Blakely: C's look to deal Wallace & Humphries

[EDWARDO]

Was thinking the same thing actually... The Humphries deal is pretty big, but should be moveable. We might have to take an extra year back from someone, but he would be a rotation guy for a team like the Pacers, I think.... if we can get him back to his 2011/12 form. Its NOT a physical thing... just getting out of the NY spotlight and getting some minutes should do it for him....

[gpap]

Hump/Crash for Amare for full tank?

Not a bad idea. I actually think the Knicks would go for this. I've got to think they'd love to move Amar'e right about now as they signed him to a max deal back in 2010 and it really hasn't paid off for them.

What would be even better however is if the Celts did this, and Amar'e returns to the player he was in Phoenix.

Then, the Celts become an even better team than they would've been with Wallace/Hump and the whole "tanking" motive totally backfires!

[danglertx]

I don't trade Humphries for anything.  That is 12mil coming off our books next year.  If we can clear Bass and Lee off in trades for expirings or no salary back, let Bogans, Crawford, Melo, and Brooks all expire we will have totally reset our payroll and have huge flexibility and a bunch of picks coming up in the next few seasons.

Then, if we were stuck with Wallace, he is still awful, and we are in a position to contend, we could stretch his two years out to 7 and he'd cost just under 3 against our cap.  Quick math comes up to 41mil off the books.

[dreamgreen]

Hump/Crash for Amare for full tank?

[dang] I used to be a huge Amare fan back in the day, but now he is just a health risk. But maybe that is exactly what we need to get below 30 wins?

I'm 50/50 right now.

[EDWARDO]

Hump/Crash for Amare for full tank?

Not a bad idea. I actually think the Knicks would go for this. I've got to think they'd love to move Amar'e right about now as they signed him to a max deal back in 2010 and it really hasn't paid off for them.

What would be even better however is if the Celts did this, and Amar'e returns to the player he was in Phoenix.

Then, the Celts become an even better team than they would've been with Wallace/Hump and the whole "tanking" motive totally backfires!

Absolutely does not change the rebuild. No championship team is going to be built around Amare as a centerpiece. Even if we brought him here and he played well, we're still a max 40-45 win team and the MAX the 5th/6th best team in the East. We'd be much better off being having 25 wins without him than having 45 wins with him. That's the whole point to all of this. Stop trying to put mediocre players onto this team to be better in the next 1-2 years. Think about getting the pieces in place to win 60 games in the next 3-4 years. Stoudemire would only be useful as a trade piece. There's no chance he's a meaningful contributor on the Banner 18 Celtics. Your dream seems to be having Monta, Amare and Dalembert on this team next year. That's our worst nightmare... truly the worst thing we could do.

[Lucky17]

http://espn.go.com/blog/new-york/knicks/post/_/id/46664/knicks-paid-fourth-largest-luxury-tax-bill-last-season

The NBA announced Tuesday night that the 2013-14 salary cap has been set at $58.679 million and the tax level has been set at $71.748 million. The contracts alone for Carmelo Anthony, Amar'e Stoudemire, Tyson Chandler and Andrea Bargnani (who could become an official Knick on Wednesday when the NBA's moratorium periods) equal about $70 million for next season.

I can't see any real benefit to helping the Knicks wriggle out of the financial straightjacket posed by Amare Stoudemire's contract. Keep them in that cap hell as long as possible.

Starting next season, luxury tax penalties multiply at various thresholds. A team that's $10 million over the tax line will have to pay $2.50 for every dollar over. The Knicks could well be paying more than $25 million to the rest of the league.

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/61220/luxury-tax-good-days-coming-end

[LooseCannon]

Humphries has MORE value than merely an expiring deal... at least we should hope so. He was dreadful last year, but is very young and his downfall was not a physical issue (as it is with Wallace). I think if we ran him out there for 30-35 minutes a night he'd put up 12 and 10 and we'd have an expiring contract and a player that would play meaningful off-the-bench minutes for a contender. Those numbers on a 12mm expiring deal are extremely valuable...

I think people don't realize that contenders are rarely in a position to match salary on a contract like Humphries.

[j804]

LOL at Blakely Mr. Captain Obvious

[SHAQATTACK]

Hump/Crash for Amare for full tank?

[dang] I used to be a huge Amare fan back in the day, but now he is just a health risk. But maybe that is exactly what we need to get below 30 wins?

I'm 50/50 right now.

LOL.......he is a guaranteed injury waiting to happen .   He is tanking material for certain.

he and oden would play four games and miss 3/4 of the season.........great tanking talent .....paycheck hounds

[JOMVP]

I'd take back that Amare contract for sure to get out of the extra year of the Wallace and Lee contracts.

http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=q98elhh

[jaketwice]

If by analytics you mean your unfounded opinion then yes Chicago is better without Boozer.  If you mean actual data then you should provide a link.

Edit: Don't call others opinions unfounded. This is your warning

-Fafnir.

I think this moderation was really excessive. A little rhetorical jibe keeps things interesting. I feel like the moderator here was moderating just to moderate. And that takes the fun out of it. Mods - please show some restraint going forward.

[jaketwice]

Hump/Crash for Amare for full tank?

I'd do it.

I like this idea. But consider - if we move Humphries for donuts, that gets us under the salary cap this year. That pushes the reset button on the "repeater" tax, and gives ownership a chance to catch its breath in a down year - and then to pay pay pay - without having to pay a quadruple dollars penalty.

I still think that simply clearing Humph off the books - even for a second rounder - is really the only move we need to make. Wallace's contract is bad, at $10M/per. But he can score 20/night and at least keep the team watchable while Rondo is out.

Other than Wallace, we don't have any truly immobile, awful contracts.

Just dump Humphries... ...there's also a logjam at his position.

[crimson_stallion]

I'd take back that Amare contract for sure to get out of the extra year of the Wallace and Lee contracts.

http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=q98elhh

Absolutely, I would do this deal in an absolute heartbeat.

We desperately need a starting calibre center right now, and we desperately need a go-to scorer to pair with Green.

Best case - Amare comes back, stays healthy and continues along his 22 Point, 9 Rebound, 55% FG, .174 WS/48 career average.  The trio of Rondo / Amare / Green becomes the new Rondo / Pierce / KG and we find outself back into top 4 position in the East.

Worst case - Amare comes back, suffers yet another career ending injury, we end up sucking badly.  We get a high ranking in the next draft and pick up a gem in the 2014 draft.  Our new draft pick has a great ROY type season in 2014, then wows the league in 2015...then at the end of 2015 Amare's contract runs out and $24M in salary comes off our books so we can sign an All-Star to pair with Rondo and our new young superstar (hopeful).

Honestly, with the current roster we are are fringe playoff team.  We are NOT going to be bad enough to be a high lottery team, and we won't be good enough to get past the first round of the playoffs (if that).  If we make this trade for Amare we lose Lee, Humphreys and Wallace in the process.  If Amare comes back and cannot play, we basically lose those three guys for nothing and become a sure-fire lottery team.  If he comes back and plays well, we have a legit shot at a top 4 seed.

I would much rather take Amare his $24M comes off the books after 2015...rather than have Wallace's $10M on the books 2016 and Lee's on the books until 2017.  That's an extra $15M saved off our salary in 2016 if we don't make that trade.

Honestly though, I'm not sure the Knicks would do this. 

If they keep Amare they have a potential All-Star and pay:
$22M in 2014
$24M in 2015

If they do this trade they have three scrubs and pay:
$27M in 2014
$15M in 2015
$5M in 2016

For a team that has as much money to throw around as the Knicks do, in 'win now' mode and already well over the salary cap, how does it help them saving $2M this year and $7M in 2015?  They wouldn't really see a big reward until Wallace comes off the books in 2016, and by that time Amare's contract would have expired anyway.

BUT

If we only send Humphries and Wallace, I think they take it in a heartbeat.  In this case they take back:
$22M in 2014 (no change)
$10M in 2015 ($14M salary drop)

That is a major improvement in their cap situation for 2015, and it's quite possible that either Humphries or Wallace could take Amare's place adequately as a backup PF (Wallace) or C (Humphries).

It works for us because we are a rebuilding team.  Holding Humphries is really useless for us because even once his contract expires, we still only drop $12M.  We are already at about 70M so that only brings us down to about $58M, which is still up around the cap limit and no real use for a team that's in rebuild mode.  However, if we trade for Amare then $24M comes off our books in 2016, and that brings us down to about $46M - well under the cap.

Plus in all honest, I would much rather pay $46M to Amare over the next two seasons rather than pay $30M to Wallace over the next three.  At least Amare has he potential to teansform the team into a legit playoff threat (if healthy) or catapult is right into the lottery (if not). 

Also for those who call me crazy for suggesting Amare (if healthy) can impact the team, just look at his win share stats.  Last season he was injured and came off the bench.  He averaged 14 points, 5 rebounds and 58% FG in 24 minutes, and those numbers were good enough for a WS/48 of .191 - to put that into perspective the WS/48 of some of our players were:

S Randolf: 0.159 (Yes, I had to do a double take also)
J Sullinger: 0.146
P Pierce: 0.135
K Garnett: 0.133
R Rondo: 0.108
B Bass: 0.101
J Green: 0.099
J Terry: 0.091
L Barbosa: 0.086
C Lee: 0.082 (Yes he was terrible, nobody believes me)
T Williams 0.046
J Crawford: 0.041
J Collins: 0.016

Also just for fun, the WS/48 for the guys we are getting:

K Humphries: 0.109
G Wallace: 0.072
M Brooks: 0.068
K Bogans: 0.047
K Joseph: -0.008

Ouch....

I'll take that gamble on Amare any day.

[bleedGREENdon]

Danny wanted to trade rondo n ray when we were the best team in the east... Idk what he thinks about trading two scrubs for a on the verge scrub, he could have an emergence season i just dont see it in NY. Danny would be real smart to make this trade. Also if amare is playing well, a contender would def trade for him at the trade deadline 20x more than for Gerald Wallace with his extra year on his deal. NY knows this as well.

[Sketch5]

I'd take back that Amare contract for sure to get out of the extra year of the Wallace and Lee contracts.

http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=q98elhh

I'd have NY add Hardaway Jr. Gives us a SG prospect with actual SG size.