Why are we paying Zeller $8 million?

[saltlover]

Talked about this over the weekend, but:

Because he's a) giving up his right to veto a trade, and b) if he gets traded he can now bring back more salary in return. Considering that a main reason to sign him is to trade him mid-year, and that many of the players we'd target make a lot of money, paying him more now is useful.

Yup.  Zeller plus Amir now brings back a max player. Since they are both centers, it makes sense for that max guy to be a center.  DA is lining up the ducks for a Cousins trade.

Yes, although I'd point out that Amir can be traded straight up for Cousins today, as far as salaries are concerned.

Yes I was thinking the same thing.  What Zeller now gives you is the ability to trade Zeller plus any contract at least 2.5M in order to match Cousins.

So, instead of having to bundle in one of Avery or Jae to make the dollars fit a deal where the primary 'value' going out is one of our young/future assets (like Smart or Brown) plus picks, you can include Zeller.

I.E., instead of having to do a package like:

Smart + picks + Jae/Avery/IT + junk salary

you could do

Smart + picks + Zeller

(where junk salary are the guys like Hunter, Young, Holland, etc.)

Just a little bit more flexibility.

It's Zeller plus $4 million (or technically $3,957,00) for Cousins.  So it'd take three prospects, one of which is Young, Smart and something, or Brown.

It's more like Zeller plus a rotation player will give the necessary salary for someone like Butler or Hayward, in my opinion.  So Amir+picks for Cousins, and Zeller+Ab/Crowder+picks for an upgrade at the wing.

Assuming we are talking about matching Cousin's 15.8M salary, we only need to get to 10.8M out-going, per

http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q82

Non-Taxpaying Teams
Outgoing salary   Maximum incoming salary
$0 to $9.8 million   150% of the outgoing salary, plus $100,0004
$9.8 million to $19.6 million   The outgoing salary plus $5 million
$19.6 million and up   125% of the outgoing salary, plus $100,000

So, Zeller (8M) plus another 2.8M would be 10.8M of out-going salary, which would match up to 15.8M of in-coming.

Problem solved.  You're looking at Cousins' salary from last year.  This year he makes $16.957 mil.

Yep.  Fool me for looking at the basketball-reference.com Salaries on the '2016-17' page!!!  (Come on guys, update it please?).

I should have looked at basketballinsiders.com in the first place.

So the needed match for 16.9M would be 11.3M, so Zeller plus a 3.3M contract would do it.

Of course, unless he's processed in a sign & trade right now, he can't be traded until mid-December, right?

It's the outgoing salary + 5 million, so Zeller plus $3.9 million.

Either mid-December or mid-January, depending if they use Bird rights or cap room.  I think they have the cap room, but it's not 100% clear.