Just trade him to the EPA for that phone booth and be done with it. 

And it’s the only bad contract here, outside of Kyle Singler, who they’ll also probably buy out to avoid the taxes. Adams basically has Dwight Howard’s contract, Russ and PG are obviously max guys. Jerami Grant looks a little overvalued in 2018, but if he winds up at 15 and 7 plus a couple blocks per in 2020 — which…

When they buy out Melo, at least they won’t pay all of those taxes Bobby Marks is talking about. They’ll wind up saving about $90 million. Not off the cap, of course, but just in the penalty, because the tax only takes into account salaries at or beyond opening day.

Especially considering they don’t really want him getting defensive boards. Their offensive rating with Russ grabbing them and starting the break is insane, like 124 or something. So that’s actually the only strategic thing they do, but it works. Adams is one of the best screeners around, is solid defensively, has…

+ Uno Udo Dirkschneider reference

The luxury tax, just by virtue of its name, extinguishes any real belief in “competitive balance.” But, if it’s about competitive balance — which should be the point of a salary cap — then it needs to be a hard cap. No penalties for going over; you just can’t go over.

Even Tesla was probably, like, “Iconic?”

Or maybe Riley’s outgrown the spare room...

She could, but the property values were super low when she moved into that part of Oakland...

Yeah, history’s pretty clear on this. When Democrat administrations have taken broad jumps to the left, Republicans and independents elected Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, and Trump. At least Ike was a good administrator; can’t say much for the others. Kennedy was not the choice of the liberal left in 1960. They saw him…

Yeah, I don’t think they stretch him. They could, but the smart play is just to buy him out very soon. Again, they won’t pay the tax on his salary, so that would save them tens of millions of dollars even though they’re deep in the luxury, anyway. But it gets him off the books this season and gives them a tiny bit of f…

Wouldn’t be a trade. Nobody would take that contract. Plus, they’d have to get 75 percent of that salary back, which would eliminate all the luxury tax savings they can get by releasing him. OKC’s going to cut him free and eat the cost, probably all at once, though they could spread it over three years. Just easier to…

Bron has made room for James Jones and Mike Miller multiple times, and as bad as Melo is right now, he’s better than both of those guys. So that seems pretty possible.

If they stretch or buy out Carmelo, they wind up saving $91 million overall, a combo of cap hit and taxes. So, yeah, that’s going to happen. Resigning Grant at $9 million per basically ensures he’s the starting four, and he should be, based on his improvement during the season. That’s a far better defensive unit than…

Indubitably. 

yakety_sax.mp3

I do, but it’s not part of my job. 

I’d probably be fired if I did that. How about you?

In other news, that picture is absolutely fedorable. 

Next year, he’s going to eliminate all 29. That’ll get him over!