If we are going to lose Ray... might as well trade him for Eddie Curry

[Chris]

Chris,

Assuming we're a contending team that's over the cap, if we're going to lose Ray, maintaining the abiltiy to use that money is in essence an asset. As a last resort I agree with the OP, you make this deal instead of letting Ray walk. It's a no brainer in my opinion.

Fine, it's an asset.  But not a good enough asset to make that a good deal. 

And no offense, but on something like this, the only opinion that matters is the one who is going to be paying $11 million to Eddie Curry, just for the off chance they can trade him. 

And based on the precedents set all over the NBA for taking on someones bad contract, I would immediately call for Danny's head if he made that deal and did not get anything else out of the Knicks.

You guys are silly. 

Anyone who is responding with "NO way!  Curry stinks" totally doesn't get it. 

Anyone who is responding with "Why wouldn't we just let Ray walk" ... totally doesn't get it.

We have no cap room to make use of flexibility.  You take on Curry because he becomes "Theo Ratliff's expiring contract" at the deadline.    It's not like Theo Ratliff was playing for us. We used his expiring contract to make a deal.  At the deadline, combining Eddy Curry's expiring contract with the bum we selected #19 could net you a guy like Monta Ellis.

You take on Eddie Curry's contract for flexibility.  It's a 1 year deal and has plenty of value at the deadline.  IT HAS PLENTY OF VALUE RIGHT NOW.  The knicks could move that contract for any number of players.  Try to convince me that the Hornets wouldn't jump at a chance to get out from under the next 5 years of Emeka Okafor's contract, for example.   There is no way you'd just get stuck paying CUrry for a year... in February, we'd find a trade partner.   

The alternative is letting Ray walk and getting nothing in return.   Nothing.   Zero.  You start Tony Allen instead.

I mean... I sort of get what you guys are saying... let Ray Walk... let Pierce walk unless he wants to sign a 2 year contract... and get a bunch of cap room in 2012.   To do what?   I'd be on board if I thought Kevin Durant would be a free agent in 2012... but he's not going to be.   There is no "Class of 2010" coming in 2012...

I'm not sure if you meant to direct this at me, but I certainly get it.  I am just saying it is terrible value, and therefore a bad trade.

I understand that an expiring contract to trade at the deadline can be valuable.  But my point is, it is a huge risk for ownership to agree to pay Curry that money this season, because there won't necessarily be a good deal for his expiring contract at the deadline.  There may be...but it is nowhere near a given.

So, for taking on that risk (and in the process helping the Knicks out, by giving them extra cap space to sign another player), the C's need to get another asset to make it worth it. 

You need to take into account the fact that real money is changing hands here, and real money plays a huge role.  It is not only about matching salaries, owners need to see the value in paying these guys, and in this case, I don't think the value is there, given the risk.

[the_Bird]

There were plenty of us around here, myself included, who were expecting a lot more pure salary dumps last year than ended up occurring.  The Kevin Martin trade is a pretty good example; Houston got a very good (albeit one way, and significantly overpaid) player, and Sacramento got cap relief via T-Mac's expiring contract.

They also got Carl Landry, a very good, cheap talent.  We don't have many of those. 

The only real salary *dumps* I can think of off the top of my head are the recent Hinrich deal, the Kurt Thomas trade of a couple years ago, Richard Jefferson to the Spurs last season (which San Antonio wishes they never did).  The expiring contract is nice, but unless you've got attractive assets to pair it with (#5 overall pick, Big Al Jeff, Delonte West, etc), it's usually not enough by itself to get anything good done.

[Chris]

There were plenty of us around here, myself included, who were expecting a lot more pure salary dumps last year than ended up occurring.  The Kevin Martin trade is a pretty good example; Houston got a very good (albeit one way, and significantly overpaid) player, and Sacramento got cap relief via T-Mac's expiring contract.

They also got Carl Landry, a very good, cheap talent.  We don't have many of those. 

The only real salary *dumps* I can think of off the top of my head are the recent Hinrich deal, the Kurt Thomas trade of a couple years ago, Richard Jefferson to the Spurs last season (which San Antonio wishes they never did).  The expiring contract is nice, but unless you've got attractive assets to pair it with (#5 overall pick, Big Al Jeff, Delonte West, etc), it's usually not enough by itself to get anything good done.

Exactly.  And lets also point out that the Hinrich deal was for immediate cap space, not an expiring contract (big difference), Jefferson was traded for non-guaranteed contracts that were immediately bought out, and the Kurt Thomas deal was also for cap space.

Expiring contracts are an important part of any big trade, but that is just what they are...a part.  If you want anything worth a darn, you need to be including other pieces of value.  That is why you cannot do a deal like this without also getting more value in return.

[Celtics18]

Of course, it doesn't come down to either let Ray Allen and Paul Pierce walk and get nothing in return or acquire Eddy Curry.

This is actually pretty funny.  This is an absolute classic example of how the mind of a New England sports fan works. 

"Oh my God, our team is absolute toast.  What can we do?  I know we can make sure we trade for the one guy who is universally accepted as the most underachieving, laziest player in NBA history.  That'll fix it, and we're screwed anyway, and it will certainly give us something fun to Edited.  Profanity and masked profanity are against forum rules and may result in discipline. about."

By the way, if New Orleans is desperate to get rid of Okafor and we're desperate to get him, why not just do a sign and trade this off-season of Allen for Okafor?

[birdwatcher]

Didn't Eddy Curry pick up his option? I wouldn't want to overpay someone that much money who may not even see the floor. That would just be tanking the season considering we only have 4 guys under contract.

[JSD]

There were plenty of us around here, myself included, who were expecting a lot more pure salary dumps last year than ended up occurring.  The Kevin Martin trade is a pretty good example; Houston got a very good (albeit one way, and significantly overpaid) player, and Sacramento got cap relief via T-Mac's expiring contract.

They also got Carl Landry, a very good, cheap talent.  We don't have many of those.  

The only real salary *dumps* I can think of off the top of my head are the recent Hinrich deal, the Kurt Thomas trade of a couple years ago, Richard Jefferson to the Spurs last season (which San Antonio wishes they never did).  The expiring contract is nice, but unless you've got attractive assets to pair it with (#5 overall pick, Big Al Jeff, Delonte West, etc), it's usually not enough by itself to get anything good done.

Exactly.  And lets also point out that the Hinrich deal was for immediate cap space, not an expiring contract (big difference), Jefferson was traded for non-guaranteed contracts that were immediately bought out, and the Kurt Thomas deal was also for cap space.

Expiring contracts are an important part of any big trade, but that is just what they are...a part.  If you want anything worth a darn, you need to be including other pieces of value.  That is why you cannot do a deal like this without also getting more value in return.

First off, McGrady wasn't traded for Kevin Martin...

All traded for cap space and/or Low to Mid level prospects:

Caron Butler, Jason Terry, Richard Jefferson, Jamison, Hinrich, Billups, Vince Carter, Yi, P. Gasol and the list goes on and on and on. That's just off the top of my head.

[Chris]

There were plenty of us around here, myself included, who were expecting a lot more pure salary dumps last year than ended up occurring.  The Kevin Martin trade is a pretty good example; Houston got a very good (albeit one way, and significantly overpaid) player, and Sacramento got cap relief via T-Mac's expiring contract.

They also got Carl Landry, a very good, cheap talent.  We don't have many of those.  

The only real salary *dumps* I can think of off the top of my head are the recent Hinrich deal, the Kurt Thomas trade of a couple years ago, Richard Jefferson to the Spurs last season (which San Antonio wishes they never did).  The expiring contract is nice, but unless you've got attractive assets to pair it with (#5 overall pick, Big Al Jeff, Delonte West, etc), it's usually not enough by itself to get anything good done.

Exactly.  And lets also point out that the Hinrich deal was for immediate cap space, not an expiring contract (big difference), Jefferson was traded for non-guaranteed contracts that were immediately bought out, and the Kurt Thomas deal was also for cap space.

Expiring contracts are an important part of any big trade, but that is just what they are...a part.  If you want anything worth a darn, you need to be including other pieces of value.  That is why you cannot do a deal like this without also getting more value in return.

First off, McGrady wasn't traded for Kevin Martin...

All traded for cap space and/or Low to Mid level prospects:

Caron Butler, Jason Terry, Richard Jefferson, Jamison, Hinrich, Billups, Vince Carter, Yi, P. Gasol and the list goes on and on and on. That's just off the top of my head.

Fair enough.  But I guess this is just running circles around the issue here.  Is Ray Allen for Eddie Curry a good deal for the Celtics?  No, it is not.  Not because Curry can't be used later, but because the value does not match up, based on what teams pay for cap space. 

In this deal, the Knicks are getting cap space, by not having to use it to sign Ray...and they are getting Ray.  The C's are getting to add 11 million of salary that they could potentially trade.  That is not good value, and that is the point. 

This is not a case where it doesn't matter to the Knicks whether they do a sign and trade or not.  They would absolutely pay a premium, for the extra cap space that would come from opening up that cap space.  To not force them to pay that premium would be downright criminal on Ainge's part.

[JSD]

I'm not advocating that we seek out this trade (nor is the OP). The only point that's being made is that if Ray Allen were about to leave and sign with the Knicks, taking back Curry to use for trade bait would be the right move to make for a Celtic team trying to put another run together. And when the Celtics package Curry, Bradley and maybe BBD for an Andre Iquadala, Rip Hamilton or Monta Ellis/Morrow. We're going to be very happy the Celtics didn't just let Ray walk...

[cdif911]

this is like my car battery died today, it doesn't mean I should buy a stupid spoiler that someone else might want... doesn't make any sense.  Just get a new battery...

[K.J.]

If losing Ray is inevitable... we might as well sign-and-trade him to New York for Eddie Curry and maybe get NY to throw us a future protected 1st rounder or something.

Alternatively, we could agree to a sign and trade, and gain a large traded player exception that we could use over the year.