John Schuhmann (NBA.com) simplifies Miami's bottom line after the league announced 2010's cap ( $58.044 million) would exceed earlier estimates by almost $2 million.
This morning, I wrote about the how the Heat can get James in Miami financially. Basically, they either need to get rid of Michael Beasley or the big three needs to accept less than max money.
The new cap number doesn’t change the first part. The Heat would still need to get rid of Beasley in order to have enough space under the cap for three max contracts.
[However,] the new cap number [also] means the [hypothetical] big three wouldn’t have to sacrifice as much as originally thought.
First, for clarification, the max that James, Wade and Bosh can earn next season does not change with the new cap number. It stays at $16.6 million, which is 105 percent of the amount they all earned last season.
Now, with the new cap number, if the Heat keep Beasley and Mario Chalmers and split the remainder of their cap on the big three, they would each have a starting salary of $15.8 million, which is just $800 thousand less than the max.
A six-year contract with a starting salary of $15.8 million would total $119.7 million, which is just $5.8 million less than a max deal. So Wade (and Bosh if he were to join the Heat in a sign-and-trade) would be sacrificing less than $1 million per year.
A five-year contract with a starting salary of $15.8 million would total $91.7 million, which is just $4.4 million less than a max deal. So James (and Bosh if he were to just sign outright with the Heat) would also be sacrificing less than $1 million per year.
Of course, if that were the scenario, the Heat would have just five players under contract and no cap space left. Even if they were to sign their three second-round rookies, they would then have to sign between five and seven more players, all to minimum deals.
It’s also possible that the three would decide not to split the cap space evenly. Maybe Wade, since he’s the one that put it out there, makes a greater sacrifice. Either way, the new cap number means that the sacrifice won’t be as big as we thought it would be earlier in the day.
Now, if James doesn’t come to Miami, the Heat would have a good deal of cap space to fill out their roster. Even if Wade and Bosh signed max deals, the Heat would have about $13.8 million of cap space. That would allow them to get a solid defensive center like Brendan Haywood and at least one good shooter before having to convince other role players to take the minimum.
