Hooray for Optionality!!

[keevsnick]

I agree Roy. But as Brad said, the Jays were eating up 70% of our cap and that makes it hard to put competitive guys around them to make the team competitive.

The cap part is right, but the cap isn't a realistic spending budget for an NBA team.

The Jays took up almost exactly 50% of the $209 million first apron hard cap.  That leaves roughly $105 million to fill out the roster.  To me, that's not unreasonable.  To me, the 70% thing is just a talking point, particularly since Paul George accounts for almost as large of a percentage as JB did.for 2/3 of the relevant time frame.

People are looking at the George vs Jaylen contract all wrong. Yes, George makes almost as much as Jaylen. But you have to look at it as sort of like the Holiday/Simons trade. Its REALLY hard to get of large contracts, it's nearly impossible to do all at once, you have to do it in stages. With Holiay/Simons they were able to first get o two years then later lip Simons to get under the tax. With George they save a year off the contract, three years if you consider they probably had to extend Jaylen if they kept him, and now as soon as next offseason he's a movable expiring contract.

So yes, they don't save much money immediately but they have a potential to save a lot as soon as next summer, whereas if you keep Jaylen you're really committing to him long term. They valued the "optionality"+ picks over whatever the difference between Jaylen vs George is this year

Except there were other offers that included more reasonable contracts coming back.

Actually, do you know some of those offers? I'm curious to work out the financial implications of those and see if they would have been better for us than taking in Mr Druggo. Mannix said "a good team made a better offer" but he refused to name it. Apparently Jaylen didn't want to go there and the Cs wanted to respect where he wanted to go, while still making sure they were ok with the return.

One was Reid + Bridges + picks, with Bridges obviously being tradeable to PHX for Allen + O'Neale. + picks.   I'm pretty sure that that one would have gotten us a decent size trade exception as well.

So to do that Bridges deal Charlotte needed to take on money for 27-28 as both Allen and O'Neale run an extra season. In other words the Celtics would have STILL ended up with 55 million committed to three players Reid, O'Neale and Allen in 27-28 along with an additional 55 million in Reid for 28-30. So actually the contracts they were getting back in net would have saved them little if anything and they likely get worse overall picks.

So that deal nets the Celtics no extra financial flexibility, no pick as good as the 2028 LAC pick, no player as good as PG, and takes up more roster spots.

[byennie]

I agree Roy. But as Brad said, the Jays were eating up 70% of our cap and that makes it hard to put competitive guys around them to make the team competitive.

The cap part is right, but the cap isn't a realistic spending budget for an NBA team.

The Jays took up almost exactly 50% of the $209 million first apron hard cap.  That leaves roughly $105 million to fill out the roster.  To me, that's not unreasonable.  To me, the 70% thing is just a talking point, particularly since Paul George accounts for almost as large of a percentage as JB did.for 2/3 of the relevant time frame.

People are looking at the George vs Jaylen contract all wrong. Yes, George makes almost as much as Jaylen. But you have to look at it as sort of like the Holiday/Simons trade. Its REALLY hard to get of large contracts, it's nearly impossible to do all at once, you have to do it in stages. With Holiay/Simons they were able to first get o two years then later lip Simons to get under the tax. With George they save a year off the contract, three years if you consider they probably had to extend Jaylen if they kept him, and now as soon as next offseason he's a movable expiring contract.

So yes, they don't save much money immediately but they have a potential to save a lot as soon as next summer, whereas if you keep Jaylen you're really committing to him long term. They valued the "optionality"+ picks over whatever the difference between Jaylen vs George is this year

Except there were other offers that included more reasonable contracts coming back.

Actually, do you know some of those offers? I'm curious to work out the financial implications of those and see if they would have been better for us than taking in Mr Druggo. Mannix said "a good team made a better offer" but he refused to name it. Apparently Jaylen didn't want to go there and the Cs wanted to respect where he wanted to go, while still making sure they were ok with the return.

One was Reid + Bridges + picks, with Bridges obviously being tradeable to PHX for Allen + O'Neale. + picks.   I'm pretty sure that that one would have gotten us a decent size trade exception as well.

The Charlotte-Phoenix deal was Bridges + 1st round pick and 2nd round pick for Allen, O?Neale, and a more distant 1st round pick.  Somehow on the board the picks sent with Bridges have been forgotten.  Charlotte sent out more in draft compensation than they received back in that deal.

I would rather have a 2033 first rounder from Phoenix than a 2029 first rounder from Charlotte.

And that is a choice that may or may not prove to be correct, but it does mean that Bridges was not worth a pick on his own, which is at least the implication some have given.  I am not sure if that was the argument you were making.

We have heard the offer was Bridges, Reid, and picks.  Was it multiple 1st round picks?  Was it the same picks they wound up trading to Phoenix?  Who knows.  It was presumably not four 1st rounders since the Celtics would have certainly accepted that.  I can come up with pick combinations that would have made me prefer Reid, Allen, and the husk of Royce Oneale to the trade that was made, and I can come up with combinations that make me prefer our current deal.  I am not happy with any of them, to be honest, and I am mostly just shocked that Brown could not get more.  Like, Brandon Miller plus four picks sounded reasonable to me, but apparently it was so far from the market as to scare some teams off.

Royce O'Neale is a husk now?  He played 78 minutes for a playoff team,, outscoring, out-shooting, out-rebounding and out-passing Hauser.

If you didn't like the deal, why are you defending it tooth and nail, like you have a personal stake in defending Brent Stevens' honor?

I'm no fan of how this played out with George by any means, but you seem to be going to the extreme in the other direction. Are you suggesting that if we ended up with Naz Reid, Grayson Allen, Royce O'Neale ($50M+ combined and more total commitments than Paul George) a 1st rounder, and/or some sort of 1st round gamble 6 years in the future, that would have been acceptable? I don't have anything against O'Neale either, but I can't see any critics of the George deal liking that any better in an alternate universe where it happened. Or are we assuming we somehow could have gotten an extra haul of 1st rounders despite only rumors to the contrary?

This whole situation sucks, and one can definitely make the argument that a lot of PR spin is happening, but what if the message is actual accurate: teams DO NOT want to pay $70M/year for Jaylen Brown in 2032, so why would they pay for the privilege? Rumors are rumors, but also we're talking about Naz Reid, Miles Bridges, Royce O'Neale, Grayson Allen, picks in 2033 as evidence there was something better out there? On top of us clearly being beat out by Miami for Giannis?

I get it, ragging on Brown over analytics and trading him away after winning a championship, and not getting was is perceived as a good return... it feels like a slap in the face to some. But man, if that's MY team, as a GM or an owner, I wouldn't be signing him to that extension. Let the Phoenix Suns of the league pay $70M for Devin Booker. We won one title with Tatum and Brown in 10 years, in their absolute primes, at the exact time we had the money to employ Jrue Holiday AND Porzingis AND White AND Al Horford. I don't think it's irrational to think that older versions of Tatum and Brown making too much money to ever have an excellent supporting cast, could be a very bad idea. And if analytics strongly support that notion in addition...

[Kernewek]

I agree Roy. But as Brad said, the Jays were eating up 70% of our cap and that makes it hard to put competitive guys around them to make the team competitive.

The cap part is right, but the cap isn't a realistic spending budget for an NBA team.

The Jays took up almost exactly 50% of the $209 million first apron hard cap.  That leaves roughly $105 million to fill out the roster.  To me, that's not unreasonable.  To me, the 70% thing is just a talking point, particularly since Paul George accounts for almost as large of a percentage as JB did.for 2/3 of the relevant time frame.

People are looking at the George vs Jaylen contract all wrong. Yes, George makes almost as much as Jaylen. But you have to look at it as sort of like the Holiday/Simons trade. Its REALLY hard to get of large contracts, it's nearly impossible to do all at once, you have to do it in stages. With Holiay/Simons they were able to first get o two years then later lip Simons to get under the tax. With George they save a year off the contract, three years if you consider they probably had to extend Jaylen if they kept him, and now as soon as next offseason he's a movable expiring contract.

So yes, they don't save much money immediately but they have a potential to save a lot as soon as next summer, whereas if you keep Jaylen you're really committing to him long term. They valued the "optionality"+ picks over whatever the difference between Jaylen vs George is this year

Except there were other offers that included more reasonable contracts coming back.

Actually, do you know some of those offers? I'm curious to work out the financial implications of those and see if they would have been better for us than taking in Mr Druggo. Mannix said "a good team made a better offer" but he refused to name it. Apparently Jaylen didn't want to go there and the Cs wanted to respect where he wanted to go, while still making sure they were ok with the return.

One was Reid + Bridges + picks, with Bridges obviously being tradeable to PHX for Allen + O'Neale. + picks.   I'm pretty sure that that one would have gotten us a decent size trade exception as well.

So to do that Bridges deal Charlotte needed to take on money for 27-28 as both Allen and O'Neale run an extra season. In other words the Celtics would have STILL ended up with 55 million committed to three players Reid, O'Neale and Allen in 27-28 along with an additional 55 million in Reid for 28-30. So actually the contracts they were getting back in net would have saved them little if anything and they likely get worse overall picks.

So that deal nets the Celtics no extra financial flexibility, no pick as good as the 2028 LAC pick, no player as good as PG, and takes up more roster spots.

Let's not talk too much sense in a grievance thread.