NBA Roundtable

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2010 Cap Space: Phoenix

In Free Agency, General NBA, Trade Talk on June 24, 2010 at 2:52 am

Phoenix Suns Salaries

Contracts above $5 million

  • Jason Richardson – $14.44 million
  • Steve Nash – $10.31 million
  • Leandro Barbosa – $7.1 million

Jason Richardson is an expiring contract. Leandro Barbosa and Steve Nash both have two years remaining on their contracts.

This gives us a sub-total of $31.85 million for three players.

Rest Of Team’s Salaries

  • Grant Hill – $3.24 million
  • Jared Dudley – $2.15 million
  • Goran Dragic – $1.97 million
  • Earl Clark – $1.9 million
  • Robin Lopez – $1.87 million

Earl Clark, Robin Lopez and Jared Dudley are on their rookie contracts. Dudley is in the final year of his deal and is due for a pay rise ($4 to $6 million) next summer. Grant Hill is an expiring contract. Goran Dragic has two seasons left on his contract.

That gives us a sub-total of $11.13 million for five players.

Other Costs

  • Draft Picks — The Suns have no first round picks.
  • Open Roster Spots — The Suns have eight players on the books so there will be a cap charge of $1.9 million for the four remaining open roster slots.

A sub-total of $1.9 million which gives us an overall total of $44.88 million.

The Cap

David Stern recently announced

NBA commissioner David Stern said on Friday that the league is projecting the cap to come in at about $56.1 million. The actual number won’t be determined until early July, before teams can begin officially signing players.

Though that figure would still be lower than this season’s $57.7 million cap, it’s far better than estimates from last summer, when the league sent a memo to teams warning them of a potential sharp drop to between $50.4 million to $53.6 million.

2010 Cap Space

The Suns have $11.22 million in cap space.

Summer Options

Amare Stoudemire

  • If the Suns re-sign Amare, they’ll immediately be above the cap and have only the MLE to use. If they sign Amare to max contract their payroll will rise to $61.45 million. If they signed Channing Frye to a $3-4 million contract they would be left $1-2 million below the luxury tax threshold.
  • If Phoenix let Amare leave, they could be a small player in free agency.

The best target for Phoenix in free agency would be David Lee. He is the best equipped, in that price range, to replace Amare Stoudemire. As fall-backs go, he is about as good as it gets (in that price range).