Charlotte in Flux

Charlotte in Flux - Still Shooting for Postseason



The Hornets have had a difficult start to the season, as apparent by a record that has hovered around .500 through 27 games.  Although the team has failed to mesh, word is that the Charlotte Brass has officially picked a new direction, one that doesn’t involve “tanking”.

Listen, it has been proven that tanking is a poor way to build a team.  I know you’ll mention recent examples that include New Orleans and Orlando as teams where tanking has worked, but I could remind you of several other teams that have been, and will continue to be, win-starved programs.

But, despite the strong stance made by the front office, many are pointing out that both conferences are stacked heavily in favor of deep squads with multiple all-star players.  Questions are becoming repetitive wherein concern is expressed for the apparently futile attempt that seems to be Charlotte’s playoff hopes.

We may have to tweak our roster more or more finely tune our offense than, say, a team that simply hands the ball to a LeBron or a Durant, but I’m confident in our players and their ability to put together a solid team effort.  It won’t be as easy, but when we win, we know we’ll have earned it.

In terms of current team goals, it seems that Charlotte does have a significant amount of flexibility.

You know, we have an internal mantra of sorts, and the goal is to always try and improve the team by one of each of three things.  The first is through trade, the second through the draft, and the third through free agency.  We believe we have significantly attractive trade assets at this point and aren’t afraid to pull the trigger.  Additionally, we have three first round draft selections in the upcoming draft.  Finally, we have enough cap space to offer a maximum contract to a game changing player via free agency.  We’ve done our research, I’ll leave it at that.

What Charlotte GM Sun Scorched seems to be referring to is the depth and quality of this year’s free agent class.  Indeed, outside of the teams who will hold their player’s bird rights, only a handful of teams possess enough cap space to offer veteran maximum contracts, making cap space significantly more valuable this year than in years past.

Key Unrestricted Free Agents: Carmelo Anthony, Marc Gasol, LaMarcus Aldridge, Rajon Rondo, Tony Parker, and DeAndre Jordon.
Potential Unrestricted Free Agents: LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh, Kevin Love, Brook Lopez, Eric Gordon, and Roy Hibbert.
Key Restricted Free Agents: John Wall, Kyrie Irving, Enes Kanter, Brandon Knight, Kemba Walker, Kawhi Leonard, Nikola Vucevic, Chris Singleton, Tobias Harris, and Chandler Parsons.

We’ve talked to each and every one of our players and they all know what the goal is.  The goal is to place this team and each of the players on it into a winning position.  Sometimes that means re-inventing oneself, still other times that means repositioning oneself.  During our internal conversations, we’ve set expectations with the players and the coaching staff and they, in turn, hold us accountable.  After all, they can only perform so well if we give them a poor foundation.

Though he declined to give specifics, GM Sun Scorched did mention that the squad will feature a new starting lineup for this next series of games and that the team has held active trade discussions regarding several current Charlotte players.

Just to make it clearer, Parsons isn't restricted. His bid war will be amazing, he's gonna get a huge paycheck, because Minny cannot sit and wait for an offer sheet to come and then they match.

After that said, I think you're heading toward a nice direction. Never looked at your team deeper like you did, and now it seems you've done ok with your roster. You still have a shot at postseason and you have tons of flexibility to improve.

I was told Parsons is restricted. He's noted as a 2nd rounder in game, but Minny has the option to extend him before free agency.

Charlotte's draft picks are going to be huge...their own and Suns both in Top 5 likely. That with some free agents, this team could contend next year if MKG gets the proper help.

But let it be known - Brook better pick up his PO and I'm in the process of extending Rondo (hopefully)

I know we're not using NBA rules but I don't know how the hell Parsons will be UFA at NBA and RFA here.
Per NBA rules:

NBA Rules wrote:Any player other than those taken in the first round with less than four years experience will be a Restricted Free Agent when they are not under contract unless the team holding their rights renounces them.

Clearly is not Parsons case as he'll have 4 years of experience next season, come FA time. (both at NBA and CSL).
Want further explanation?
The Curious Case of Chandler Parsons Contract. - By RealGM

Jake would have the bird rights to go over the cap and re-sign this kid, but he'd not be able to extend him nor match any offer sheet as he'd be a RFA.

I don't give a Damn about it, because I have no CAP to go after the kid, so don't think I'm bringing this up because I want him to be a UFA. I really don't care, it has zero effect on my team.
I'm just bringing a topic that is not in our CBA (There's no explanation of how players become RFA, just explanation about how it works.)

I just thought it was extenuating circumstances, similar to whatever the Kenneth Faried issue was last year ?

Sorry bro I was not here last year so I don.'to know about that Faried issue.
Still two different cases because Faried was a 1st pick and Parsons a 2nd pick...

Yeah, only 1st round picks become RFAs.

Well I knew that I just assumed this was a different situation. But damn, wonder if Jake knows he'll be losing Parsons for nothing since he has no bird rights and can't offer any contract unless he has cap space to do so....that's gonna be a tough loss.

Parsons has 3 years of Bird Rights. If he gets traded his Bird Rights go with him, allowing his new team to go over the CAP and re-sign him..

Man, what are you talking about? I have bird rights AND I can extend him. ANYONE can be extended since we're using player agents as much as I knew.

He'll be a UFA this off-season, ill have his bird rights and I can extend him if I choose to do so.

Jake0890 (MIN) wrote:Man, what are you talking about? I have bird rights AND I can extend him. ANYONE can be extended since we're using player agents as much as I knew.

He'll be a UFA this off-season, ill have his bird rights and I can extend him if I choose to do so.

According to CBA you can give him a mid-season extension up to 120% of his previous salary as the 1st year of the deal.

Come FA time he's an UFA and you can go over the CAP and offer him up to 13,something and 7,5% raises for five years as you have his bird rights. But every other team with CAP can offer him the max and you have no right to match offers.

Marcos_Beck (OKC) wrote:

Jake0890 (MIN) wrote:Man, what are you talking about? I have bird rights AND I can extend him. ANYONE can be extended since we're using player agents as much as I knew.

He'll be a UFA this off-season, ill have his bird rights and I can extend him if I choose to do so.

According to CBA you can give him a mid-season extension up to 120% of his previous salary as the 1st year of the deal.

Come FA time he's an UFA and you can go over the CAP and offer him up to 13,something and 7,5% raises for five years as you have his bird rights. But every other team with CAP can offer him the max and you have no right to match offers.

Yeah, I know the CBA and I know what UFA is. I can't match offers.

And for what its worth, I was responding to HiGrade, not you. You were right.

Jake0890 (MIN) wrote:

Marcos_Beck (OKC) wrote:

Jake0890 (MIN) wrote:Man, what are you talking about? I have bird rights AND I can extend him. ANYONE can be extended since we're using player agents as much as I knew.

He'll be a UFA this off-season, ill have his bird rights and I can extend him if I choose to do so.

According to CBA you can give him a mid-season extension up to 120% of his previous salary as the 1st year of the deal.

Come FA time he's an UFA and you can go over the CAP and offer him up to 13,something and 7,5% raises for five years as you have his bird rights. But every other team with CAP can offer him the max and you have no right to match offers.

Yeah, I know the CBA and I know what UFA is. I can't match offers.

And for what its worth, I was responding to HiGrade, not you. You were right.

Yeah, I was trying to clarify the situation so HG could understand it..
Sorry Jake, I've nothing to do with that, nor was trying to teach you anything. And I'm sure you're not going to let Parsons walk that easy..

Yeah Parsons isn't extendable, or shouldn't be anyway. Only players at the end of a 4 or 5 year contract are extendable, which is an NBA rule that, if we don't have in our CBA, is an oversight and not intentional.

Myles (SAS) wrote:Yeah Parsons isn't extendable, or shouldn't be anyway. Only players at the end of a 4 or 5 year contract are extendable, which is an NBA rule that, if we don't have in our CBA, is an oversight and not intentional.

Well Parsons is coming off of a 4 year contract, no?

But I was under the impression that everyone could be extended, maybe not.

CSL CBA wrote:Contract Extensions
Contracts can be extended when a player is in the final year of their contract and have at least 3 bird years. When extending players, the maximum value of the first year is 110% of their final year salary, however this cannot exceed the league maximum for that player. This excludes players coming off their rookie scale contracts, where the first year value can be up to the league maximum.

Extended contracts can only be for a maximum of four (4) years, as opposed to the five (5) which can normally be offered to Bird-eligible players in the offseason.

Parsons has three (3) bird years and, thus can be extended in-season. He is also a UFA, and cannot be matched. So, either MIN signs him in-season or has his rights this offseason, but Parsons is free to choose his new home.

But Parsons isn't coming out of a rookie scale deal, because he was a 2nd pick, he wasn't handled a rookie scale contract like 1st picks do.
So he can't be extended to big money, just 120% of his previous salary, which is little more than 1M.
If he wants to sign an extension for 1M, well then, that's up to him LOL

Marcos_Beck (OKC) wrote:But Parsons isn't coming out of a rookie scale deal, because he was a 2nd pick, he wasn't handled a rookie scale contract like 1st picks do.
So he can't be extended to big money, just 120% of his previous salary, which is little more than 1M.
If he wants to sign an extension for 1M, well then, that's up to him LOL

We're attempting to blend NBA and CSL theory here - the mods will need to discuss and post a resolution, with the update to the CSL CBA. I have read a ton on the issue, and can see both sides. Both the objective and subjective views of both.

I can assure you, we will reach a decision that makes practical sense and, hopefully, one that gives the CSL a bit more clarity than the IRS-like NBA CBA.

 I have no clue what the rule is or how his specific situation will be handled, I was just pointing out that there might be an issue that needs to be addressed and get an "official" ruling from the admins. Either way, I think you should be able to extend him to the Max if you want to, it's only fair..otherwise I bet he walks in FA to a max deal.

Depends what the CSL does but from what I understand, Parsons would be a restricted free agent in the NBA (see Omer Asik and the Bulls opting not to match). I guess most leagues just take the second round UFA approach as it's much easier.

Pretty sure an in-season extensions can't be done for second rounders though.

2nd rounders in NBA are always RFA if they have a contract of 3 or less years. That's Asik case. His contract had 3 years and it when it ended he only had 2 Years of Bird Rights (meaning they could not go over the CAP to re-sign Omer). Therefore the NBA makes them RFA so there is a chance former teams can stay with them. But their rules for those 2nd rounders RFA are completely different, easy to notice when you look at what happened.

Houston was allowed to offer 5M / 5M / 15M (the rule says that the Max. salary for 1st and 2nd years of those 2nd rounders RFA is the MLE, and after that it continues to follow the max scale for players under 6 years of NBA). So, they offered a 3-year deal like that:
1st year: MLE
2nd year: MLE
3rd year: 15+ million (following the max contract scale)

But the CAP hit for the new team (Rockets in this case) would be:
1st year + 2nd Year + 3rd year / 3 = 8.3M in Asik's (or Lin's) case.

Had the Bulls matched, Asik's CAP hold would be MLE, MLE and 15M.
The Bulls could not match, nor the Knicks. It was easy to swallow that 1st and 2nd years with a MLE contract counting against your CAP, but I'm sure they would not want to have a CAP hold of 15M with Asik in his last year.

Parsons contract was for 4 years, meaning that now he has 3 Bird Right years. So MIN (and Rockets in real NBA) can go over the CAP to re-sign him without problems. And they can't offer Parsons big money at a possible mid-season extension because his contract was not a rookie scale contract (applied only to 1st rounders).

Hope it is clearer now. I know, lots of rules, but that's the NBA. Otherwise, if it was that easy, all of us would be GMing there LOL

No, you get one bird year per year of service. Not more bird years than service years which basically means that the Parsons bird year figure or contract was incorrect in the original import. DDS games show the birds after they've been served so second round rookies show 0 years until a season is completed.

League will just have to decide what to do as either the import had a 4 year deal for Parsons, which is incorrect for a second rounder, or the contract was correct but the bird years were showing one extra.

MKG is a great block to build around. You know how to get the most out of your players so I'm sure you are heading in the right direction, sooner rather than later.

Getting this discussion back on track, and rekindling this rivalry:

The New Orleans Pelicans would like to announce that at no point over the last few seasons did we ever tank as the Charlotte franchise has stated. We inherited a roster with Anthony Davis on it. We tried to win as many games as possible and lucked out winning the lottery for Smart and have built around the two beautifully. Losing is never an option for us. Not sure Charlotte can say the same thing...