Re: The Boston Celtics Maili

["Jeremy Warren" <jeremy.warren@alphatech.com>]

                      RE>The Boston Celtics Mailing List Digest    8/21/97

>I must have this whole salary cap thing completely screwed up, as I'm
>obviously missing something here.  How can any team other than
>Minn. possibly give Garnett $20+ million a year?  In order to stay under
>the cap, they'd have a team of Garnet plus 11 scrubs - hardly going to win
>you a division, let alone a championship.  Sure, the T-Wolves can offer
>him as much as they want, but I just can't see how he can hit the market
>and get such exorbitant offers from anyone else.  Maybe I need some
>lessons in capology from Jan Volk.  

>Anyone?

>- - Rob

Because teams are allowed to give 20% raises every year, they don't need to be
$20M under the cap to offer a contract that averages $20M per year.  I haven't
run the numbers, but I think a team could offer $140M over 7 years if they had
$12M in cap space.  And the cap is expected to be raised to at least $30M next
summer.   So if the Bulls renounce Jorden and Rodman next summer, they could
probably sign Garnett to a mega-deal, and then resign Pippen and Longley.

As far as this years free agent bonanza is going, I really like what Charlotte
is doing.  They already had a very good frontcourt (Rice, Mason, Divac), and
now they have a very solid backcourt with their free agent acquisitiions of
Wesley and Phills.  Both of them are good all-around players and great
defenders.  A little over a year ago they were the laughing stock of the
league for trading away Mourning and L.J., but I think they have positioned
themselves to be in the thick of things after Chicago disintegrates.

Jeremy