Cap Space
#1 – Minnesota Timberwolves
- Cap Space at start of summer = $15 million
- Free Agent Signings = Darko Milicic = $4.5 million
- Other Acquisitions = Michael Beasley + Kosta Koufos = $6.26 million
- Departures = Al Jefferson = $13.2 million
- Remaining Cap Space = $17 million
#2 – Sacramento Kings
- Cap Space at start of summer = $17.3 million
- Free Agent Signings = none
- Remaining Cap Space = $16.7 million
Note: The Kings signed DeMarcus Cousins. The cap hold was 20% smaller than the contract he received. The reason for the difference in the figures.
#3 – New Jersey Nets
- Cap Space at start of summer = $32.32 million
- Free Agent Signings = Johan Petro + Travis Outlaw + Anthony Morrow + Jordan Farmer = $18 million
- Remaining Cap Space = $15.8 million
#4 – Chicago Bulls
- Cap Space at start of summer = $31.81 million
- Free Agent Signings = Carlos Boozer + Kyle Korver + Ronnie Brewer + Omar Aski = $23.7 million
- Remaining Cap Space = $10 million
#5 – Los Angeles Clippers
- Cap Space at start of summer = $18.15 million
- Free Agent Signings = Randy Foye + Ryan Gomes = $8.25 million
- Remaining Cap Space = $10 million
#6 – Cleveland Cavaliers
- Cap Space at start of summer = $7.5 million
- Free Agent Signings = none
- Remaining Cap Space = $7.5 million
Note: If Cleveland waives Delonte West they can raise this figure to $11 million in cap space.
#7 – Oklahoma City Thunder
- Cap Space at start of summer = $8.35 million
- Free Agent Signings = none
- Remaining Cap Space = $8.35 million
#8 – Washington Wizards
- Cap Space at start of summer = $8.5 million
- Free Agent Signings = Hilton Armstrong = $850k
- Remaining Cap Space = $8 million
#9 – New York Knicks
- Cap Space at start of summer = $36.04 million
- Free Agent Signings = Amare Stoudemire + Timofey Mosgov + Raymond Felton = $27.2 million
- Other Acquisitions – Kelenna Azubuike + Anthony Randolph + Ronny Turiaf = $9.27 million
- Remaining Cap Space = $2.42 to $3.34 million
Spent Cap Space
#10 – Miami Heat
- Cap Space at start of summer = $49.95 million
- Free Agent Signings = Dwyane Wade + Chris Bosh + LeBron James + Mike Miller + Udonis Haslem + Zydrunas Ilgauskas = $51.4 million
- Remaining Cap Space = none
#11 – Phoenix Suns
- Cap Space at start of summer = $13.12 million
- Free Agent Signings = Channing Frye + Hakim Warrick + Josh Childress = $15 million
- Other Additions = Hedo Turkoglu = $9.8 million or $10.2 million depending on trade kicker
- Remaining Cap Space = none
Advertisement
Posted in: Free Agency
babytyche08
July 18, 2010
Great Update. So how does it work. Miami has over stressed their salary cap. Will they be fined or charged?
Dave
July 18, 2010
Hey Babytycheo08, thanks for all the comments recently!
The NBA uses a soft cap instead of a hard cap like the NFL. That allows their teams to go over their cap figure to sign players.
The main reason for a soft cap is to offer teams enough flexibility to hold onto their own players (sign player using their bird rights — when you have had the player on your team for three years). To stop teams from losing talented youngsters just because they’re pressed right up against the cap.
The cap is set at $58 million. The NBA then uses a luxury tax threshold at $70.3 million to try and stop teams from spending too far beyond that figure. A dollar for dollar tax. So if a team has an $80 million payroll they will be charged a tax of $10 million ($80mil minus $70.3 million) on top of their payroll. That tax gets re-distributed throughout the rest of the league (teams who are below the tax).
Anyway, back to teams who have cap space. Teams can spend all of their cap space and reach the cap limit of $58 million like Miami did. At that point, those teams are only allowed to sign minimum contract players. So by the time a team fills out the rest of their roster, like Miami, their salaries could be up around $63 million. Just because they signed five players on minimum contracts to round out their roster.
Teams that are above the cap have two other exceptions — the mid-level exception (league average salary worth $5.7 million) and the bi-annual exception (worth $2.08 million) — as well as the ability to sign minimum contract players.
So a team like the LA Lakers who are way above the cap can still make a substantial signing by using their $5.7 million MLE exception this offseason. Actually, the Lakers used part of their MLE, they spent $4 million of the $5.7 million exception on Steve Blake. They still have their LLE + the remaining the $1.7 million to spend if they so wish.
I hope that clears things up for you!
Sam
August 2, 2010
I still can’t believe the contract Kahn gave Milicic. It’s not a great deal of money a year, and young/big/athletic centers always get paid, but still…
khandor
August 3, 2010
re: I still can’t believe the contract Kahn gave Milicic. It’s not a great deal of money a year, and young/big/athletic centers always get paid, but still…
Now that Al Jefferson has been traded, if the T-wolves go with a front-court tandem of Love and Milicic, for heavy minutes next season – while still using Rambis’ version of the Triangle Offense – expect to see Darko put up much better production numbers than he has to this point in his career.
Darko is a solid post player in this specific offensive system.
khandor
October 1, 2010
Hi, Dave.
Are you no longer updating your blog? Or, will you be starting up again once the regular season arrives?
Dave
October 1, 2010
Hey Khandor,
Apologies to all for the lack of communication (one way or the other) over the last couple of months.
I was short on time over the summer and gradually became unable to update the site regularly … and after awhile I simply decided to just leave it alone until I figured out whether to keep it running or not.
Unfortunately, I haven’t reached a final decision on that yet.
I think there will be some posts over the next month or two — written most of an updated power rankings post to begin pre-season — but I am not sure if the site will last beyond that point.