Tag: NBA

Mike Monroe: Amnesty for RJ not a simple choice

Mike Monroe/Express-News staff

The last time the NBA and the players union struck a new collective bargaining agreement, in 2005, the deal included an amnesty clause that allowed teams to waive one player and remove his salary from its official payroll.

Mavericks owner Mark Cuban used the provision to waive Michael Finley, and the final three years of his contract ($51.8 million) disappeared from Dallas’ official payroll but not from its contractual obligations. Finley is still getting paid by Cuban, $5.18 million a year, give or take, through 2015.

The Spurs, fresh off a championship run, swooped in and convinced Finley to sign a three-year deal at $2.5 million per season. Ultimately, he earned a championship ring and made another $10 million.

Another amnesty clause is part of the tentative NBA deal awaiting finalization and approval.

Isn’t this a chance for the Spurs to get Richard Jefferson’s contract, average salary $10.17 million, off their payroll through the next three seasons?

Seems like a no-brainer, unless you think $10.1 million is fair value for a guy who averages 11.0 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.3 assists. Or unless you’re the guy who still has to sign his paychecks.

Turns out there is a new wrinkle to the proposed amnesty rules that makes dumping Jefferson anything but a slam dunk: The new amnesty can be implemented in any offseason of the new CBA.

As underwhelming as Jefferson has been in his two seasons in silver and black, he was a pretty solid contributor last season on a team that won 61 games. So doesn’t it make more sense for the Spurs to see how the returning core group fares this season? After all, Jefferson made a career-high 44 percent of his 3-point shots, fifth-best in the league at a skill the Spurs value highly.

If Jefferson can help the Spurs remain in the hunt for another championship, his contract will have been well worth keeping.

But if the Spurs should suffer another first-round playoff disaster or fail to make the postseason at all? Then the conclusion will be evident: Getting Jefferson’s money off the cap will make basketball sense, no matter how painful the fiscal hit.

In all likelihood, the Spurs will keep Jefferson, but it’s not a simple decision. That’s because the pending agreement contains other wrinkles that argue for big-spending teams to use amnesty.

For one thing, the proposed deal requires teams over the luxury tax threshold to operate under more punitive restrictions on their free-agency options, including a mid-level cap exception of $3 million. Teams that are not over the luxury tax threshold will be able to offer free agents a $5 million mid-level exception.

The Spurs continue to hover around the threshold, which was $70.3 million last season. With Jefferson on this season’s roster, they’ve got 12 players whose contracts go well above $70.3 million, plus two first-round draftees who will add about $2.2 million. Getting Jefferson’s salary off the rolls would guarantee the Spurs would be under the threshold.

A third change in the pending agreement might mitigate the sting of writing all those post-waiver checks. Players waived under amnesty will be subject to a secondary waiver process that will give teams with cap room a chance to bid on them. Winning bids will apply to the player’s prior contract, effectively reducing the cost to the team that waived him.

Jefferson is still worth $4 million-$5 million a season to a team well under the cap, isn’t he?

The Spurs must decide if that is a question worth asking.

NBA jersey sales plummet because of lockout

Apparel companies  and the NBA have to be hoping for a robust holiday buying season after sales of their jerseys have dipped significantly during the lockout.

The New York Post reports that NBA jersey sales .

Most online retailers are offering 15 percent to 20 percent discounts on NBA apparel, in addition to peddling old-school or throwback jerseys at half-price to entice visitors. It’s a bullish market for consumers who can make deals in the next  several weeks as the league scrambles to regain momentum after the lockout.

“Expect FootLocker, Champs and others to follow suit,” an insider told the Post. “It has nothing to do with the holiday, either. Retailers understand that after the lockout, the price tag must be cut.”

Total NBA apparel product sales last season were close to $3 billion. With the lockout, analysts expect this year’s sales number to be closer to $1 billion, with sneakers as the sport’s lone bright spot.

NBA gets new deal; Spurs get an old one

The short season works. The NBA might even be better suited for 66 games rather than 82.

Starting on Christmas lessens the damage, too. Most casual fans don’t pay attention to the sport until then; this time, they will pay attention to Dirk Nowitzki getting his ring while LeBron James does not.

So the owners are happy because they will get more money, and the players are happy because they will start getting theirs. The only ones who will be disappointed are those who thought the NBA was closer to a level-playing field.

As it turns out?

It’s been leveled for 24 or 25 teams.

Business will change for the other half-dozen franchises, too. Now they will think twice before they burn through a few extra million; they used to think only once.

Last season, four franchises had larger payrolls than everyone else, and that was only because the Heat and Knicks weren’t able to open their wallets as they would have liked. As it was, the Lakers spent about $22 million more than the Spurs, and the Magic, Mavericks and Celtics each paid at least $15 million more than the Spurs.

Not coincidentally, each made the playoffs. Not coincidentally, the Finals included two owners whose combined worth is more than $7 billion.

Mark Cuban is the poorer of the two, but one of his personnel moves before last season was indicative of what money can do for a basketball team. After the Spurs eliminated the Mavericks in the spring of 2010, Cuban bankrolled the trade that exchanged Erick Dampier’s expiring contract for Tyson Chandler.

Cuban got the player who would change his team with a price tag to match. Adding tax, Chandler cost Cuban about ? twice his salary of $12 million.

Cuban could afford it; the Spurs could not. Their one splurge in this era was the trade for Richard Jefferson, and that still hangs on them. They will be debating, soon, whether to amnesty Jefferson and reduce the loss the best they can.

Under the tentative agreement, the old rules will be in effect for the next two seasons. That gives the Mavericks a better chance of signing Chandler and keeping their championship group together, and being given a chance to repeat is only fair. Cuban will have to pay only a dollar-for-dollar tax.

Under the new labor deal, that will go up considerably. The scale escalates as the payroll does, and no one is certain of the details yet. But it’s safe to say Cuban, given the same circumstance, would pay at least twice as much for Chandler.

That sounds stiff, and it will likely dissuade some deals. Again, they will think twice.

But just as the best players will always get their money, the richest franchises will spend theirs. Their revenues will encourage it, too. The Lakers, for example, will be working with a new Time Warner contract that will pay them $150 million a year.

The Spurs have won in this environment before. But they’ve had Tim Duncan, an economic equalizer, and they had hoped for a labor agreement that would create a competitive balance closer to the NFL than to Major League Baseball.

The owners’ proposals included various provisions as recently as last week that would have led to that. But Friday, getting everything else they wanted from the players — and needing to meet the Christmas deadline — the owners compromised.

“It’s not the system we sought out to get in terms of a harder cap,” NBA deputy commissioner Adam Silver said, “but the luxury tax is harsher than it was in the past deal, and we hope it’s effective.”

They hope.

Which is what the small-market franchises have always done.

bharvey@express-news.net