TDL Archived: The 2nd Rnd Pick Yankee Swap

[DanSchwartzgan]

I am still struggling with this mindset that you have to have all your contracts expire in 24 in order to clear room for free agents.  Miami, GS and LA are not unique in that they can clear cap when they need to (anybody can do that), they are unique in that they can actually attract max free agents to begin with.  If you need to clear cap you just need movable contracts or draft capital.  If the Mavs plan it correctly, they will have both.  

I find it hard to believe they will have trouble moving Timmy's contract at 16 mil when he will be an expiring and potentially an asset at that amount.  Bertans will only be a 5 mil hit.  I don't see that we need to make moves right now with explicit purpose of clearing those two for 24, especially when it involves spending assets.

I don’t think you have to have all of your contracts expiring in 24.  I think you have to have a credible threat to get to the number you want fairly easily.  It gives you the option of offering to S&T for your guy (but that might have BYC issues).  If the other party won’t play along, then you activate your plan to get space.  But, there are other things to consider besides just THJ and Bertans.  Are we keeping Wood past 23/24?  If so, that eats into some of the margin we’d generate by moving THJ and Bertans.  What do we do with McGee.  

I’m not trying to create $60-something million in space.  I do think you need to be one easy move from $40mm.  Maybe that one move is Tim.  Maybe it is Wood.  Maybe it is a S/W of someone.  I don’t think we can dismissively say Tim will be easy to move for space.  We don’t know what his health will be at that point.  We don’t know which teams will have cap space and what the going rate for taking on someone like Tim will be.  With the FA class I’m envisioning, space might be very expensive to come by.  We’d definitely need to hold onto a tradable 24 pick in case we have to have it to buy our way to space.