First, I think Pierce opts out ONLY if he's made a deal with the Celtics whereby they basically spread out some of the money he's owed this year over two or three additional years. Something like a 4 year deal for $56 million ($14 mil per year). If the deal is structured with payments of $13-14-14-15, the Celtics save $8.5 mil this season. Pierce basically gets to keep his $21.5 mil owed for this year (albeit spread out over the following years), plus a 3 year, $34.5 mil extenstion ($11.5 mil per year) that likely allows him to retire a Celtics and add some long term security in light of the looming CBA renegotiation and potential lockout.
If Pierce agrees to that, I think the Celtics will use those savings to overpay Ray for the next two seasons so they can take another shot with this crew next year, after having really come together over the playoffs, while making sure that Ray is off the books at the same time as Garnett. I'm thinking 2 years, $20-22 million will be far more than anybody else will offer on a per year basis. The teams with big cap space are going after the first and second tier free agents to fill up all their space; the teams with cap space that don't get those free agents won't want to invest it in an older player like Ray since they won't have a chance to win now anyway. The risk is a fellow contender offering the full midlevel, but I don't think anybody goes beyond a 3-year midlevel offer to Ray. If somebody does go to 4 (which would equate to about $26-28 million), the Celtics MAY go to 3 years but at a lower rate like $26-28 million. Even in that case, though, the Celtics might just tack a little more on a 2 year deal.
If they've saved $8.5 million in 2010-11 from the Pierce extension, and Ray agrees to a 2 year, $22 ($10.5-11.5) mil deal, the Celtics are essentially adding Allen for only $2 million more than they were already on the books to pay Pierce.
Now comes the Wallace contract part. I think the Celtics end up getting involved in the big time free agent chase using Sheed's contract, but not in a traditional sense. I think they trade Wallace's contract to one of the teams losing a big time free agent as part of some sign and trade deal where they pick up a center owed similar money. The Celtics don't get the actual big time free agent, they get a guy that a team is trading to bring in the big time free agent and sending the relatively empty Wallace salary to the team losing the free agent so they don't have to pay out on it.
I'm thinking something like this - Bulls get Lebron and Bosh; Miami gets Boozer or Amare; New Jersey and the Clippers decide to wait a year; the Knicks go after Joe Johnson and the remainder of Amare/Boozer, agreeing to max them out. One of them wants a sign and trade to max out even further. Utah, Phoenix and Atlanta do not want to add much salary or David Lee. So we end up with a sign and trade where Knicks sign and trade David Lee up to Boston on a 5 year, $55 million contract. We send Sheed's empty contract, Big Baby and one of our non-guaranteed contracts (Gaffney or the other guy) to Atlanta, Utah or Phoenix with another part from New York. We get David Lee, New York again doesn't make the playoffs since they spend on the wrong guys.
And the Celtics will still have the midlevel to use on some combination of a big man and wing player, can afford to hold onto Tony Allen, and likely will have cut overall payroll compared to last year.
Topic: My Thoughts on the Celtics' True Summer Plan (Read 1128 times)