Author Topic: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract  (Read 16666 times)

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Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #30 on: September 17, 2014, 11:03:14 AM »

Offline obnoxiousmime

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Under this rationale, anybody who signs before the new tv deal would become a bargain because everybody's salary would go up. So if we didn't spend the money on Bradley and say, signed a free agent instead THAT player would also be a great deal! See where the logic gets faulty here?

Also, you're assuming 1) Bradley will improve over the course of the deal and 2) he will stay healthy over the course of the deal. I'm sure number 1 is a reasonably safe assumption though obviously he's not going to ever reach star levels. Health is where I get worried because his track record is not the greatest.

Finally, it's another question of who are you bidding against? Like with the Green contract there wasn't much of an impression teams were clamoring for this guy at 8 mil/year. There's also a line of thought that you can't have too many non-star players on these 8-10 million dollar deals because it just traps you in mediocrity. You try to load up on stars first, then find role players who take discounts or will accept the mid-level.

If Bradley is worth 8 million, what is Sullinger worth? Are we going to have an entire squad of guys making 8-10 million that will never make an all-star team?

Your point is moot because by the time Sully will be worth that money (and it is my opinion that he will be worth at least that) the Celtics will a) have an extremely young, talented crop of players on very manageable deals (think past this year's pick and the BKN picks) and b) be operating under a significantly raised cap. You sort of just toss aside the latter point as if it isn't substantial when evaluating Bradley's deal.

The point raised is, what player will be more of a bargain at $8m/yr when the hard cap is hovering around the $80m? AB's 23 with a whole lot of serious offensive potential left and has already proven he can at least stick around on a contender's bench as a perimeter defender, three-point shooter and off-ball finisher. Worst case scenario he's a fairly paid bench player. Best case scenario he's a quasi-star who can play two positions. I don't get the pessimism about his improvement. He's 23 (have I said that already?) and has taken sincere steps in preventing chronic injury. That 15-20 extra pounds of muscle should go a long way in keeping him on the court.

People keep talking about what Danny was "keeping in mind" when he signed Bradley. He knows a few things:

1) He can assemble a legitimate, affordable contender merely by continuing to draft well. If he *ever so slightly* gambled on Bradley, it isn't disastrous for our future. There's a reason why we gave up Truth/KG and took on Wallace for those picks.

2) He has a few tangible bright spots even aside from Bradley on this miserable team who will be affordable for years: JS/KO/Smart/Young on their rookie deals or team option/qualifying offer deals.

3) The cap will continue to rise.

4) The medical staff has said Bradley's injuries are not chronic ones (meaning he doesn't have a bum shoulder or bum knee, just has suffered random injuries).

5) Bradley has displayed dedication and the ability to recognize weaknesses in his game: last year three-point shooting, this year hopefully ball-handling/play-making.

What's so bad about this deal? Please somebody explain without just saying "we could've signed someone else."

I "tossed it aside" because you can't judge the Bradley deal solely on the fact that it will be a bargain two years down the line. As I said before, using that logic EVERY contract signed now will be a bargain two years down the line. We could have signed a free agent and been on this board talking about how "you cannot question the money spent for player X at all because the salary cap is going up." We should discuss the merits of Bradley's deal on their own.

Personally I don't like signing a lot of non-stars to long terms deals when you're rebuilding. I would rather maintain flexibility than possibly be stuck with a guy whose contract isn't instantly moveable. How many games did Jeff Green and his 10 million/year salary really win us last year? These middle-class guys are better than your average player, but they also are far from the stars. And this is a league where stars are underpaid.

Personally I like Bradley fine, though I worry about his health (sometimes guys are just brittle) and would have preferred paying him closer to 5-6 million/year. It's really more about your philosophy of building a team and cap management.

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #31 on: September 17, 2014, 11:10:02 AM »

Offline D.o.s.

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There's also the fact that the cap could very well stagnate, or at least increase so incrementally as to make no practical difference.
At least a goldfish with a Lincoln Log on its back goin' across your floor to your sock drawer has a miraculous connotation to it.

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #32 on: September 17, 2014, 11:55:47 AM »

Offline gpap

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We'll see how he progresses as the season begins.

Like others have mentioned, my main concern with Bradley is not his talent but being injury prone and staying on the court.


Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #33 on: September 17, 2014, 11:57:09 AM »

Offline MBunge

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Personally I don't like signing a lot of non-stars to long terms deals when you're rebuilding. I would rather maintain flexibility than possibly be stuck with a guy whose contract isn't instantly moveable.

So, your philosophy is to make sure you have a crap team so that when a miracle happens, you might possibly be SLIGHTLY better positioned to take advantage of it?

Mike

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #34 on: September 17, 2014, 12:23:06 PM »

Offline BballTim

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Finally, it's another question of who are you bidding against? Like with the Green contract there wasn't much of an impression teams were clamoring for this guy at 8 mil/year.

  I don't think this is the case. In general people seem to think that if there aren't any publicly made offers then there are no offers. This is fairly unlikely, both in Green's case and Bradley's. First of all, it's extremely unlikely that Danny would make a large offer to a player without knowing the market for him, or making an offer that's millions a year over the market value. He'd have been gone well before the KG trade if that was the case. Also, we have pretty solid indications that there were markets for those players in the price ranges that they got. In Green's case, his agent turned down a deal with the Thunder that was probably better than what he got. In Bradley's case, there were multiple threads during the season about GMs from other teams saying he'd end up getting signed for $8M a year or so.

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #35 on: September 17, 2014, 12:31:00 PM »

Offline mmmmm

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There's also the fact that the cap could very well stagnate, or at least increase so incrementally as to make no practical difference.

I've heard some commentators speculating along these lines -- that the NBA will try to phase in the revenues from the new TV deal to mitigate the salary cap jump.

While they may try to do something there, I doubt they can mitigate it so far as to "make no practical difference".

The TV deal will result in a huge bump in BRI -- there is no getting around that.  And if the NBA tries to play shenanigans that push off the appearance of a correlated bump in the Salary Cap numbers, then the NBPA is going to cry, well, "Shenanigans!".

Owners can accept a deferred revenue model because once the value of the contract is locked in that pretty much gets locked into the value of their franchise.

But individual players are transitional -- they only realize the value out of BRI in current contracts.  And any one of them could get hurt at anytime, ending their career.  They will want that money now (in the form of contracts signed over the next couple of years), not deferred to be paid to future players.  The CBA guarantees a little over half of BRI to the players.

So I expect a lot of pushback against any overly aggressive deferral plan.
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Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #36 on: September 17, 2014, 12:44:44 PM »

Offline D.o.s.

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Agreed -- not to mention that the 2017 CBA should see a BRI split that's closer to the old model than the one they've got now.
At least a goldfish with a Lincoln Log on its back goin' across your floor to your sock drawer has a miraculous connotation to it.

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #37 on: September 17, 2014, 02:44:45 PM »

Offline Chris22

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #38 on: September 17, 2014, 02:46:26 PM »

Offline CelticsFanFromNYC

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Personally I don't like signing a lot of non-stars to long terms deals when you're rebuilding. I would rather maintain flexibility than possibly be stuck with a guy whose contract isn't instantly moveable.

So, your philosophy is to make sure you have a crap team so that when a miracle happens, you might possibly be SLIGHTLY better positioned to take advantage of it?

Mike

1st of all we didn't "Sign a lot of non stars" we just SIGNED ONE! Ainge is still riding the wave on weather to keep Rondo or go into complete rebuild mode thus signing Bradley kept both those options still feasible. If Bradley improves with the team as a whole, then maybe rondo or other stars consider playing here. If not, we still invested in an up and coming SG who has only shown signs of improvement. Either way its a win-win weather the signing shows its benefits long term or short term.

Letting Bradley go DEFINITELY WOULD'VE SOLIDIFIED RONDOS  CHOICE TO RESIGN. Bradley is the glue to our youth movement. KO is slowly creeping. Ainge made a decision for the future. Pretty sure the CBA thing played only so much of a factor
« Last Edit: September 17, 2014, 02:55:34 PM by CelticsFanFromNYC »

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #39 on: September 17, 2014, 02:56:07 PM »

Offline manl_lui

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

if Smart pans out, and Bradley also plays well and became a backup, we can either use him as a reserve as we have him for 4 years. OR we can use that to trade him to a team that is willing to start him, and get another asset back

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #40 on: September 17, 2014, 04:08:12 PM »

Offline BballTim

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

  Who's the highest paid backup now?

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #41 on: September 17, 2014, 04:35:33 PM »

Offline Fafnir

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

  Who's the highest paid backup now?
I think that'd be Tyreke at 10.5 million or so, though he does start sometimes (probably when Gordon/Holiday were hurt? not entirely sure when his 22 starts happened)


Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #42 on: September 17, 2014, 04:46:06 PM »

Offline BballTim

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

  Who's the highest paid backup now?
I think that'd be Tyreke at 10.5 million or so, though he does start sometimes (probably when Gordon/Holiday were hurt? not entirely sure when his 22 starts happened)

  "Gordon was hurt" is usually a safe bet.

 

Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #43 on: September 17, 2014, 05:29:04 PM »

Offline kozlodoev

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

  Who's the highest paid backup now?
Our very own Marcus Thornton will be in contention this season, making 8.5 million to come off the bench. For what it's worth, he's started just 35 games over the last 2 seasons, and made over $7 mil per in the process.
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Re: Projected salary cap and reassessing the Bradley contract
« Reply #44 on: September 17, 2014, 05:31:53 PM »

Offline fairweatherfan

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Bradley will be the highest paid backup guard in the league after this year.

  Who's the highest paid backup now?
Our very own Marcus Thornton will be in contention this season, making 8.5 million to come off the bench. For what it's worth, he's started just 35 games over the last 2 seasons, and made over $7 mil per in the process.

He's a ways short of our very own Gerald Wallace.  Unless you just meant guards.

EDIT: Guess if we're looking at all positions it'd have to be Amar'e.