I started posting on this in another thread, but I might as well put a whole idea down here.

In my eyes, this deal just makes too much sense for both teams.

Sign Bass - $3 million? If that's not enough, drop Ajinca and Houston's 2nd.
Rip/Kwame/Max/Houston's 2nd for Okafor/Bell/Diop/Ajinca

We have Bass backing up the PF spot in place of Max, Okafor solidifying the C with Diop as his very overpaid backup. It saves the Bobcats some money over the life of the Diop/Max contracts and Bell's expiring turns into Kwame's expiring.

Rip -11.6 : Okafor -10.5
Kwame -4 : Bell - 5.3
Max -5 : Diop - 6
2nd - 0 : Ajinca - 1.4

They save $2.4 million (I rounded above) this year from the trade. They save about $6.5 million over the next 4 by swapping Max for Diop, and Max has more upside than Diop at this point.

The change from my other post is that Radman and Nazr are both listed as "non-guaranteed" on Hoopsworld, where I checked the salaries, with Radman listed as a PO and Nazr just listed as a regular contract on Hoopshype so I'm not sure what the status is on them. That changed the numbers I had. No way Radmanovic opts out of a $6.8 million dollar deal in that FA class. With Felton resigned at $8 million per season, they're right around $56 million, potentially under the cap and well under the luxury tax, or they give Augustin the keys and use that next offseason. If the cap was up around $60 million (57 million last year, that's reasonable), they'd be able to deal Nazr or Radman's $6.9 million expiring for a player making $10 million, or a combination of those two for someone making up to $17 million.

We'd be:

Stuckey/Bynum
Gordon/Bell/AA
Tayshaun/Bell/rooks
Villa/Bass
Okafor/Diop

They'd be:

Felton or Augustin
Rip
Wallace
Diaw
Nazr or Kwame or another trade (they could go after Chandler with Kwame's expiring)



Log this under (never going to happen), but I just needed to get this out of my head before I left work.

Can't see the Cats going from Oak to Kwame (with even less depth at the 5).

I think Charlotte will fill that arena with a playoff caliber squad.

Just 1 example that gets them a C like Chandler:

We could get Chandler involved if New Orleans is still looking to cut salary. Make it a 3-team deal. It would be a bit harder now that we only have a small amount of cap space but it's possible. They're sitting on 77 million for next season and they're not known for high spending.

NO gets Kwame - 4 Max - 5
CHA gets Chandler - 12 and Rip - 12
DET gets - Okafor - 11 Ajinca - 1.5 Diop - 6 Bell - 5

NO cuts 3 million in salary, both being expiring deals. They get a C in return for Chandler (not saying Kwame is anywhere near as good, but he's still a big body), and a decent backup PF that could flourish in the right system.

Charlotte gets a C to replace Okafor and was a borderline star before his injury, bonus that his contract expires giving them plenty of cap room next year. They get Rip, already discussed. They get out from under Diop's contract. Essentially, they upgrade at SG and lose little at C, gain cap space for next year's big offseason, and lose one of their terrible long term deals.

Detroit gets Okafor, Diop is an overpaid backup C (better hope he regains some of that Dallas form), Bell as the backup SG/SF for a season giving our rooks time to develop, and Ajinca as a developmental F/C. If we do this deal after we sign Bass, the trade fits. I took Max's BYC into consideration. If we didn't sign Bass and kept Max, Bell or someone paid similarly goes to NO. Could be Bell (expiring), Radman, Nazr, or even Diop if the Hornets were interested in his potential, which is very doubtful.

Just saying, there are ways around them not having being stuck starting Kwame. It can be done.

Or we skip all of that noise, use Kwame and Max for Chandler, then use Rip for something else. Not sure what, exactly.

Or Kwame and Max for Kaman? Saves them a million this year, 6 million next, and 7 million the year after, while giving them a decent backup to Griffin.

LA won't do RIP for Kaman. They have Gordon at SG. They might do Tay though. They should just move Camby to save money.