Memphis Grizzlies Salaries
Let’s start off by looking at who is currently on the Grizzlies books for next season.
Here are the contracts over five million dollars
- Darko Milicic — $7.54mil
- Marko Jaric — $7.1mil
That totals $14.64 million spread across two players. Next season is the final year of Darko’s deal, but Jaric has another year on his contract beyond that worth $7.65mil.
Now let’s have a look at the rest of their contracts
- OJ Mayo — $4.17mil
- Mike Conley — $3.88mil
- Marc Gasol — $3.24mil
- Rudy Gay — $3.28mil
- Hamed Haddaddi — $1.63mil
- Darrell Arthur — $1.05mil
These contracts add up a little over $17.25 million. All six of those players are on their rookie contracts, with four of those players entering just their second season. Conley and Gay are the other two, and they will be entering their third and fourth (final) seasons of their contracts.
That brings the Grizzlies total up to $31.8mil for eight players.
Other costs
- Greg Buckner — $4.08mil — non-guaranteed contract — I have read that only $1.06 million is guaranteed, so let’s assume Memphis waives Buckner and use that figure instead.
- Hakim Warrick — restricted free agent
- Qualifying offer is $3mil
- Cap hold is 300% of his 2008/09 contract, which was worth $2.12mil, so that cap hold is $6.36mil.
- 2009 First Round Draft pick — The Grizzlies won the rights to the second pick in the draft. The cap hold for that pick is $3.72 million.
- Eight players plus the first round draft pick takes Memphis up to nine players. So there will be a roster charge for empty roster slots worth $1.425mil. This roster charge could decrease depending on the Buckner/Warrick decisions.
Okay, so two figures — (1) Without Warrick, the additional charges add up to $6.2 million (2) With Warrick on the books, the additional charges add up to $12.56 million.
The Grizzlies lowest cap total now moves to $38 million. If they choose to keep Warrick, that rises to $44.4 million.
The Cap
We don’t know where the cap will end up being.
- If it holds steady, it’ll be at $58mil.
- If it increases it could go up to $60mil but that is the most unlikely of the three possibilities.
- If it decreases, then the cap could fall to say $56mil which is a figure which has been mentioned in some press stories. This is the most likely event, but holding steady is also a strong possibility.
Grizzlies Cap Space
As with our other teams, we’re assuming the cap either holds steady or decreases.
So if it holds steady, the Grizzlies could have $20 million in cap space if they part with Warrick. If they keep Warrick, they would only have a little under $14 million.
If the cap decreases to $56 million, the Grizzlies would have $18 million in cap space. Once again, cost Warrick’s cap hold, could take that down further, to $11.6 million in available cap space.
Grizzlies Free Agent Targets
There was a very good article by Ron Tillery the other day, which I noted in a separate post, and it contained information from Michael Heisley in which he gave a brief explanation of how he would view spending the team’s cap space this summer. Here was my reaction to the quote
So that is basically the same statement that Heisley made last summer, so we can expect something similar — The Grizzlies will only spend their money on a top level player, or an up and coming prospect. If those players are not available the club will not spend money, and will instead continue to look to build through the draft and spend that money in future offseasons.
So we’ll need to keep that information in mind when considering who the club may sign this offseason. Therefore, I think it’s safe to rule out a few players — Jason Kidd, Ron Artest, Allen Iverson, Shawn Marion, Rasheed Wallace, Andre Miller, Mike Bibby, Hedo Turkoglu.
What young star quality players does that leave us with? [here's a 2009 free agent list if there's anyone you'd like to add]
- Ben Gordon
- David Lee
- Paul Millsap
- Possibly Lamar Odom depending on how Grizzlies management views him. They could get him fairly cheap, plus he fills a massive hole for the club, and is still in his prime.
- Carlos Boozer, once again depending on how management views him, is he a big enough star for them to spend money?
- Anderson Varejao
- A final list of some restricted free agents — Marvin Williams, Josh Childress, Linas Kleiza, Ramon Sessions, Raymond Felton.
It’s always hard to predict what a club like Memphis is looking to do in a free agency.
- Especially a club like Memphis who have shown some patience in developing, at least since Pau Gasol left.
- You don’t know how highly they regard their own talent. How talented a player would it take for Memphis to give up on Conley? Or Rudy Gay?
- How highly they rate their core. Are they one piece away? Two? How good do those pieces need to be?
- Their 2009 draft pick is unknown at this point, but a top five pick could net a player they view as a potential star. That player, and position that he plays, could hugely effect what type of additions they look for in free agency.
The Grizzlies have shown interest in Ramon Sessions in the past, but Mike Conley’s progress since the coaching change will likely end that interest. That should follow for all point guards on this list.
The Grizzlies didn’t seem overly enthusiastic about adding Ben Gordon during the Gasol trade talks two years ago, so it’s doubtful they’re interested in paying him big bucks. The play and youth of Conley+Mayo makes the situation doubly unlikely.
Ergo, the Grizzlies are unlikely to sign a guard this summer because it appears that there is no-one of enough quality available to persuade the Grizz to give up on their young backcourt.
The Grizzlies believe in Rudy Gay appears very strong so it’s also highly unlikely that the players available are good enough to convince them to part with Gay.
That leaves us with big men options — Carlos Boozer, Paul Millsap, Lamar Odom, David Lee, Anderson Varejao.
The Grizzlies have shown strong interest in Varejao in the past, and could do so again this summer. Varejao would likely only cost them $6-7mil though, which still leaves Memphis with enough cap space to sign one of the other bigs should they choose to do so.
While it’s possible that the Grizzlies may be interested in Carlos Boozer and/or Lamar Odom, I do not think that they will. I think they’ll view both players as too old, or not good enough to vault their young core into contender status.
That leaves Paul Millsap and David Lee. If they choose to sign one of these players, I do not think that they would also sign Varejao. So it’s one of the three players. Varejao will come the cheapest, Millsap is the player I rate as the best, and Lee’s price tag could be many different things — in other words, the Grizzlies could get a great deal on Lee or screwed, depending on how many teams come after him.
I think the Grizzlies will make a soft play after these three players, similar to their advances on Josh Smith last summer, and offer contracts which provide very good value to the club but will ultimately be matched/bettered by some other team.
In other words, I think the Grizzlies will choose not to spend their money this offseason. I think they’ll keep their cap flexibility and try to use it at a later stage, possibly picking up some future draft picks in the process.
Maybe they end up signing Varejao to a contract worth slightly above the MLE, and he replaces what they hoped Darko would be, but I do not expect the Grizzlies to sign a player to an eight figure annual contract.
