I'm surprised they were unable to trade him before the deadline.
If Sacto is willing to buy him out now, and basically eat his remaining salary, does that mean that no one was willing to trade a 2nd rounder or even cash for Jimmer before the deadline? Or was Sacto asking for too much in return?
I'm at work, so I don't have my spreadsheet at work that tracks this, but we have a little under a million wiggle room. If the C's actually want him, they can offer him more than the minimum, since they have most of the MLE left. I'm not a huge Jimmer fan, but our team stinks, so it can't hurt. It might even be a win-win -- if he's good, then we get a cheap pickup. If he's not (and he may not be, considering he wasn't good enough for Sacramento), he'll help out tankfest a bit more.
SL, any estimates as to how much of the MLE Boston still has?
If the Celtics do have roughly $750K of room, they could offer a prorated deal with a decent second year attached.
I think Boston would be a better place for him to (re)establish himself. On a playoff team, I doubt he gets more than spot minutes.
As Chris said, the Lakers could be a fit too. Milwaukee? Utah?
We used about $2.5 million of the MLE on Faverani and Pressey, leaving us with about $2.65 million. However, beginning in January (the 10th I think), the value of the MLE starts to prorate down on a daily basis. Still I'm sure we have more available with the MLE than we do the luxury tax. The advantage we'd have, if we want it, is that we'll be able to offer more than the minimum.
I don't see the Lakers spending any luxury tax dollars on Fredette. They're also not likely to sign him to a multi-year deal, since they want to keep salary clear for next season. I don't see him ending there at all. Maybe Utah, to get fans in the seats. Milwaukee would have the same reason to sign him as we do. Same with Philly.
But I expect Jimmer to end with one of the lottery teams like us, and not one of playoff teams, since he'll want playing time more than being at the end of the bench of a winning time at this point in his career.
EDIT: Forgot about Chris Johnson, who cost us a couple hundred K of the MLE. Still, as I and other posters have said, the key constraint is the luxury tax, and not the MLE.