Trade & FA 2023-24: Lavine Market Barely There| NOP Want Trae or Murray

[KillerLeft]

What's stopping us from sending out Timmy's $16.2 mil and getting back 2 players who make around $11 mil combined?
That would let us give DJJ up to the full mle and give us space to maybe do a 15th guy if he takes less


Edit
I forgot about AJ Lawson.
On the books for 2.1 mil next season but his contract isn't guaranteed

Easy in theory, because I assume what you mean by “what’s stopping us“ is that you are willing to take back a very low level of player to accomplish the financial goal. That kind of thing has been fairly easy in the past.

The issue now is that many, many teams will hit the off-season with the same goal of reducing payroll in order to accomplish what they are trying to accomplish without incurring excessive cap penalties. So, many of the would-be trade partners will also be insisting that THEY take back less salary than they send out. There are teams with cap space and not all of them will find free agents on which they are willing to spend it, but the teams who are in position to absorb someone like Hardaway as a favor for the Mavericks, even in just in a lopsided, still sending some money out kind of deal, will expect value for doing so. 

The reality is none of us really know what to expect over the next couple of summers, including most of the dudes who work in these front offices.

I will be satisfied with the off-season if the Mavericks are able to maneuver enough to retain DJJ and MAYBE add one minimum who can hopefully contribute, similar to Exum/DJJ last summer. I feel like we have arrived at a place where that amount of work constitutes a successful off-season. Anything past that is gravy, and it might be more difficult to accomplish those things then we understand sitting here now.