Tag Archives: Dunk That Sh!t

Well, at least the made up trade scenarios for Chris Paul are getting better. Remember when he was going to Orlando for Jameer Nelson and a pile of junk last summer? No longer. Now, he is destined to be a Thunder (it is so odd when the team name is not plural) and the Hornets will be granted a budding All-Star in return. Gee thanks false internet rumors, we really appreciate it. How very kind of you.

Today we had two questions that come regarding CP3 that kind of go hand in hand, so we will take a look at what the facts say on this edition of Dunk that Sh!t:

James Grayson (Swarm and Sting): What is the likelihood that Chris Paul accepts the extension offered by Dell Demps? Seeing as the contract can only be offered AFTER the CBA expires can Dell even offer it to him? And if so is it a 20 million-a-year contract or one far less?

Michael McNamara: I will actually answer the second question first, and although I can not know this for certain, everything points to a scenario in which Chris Paul’s contract extension will be significantly less than the 20 million dollar per year one that you proposed. All we have to do is look at the aims of the owners in prior CBA’s as evidence for how they are going to negotiate in this session. In 1998-99, the owners were worried that spending was getting out of control and that they needed to put a cap on max salaries in order to curb that spending. Michael Jordan had just received a contract a couple of seasons prior that paid him $30 million annually and Kevin Garnett had recently inked a 6 year 126 million dollar contract after just three years in the league. Seeing the potential for this to become disastorious, the owners capped max contracts at between 9 million and 14 million (depending on how long you had been in the league).

Think about that for a second. That means that Michael Jordan’s earning potential would have theoretically dropped by over 50%. Garnett’s dropped by nearly that same amount when you factor in that he was just a fourth year player after the lockout ended and would have likely only gotten 10-11 million per year. This is the reason why Carmelo Anthony’s agent was so aggressive in getting him dealt to a team where he could sign the 3 year/65 million dollar extension. In all likelihood, Melo would have lost 20-35 million dollars had he waited until after the new CBA, just like KG would have lost boatloads of money if he had not signed his extension prior to the lockout.

There is no telling just how much the owners will push to put a significantly lower cap on max contracts, but they might not even have to directly write this into the CBA. Let’s say they get this 45 million dollar hard cap that they are looking for. How then could they commit 20+ million dollars to one player and still be able to put together a competitive team? The only hope for superstars is that the owners do what they should have done all along- pay the mega stars what they deserve and give the change to the guys who don’t put the butts in the seats. But even then, committing half of your cap to one player will, best case, just lead to a Lebron in Cleveland type of outcome for a team.

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