New CBA agreement

[DanSchwartzgan]

Yes, in addition to all the other ways we've had to create a hard-cap at Apron 1, using trade matching above 110% (or 100% after this coming season) will make you hard-capped at Apron 1.

1 yes  -- as long as you stay under Apron 1, lots of flexibility
2 no  -- that rule starts July 2024 and is allowed on all the annual exceptions except TxMLE
3 14 is the general roster minimum through the season (and you count all salaries of whatever number you have)

Irrelevant to any of the above, I ran into another little goodie being added that you might like -- once we get to the end of the 2023-24 regular season, all TPE's will expire and will not carry over for use in the post-season or free agency. Each year, the end of the regular season will become the expiration date for all of them.

Thanks for all of that.  I'd seen where TPE's expire each year, but didn't dream it would be at the end of the regular season.  Yikes!  

It seems really imperative that if Dallas wants to make a splash this summer, they need to either:

1. Get most of their work done in June

2. Get themselves well below the first apron and then do the things they want to do to get right back up to it (even if it hard caps them this year).   Maybe that is some or all of the TPE.  Maybe that is a trade with greater than 110% matching.  I'm more convinced than I was before that Kyrie's number is going to be flexible.  Whatever we have left up to a hair below the first apron.

Trading down in the draft for picks, players and to reduce salary starts to make more sense (Utah has multiple TPE's that would absorb McGee).  Maybe you S/W Bertans or maybe you S/W Reggie's guaranteed amount.  But if you want a sizable trade spread and use of most of the MLE, you can't stand still.

Once you have the team you want in place, you can fiddle around the edges (TP MLE and 100% trade matching) if you stay under the first apron.  Or, you can drift over the first apron and kind of screw your flexibility.  This may really hurt the little cottage industry that exists around player movement at the TDL and in the offseason.