Why Wally won't be included in any S&T scenarios...

[MalTalm]

I don't create new threads very often, but this has been coming up a lot on proposed trades lately, and I felt the need to explain why it's completely unrealistic.

The idea of a Wally S&T is essentially to sign him to a 1 yr deal for X amount of dollars, and offer him as an expiring contract as an asset to another team.

First, it's important to understand that in June, an expiring contract for next season is at an all-time low. I think we already over-estimate expiring contracts because they were at a premium this past year as teams shuffled around to be able to court a max contract type player in 2010. But savings coming next year are far less enticing than savings coming now. Which brings me to my next point.

Wally would need to be paid the entirety of whatever deal he was signed for.

If a team only cares about salary relief, they'd rather take a scrub with an expiring who can be cut for instant savings. Obviously, Delonte is an extreme version of that with only 500k guaranteed this year, but most players aren't on contracts which only contain guaranteed money. A trading partner would vastly prefer to get any other expiring deal which they could cut and save even more money on the cap, with that relief coming now rather than down the road.

Expiring contracts also aren't terribly hard to find (though, again, ones structured like West's are the exception), and if a team wanted to find a way to make the salaries match, they'd certainly rather bring in a 3rd team to facilitate the deal. A Cavs future 2nd rounder and cash considerations would be more than enough to land a bad player who's owed 3-5 mil this year.

Wally will not be a productive player.

He's a year out of the NBA, semi-retired, and well past his prime. I don't think this needs too much explanation.

Finally, it's an unknown factor to handle in negotiations.

I don't think Wally would be too upset about taking 4mil just to be involved in a trade, but him and his agent still are a factor. I doubt Grant would want to come to a deal in principal only to have it fall apart because he couldn't agree to numbers with Wally's agent.

All in all, Wally could theoretically have been involved going into the trade deadline, where a team would only carry him on the roster for a couple of months and then have unloaded him this summer. But even in those scenarios, he'd have to be paid the full amount of his contract, so it wasn't an option teams were chopping at the bit for.

 

[InBoobieWeTrust]

Nobody is saying it's likely, but unfortunately you've probably wasted some time with this post partially because you misunderstand what he would be used for and partially because other people do the same thing.

Is it likely that he will be used as extra salary filler to make a deal work that couldn't without him? No.

Is it unrealistic? Not at all. I could easily see it happening it it was absolutely necessary. Wally's potential role is basically the same one Keith Van Horn played in the Jason Kidd trade. Not as an asset, simply as salary filler in a larger scale deal. It's a realistic scenario(but not likely...two different things).

 

[col63onel]

When you do a sign and trade, the first year is guaranteed, but the next 2 aren't fully guaranteed. So they wouldn't be paying him a full amount for 3 seasons.

We all know it's unlikely, but it's still technically a possibility.

 

[Binkster]

Thanks for the effort, Talm.

 

[eighter08]

could they do a contract for say 3-4 mill, then include 3 or 4 mill in the trade to buy him out?

 

[CornerThree]

could they do a contract for say 3-4 mill, then include 3 or 4 mill in the trade to buy him out?

they could include up to 3 million in cash.

 

[Heej]

Why is it that we couldn't just sign him to a partially guaranteed contract like Delonte? I'm guessing there's a CBA rule that prevents this?

 

[Mdog1]

Why Wally should be included in a S&T if necessary is because we will be at an all time low (not literally, just in the past few years) in total salary even after we re-sign LeBron to the max, and use our MLE, BAE, re-sign Z and Shaq. If we did all of that we would still be about 2 million under what we paid last year in salary (depending on Shaqs price). Not to mention that if it was a big deal over 10 million we could cut West and basically pay the same as we did last year.

 

[sailfish]

When you do a sign and trade, the first year is guaranteed, but the next 2 aren't fully guaranteed. So they wouldn't be paying him a full amount for 3 seasons.

We all know it's unlikely, but it's still technically a possibility.

Exactly. Steven Hunter was signed & traded by Orlando as part of the Gooden, Varejao-Battie deal. He was needed to make the numbers work under the salary cap, even though he was never going to play in Cleveland. In a prearranged deal, Hunter was bought out and he walked away with about $1 million for his troubles.

Keith Van Horn is another example.

Sign & trades, strictly for cap reasons happen. Not a lot, but they do happen. It's probably more likely to happen around the trade deadline than right now.

 

[Surge]

I wish I could be a salary-filler...

 

[MalTalm]

Nobody is saying it's likely, but unfortunately you've probably wasted some time with this post partially because you misunderstand what he would be used for and partially because other people do the same thing.

No, I get it, but the same thing can be accomplished by getting a little more creative and involving a 3rd team. It's a little more work, but far more preferable to teams not named the Cavs.

What it comes down to is no other team will WANT Wally. Everyone keeps pointing to Van Horn, but he was only traded because the deal was, essentially, Devin Harris and 2 first round picks for Jason Kidd, and a few pieces needed to be added to make the deal go. We're offering sizable contracts up like AV and Mo Williams, our roster isn't packed with recent draftees making 1-2 mil a year.

 

[jmill]

No, I get it, but the same thing can be accomplished by getting a little more creative and involving a 3rd team. It's a little more work, but far more preferable to teams not named the Cavs.

What it comes down to is no other team will WANT Wally. Everyone keeps pointing to Van Horn, but he was only traded because the deal was, essentially, Devin Harris and 2 first round picks for Jason Kidd, and a few pieces needed to be added to make the deal go. We're offering sizable contracts up like AV and Mo Williams, our roster isn't packed with recent draftees making 1-2 mil a year.

If you were the Raptors which contract would you want Wally's (expiring plus 3 mill for buyout) or Turkoglu's(4 years 44 mill). I do not think it is going to happen but it is another tool the Cavs may consider using in a trade.

 

[Triumph36]

No, I get it, but the same thing can be accomplished by getting a little more creative and involving a 3rd team. It's a little more work, but far more preferable to teams not named the Cavs.

What it comes down to is no other team will WANT Wally. Everyone keeps pointing to Van Horn, but he was only traded because the deal was, essentially, Devin Harris and 2 first round picks for Jason Kidd, and a few pieces needed to be added to make the deal go. We're offering sizable contracts up like AV and Mo Williams, our roster isn't packed with recent draftees making 1-2 mil a year.

In the NBA you don't get points for creativity. There's no reason to make it more complicated than it needs to be. Time is not on our side. If including Wally makes it work, you do it and don't waste time fucking around with a third team when you don't HAVE to.

Look....an expiring is an expiring. If a team trades FOR an expiring, they will not be expecting much production from the player. In fact, they likely wouldn't even want much production from the player because it would ultimately hurt them.

Guys like Moon and Parker work here because they don't have very big roles. For a team trading a major player....their on-court play is essentially useless. Their contract is what matters. So they're really not much different from Wally. A S&T'd Wally is also good for the other team because it will give them a good trade chip next off-season.

 

[MalTalm]

In the NBA you don't get points for creativity. There's no reason to make it more complicated than it needs to be. Time is not on our side. If including Wally makes it work, you do it and don't waste time fucking around with a third team when you don't HAVE to.

Look....an expiring is an expiring. If a team trades FOR an expiring, they will not be expecting much production from the player. In fact, they likely wouldn't even want much production from the player because it would ultimately hurt them.

Guys like Moon and Parker work here because they don't have very big roles. For a team trading a major player....their on-court play is essentially useless. Their contract is what matters. So they're really not much different from Wally. A S&T'd Wally is also good for the other team because it will give them a good trade chip next off-season.

Actually, you waste a great deal of time fucking around to make the deal as best as you can. Both sides do. It's why they get paid lots of money, and trades aren't done by fans.

And you're right, time isn't on our side, but most other teams aren't going to rush because we're trying to re-sign LeBron. They'd rather get the deal they'd be happy with.

Not all expirings are created equal. They are all different. Wally's would be the worst one a team could get. And teams don't try to stack expiring deals for next summer this summer. It's better to field a semi-competitive team until the trade deadline to sell tickets to your games in the meantime, and do a salary dump at the trade deadline. The only expiring a team would want this summer is one built like Delonte's. So his is valuable now.

Your last paragraph is bizzare. It's all wrong. I don't really understand what you were talking about with major player's on-court play being useless, but you do understand that A) Wally's contract could not be traded next off-season and B) Any team that picks up expiring contracts isn't doing it to trade them to someone else, right?

EDIT:

If you were the Raptors which contract would you want Wally's (expiring plus 3 mill for buyout) or Turkoglu's(4 years 44 mill). I do not think it is going to happen but it is another tool the Cavs may consider using in a trade.

Hedo is a guy who is over-paid, but can still be a very good player. The Raptors would be able to trade him with Bosh in a s&t very easily, but at the very least, they'd be able to move Hedo straight up for a much better deal than Wally.

 

[Quavvy]

Talm, you're surprisingly lost here. Do you think Aaron McKie or Keith Van Horn ever played a single minute for those teams they were traded to in the deals they were involved in? No.

His basketball contributions are not at all important in the equation. His contract is just a way to take back MORE salary from a team trying to dump a longer term contract.