Lebron James leaning toward joining Al-Queda!

http://www.theonion.com/articles/breaking-lebron-james-leaning-toward-joining-alqae,36417/

He could grow the beard James Hardin style.

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I can totally see Cuban offering that kind of cash just to get Houston to match, and take them out of the running for Bosh...

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That only works if parsons signs before houston signs their FA(s).

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The Charlotte Hornets and Utah Jazz restricted free agent Gordon Hayward have agreed to a four-year offer sheet at the projected maximum of $63 million that Hayward is expected to sign Thursday at 12:01 a.m., according to sources close to the process. ESPN.com

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Jody Genessy: Gordon Hayward agreeing to a max deal w/ Hornets is a "non-issue for the Jazz," per a person with knowledge of situation. Utah will match.

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Per hoops hype.

For those scoring at home, there are at least two teams who think Gordon Hayward is worth max money.

Utah does not like it when you try and sign away their white people.

Crazy market. Hayward would be a good fit in Charlotte but doesn't look like it will happen.

So Clevland just dumped Jack, Zeller, and Karasev's contracts in a 3-team deal with Brooklyn and Boston. They've now got max room to offer Lebron. Talk about going for broke.

That's good news for Houston. I think if Bron goes to Cleveland, Houston gets Bosh and Wade will have to cry himself to sleep at night.

Cleveland going absolutely ALL IN to be witnesses again

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That's good news for Houston. I think if Bron goes to Cleveland, Houston gets Bosh and Wade will have to cry himself to sleep at night.

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Anything involving Wade crying is fine by me!

My man @Chris_Broussard reports that Cavs, in addition to clearing space for their LeBron pursuit, also after Ray Allen to appeal to Bron



Ray Allen Zzzzzzzz

Ray said last week he will take the vet min for whatever team takes Bron.

Also I found this pic of Don Nelson with the guys from NSync.

I don't think Cleveland makes that move without being told by Bron that he is coming back.

I honestly don't think anyone knows what LeBron is doing

https://twitter.com/CavsFredMcLeod/status/486691888548700160/photo/1

Also, Anthony Bennett isn't as much of a fat ass anymore.

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I honestly don't think anyone knows what LeBron is doing

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Bron is meeting with Riley, Arison, Spo and Wade today. I think he is giving them the bad news that he is taking his talents to Cleveland.

I bet he gets a nice fat offer to stay in Miami.

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I honestly don't think anyone knows what LeBron is doing

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Bron is meeting with Riley, Arison, Spo and Wade today. I think he is giving them the bad news that he is taking his talents to Cleveland.

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I think that's what his agent wants at least.

But if the players around him in Miami are a broken down DWade, a broken down Danny Granger, some point guard with zero minutes in the NBA and Josh McWhitey, why would LeBron take that? A couple million in Miami over Cleveland isn't going to matter when he makes triple that in endorsements off the court.

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Wade will have to cry himself to sleep at night.

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Personally I think Lebron would be a fool to leave Miami. They've made the finals all four years. All they need to do is get a couple players to take a little less money so they can add some new pieces to get right back to the finals again. Riley has a track record of knowing what he is doing. Cleveland has great potential but is not a sure thing.

However he could view a return to Cleveland as a redemption story to make himself the "good guy" again.

He added Josh McRoberts and Danny Granger. He has a hard cap at 84mm because of using the MLE.

He really doesn't have the space to do anything else other than hope other vets like Ray Ray will take the minimum.

Plus I'm not sure why Bosh would agree to a substantial pay cut, particularly when management is forcing your hand by giving out the full MLE to Josh McRoberts.

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Charlie Palilo in Houston just said on his radio show Dallas offered Parsons 15 million a year.... Wow if true

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Interesting if that happens. Mavs have about $16M in cap space. Parsons's max salary assuming a $63.2M cap is $15.8M this year. That means Cuban will be all in on Parsons by basically giving him a max deal (which IMO is too much, I don't consider Chandler a max-worthy player) and at the potential expense of missing out on other free agents they may be targeting or fortifying the bench, because that would tie up his cap space for 72 hours.

On the court, it's not a bad fit, you get a starting lineup of:

PG - Felton
SG - Ellis
SF - Parsons
PF - Dirk
C - Chandler

The bench under this scenario is probably similar to last year, but I think you take a hit by losing Carter and Larkin, unless Carter can be convinced to return for the minimum, because you've had to burn your room mid-level of $2.73M to bring back Harris (they've agreed to 3 years/$9M) because you've burned your cap space offering $15M to Parsons. Also not sure what the demand is for Blair, he was a solid bench contributor that you may be able to bring back for a minimum-type salary.

Don't sleep on Cuban offering a front-loaded contract to Parsons. So 15mm the first year, but it gets smaller as the years go on, so it is really a 12mm or whatever average contract.

Spurs have done that in the past. Helps keep you flexible for future free agency summers.

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Don't sleep on Cuban offering a front-loaded contract to Parsons. So 15mm the first year, but it gets smaller as the years go on, so it is really a 12mm or whatever average contract.

Spurs have done that in the past. Helps keep you flexible for future free agency summers.

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I was thinking about that yesterday. I think Houston would be even more inclined to match if that were the case. He'd have a lower cap figure than he's worth yet again.

Didn't Morey do that with Asik and the Bulls? Backloaded to push Asik way over

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Don't sleep on Cuban offering a front-loaded contract to Parsons. So 15mm the first year, but it gets smaller as the years go on, so it is really a 12mm or whatever average contract.

Spurs have done that in the past. Helps keep you flexible for future free agency summers.

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I was thinking about that yesterday. I think Houston would be even more inclined to match if that were the case. He'd have a lower cap figure than he's worth yet again.

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Disagree. In the case I brought up, Parsons would have a cap figure exactly as he was paid. So like 15mm this year, 13mm next year or whatever it is you can do.

Spurs did it with Tiago Splitter.

It would not be like JLin contract where it was averaged over three years. The reason that worked was because the Knicks would have had to pay luxury tax on the 15mm this year and they knew they would be way over the luxury tax line with their terrible contracts. So 15mm would have been closer to 40mm or whatever.

Right, Houston was able to get Lin and Asik because it averaged out for them but their home teams were going to have the exact salaries count against the cap. $15M was a huge cap number.

For Parsons, I think Houston would want declining cap numbers in the future. Gives them more flexibility, particularly as the cap increases.

But it would keep them from getting Bosh. Which is kind of the point.

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But it would keep them from getting Bosh. Which is kind of the point.

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How? Bosh will sign somewhere before the 13th, when Houston would have to match.

Maybe they changed how it works under the new CBA, but under the old CBA, when an RFA signed an offer sheet, he takes on that a cap hold equal to that offer sheet until he is renounced. Portland screwed up Utah's cap space with their Wesley Mathews offer years ago by doing this.

So Parsons goes from a 2.8mm hold to a 15mm hold until Houston signs or renounces him because at that point, he either costs 15mm or 0.

You might be right. I don't know. I think the pieces fall into place today though.

Houston can match Parsons offer sheet (within the 72 hours) since they have his Bird rights and they can exceed the cap if that signing drives them over it. So for their plan to work they would need to sign Bosh first to eat up the available cap space (that they created by trading Asik and Lin (another step that has to happen for this to work)) and then match Parsons offer sheet which would allow to them to get both Bosh and Parsons. If they had to match Parsons first that would eat up the cap space and not leave them the additional room to sign Bosh. That is my understanding. It really comes down to Les Alexander realizing he is going to pay the tax the next few years until the cap space increases.

[This message has been edited by AgBrother (edited 7/9/2014 11:36a).]

Parsons, if he gets offered $15M by Dallas for example, doesn't have to sign it right that second. My guess is parsons and his agent are well aware of the situation and won't sign an offer sheet until the rockets have gotten word back from the bigger fish (bosh, melo, etc)