ahead and break down the Jazz.

As you can see from the list above the Jazz spent $54,790,979 this past season. This next list is a list of everyone who has a current deal in place or who has been made an offer.

Deron Williams $14,940,152
Andrei Kirilekno $17,822,187
Mehmet Okur $9,450,000
Paul Millsap $6,200,000
CJ Miles $3,700,000

Ronnie Price $1,380,000
Kosta Koufos $1,298,640
*Kyrylo Fesenko $1,087,500
*Wes Matthews $937,195

*offers made to players

This now means that the Jazz payroll without re-signing Kyle Korver, Carlos Boozer or their current draft picks Gordon Hayward and Jeremy Evans is $59,315,674. Yes the offers to Matthews and Fes have not been signed yet, but this doesn't leave a whole lot of room for Boozer at least. Luckily under the current collective bargaining agreement a team is allowed to sign their rookies without it hurting the team's cap. The Jazz have traditionally not paid the luxury tax in extremes and I don't really see them doing it this year even for just Boozer. One factor though is Larry is gone and I think that Greg Miller realizes that in order to keep his fan base interested they need to stay competitive and signing their top scorer (Boozer) from last season might be the way to go, especially if Memo isn't ready.

I don't really have any speculation for any of these teams either way. We all know the teams that are willing to go over the cap range i.e. the Lakers, Knicks, Mavericks, Pacers, Heat, Bulls, Magic, and Nuggets. Certainly as I mentioned before we know who wants the services of Mr. James. As for the rest of the free agents well last time I checked we're still in a recession which means I will continue to steal NBA TV, FSN, and ESPN for as long as I still can.