Pat Riley & Co. appear to be quietly building a potential dynasty

The first step of Pat Riley’s mater rebuilding plan might be near completion, if Miami Herald radio host and ESPN contributor Dan LeBatard is to be believed.

According to LeBatard, a sign-and-trade of Toronto forward Chris Bosh has been agreed to in principal. The Heat would acquire Bosh in exchange for Michael Beasley, Mario Chalmers and Joel Anthony. The Raptors would also get a trade exception in the deal, the value of which would depend upon the agreed-to contract of Anthony.

Any conversations held between Bosh and any member of Heat management prior to July 1 would certainly be considered tampering. The league takes tampering very seriously and may impose stiff penalties if it is discovered, though it traditionally does not investigate unless another team files tampering charges.

However, the rules regarding communications between fellow players (and friends) are much more slippery. It appears as if Wade has been acting as the unofficial spokesman for the Heat, and perhaps deserves the GM of the Year award for his efforts. Read more…

With a spectacular convergence of talent and salary-cap space finally set to take place Thursday at 12:00 a.m., the mood across the various NBA cities varies as widely as do the options of their star free agents.

In Cleveland, things have turned bitter.

It had widely been expected that if Lebron James decided to leave the Cavaliers, a sign-and-trade would be the likely avenue. Doing so provides obvious mutual benefits between team and player. It would allow James to sign a six-year, $125.5 million contract instead of a five-year, $96.1 million deal. It would allow the Cavaliers to get something of value in return for the game’s best small forward, rather than losing him for nothing.

However, owner Dan Gilbert apparently has no intention of assisting its star player in leaving the state of Ohio. If James decides to leave, Cleveland management will simply let him walk – leaving that extra cash on the table and putting further strain on a potential rebuilding plan.

The Cavs appear surprisingly dead-set on making an alternate life as difficult as possible for the King, even at the expense of the health of the franchise. The team figures to have as much as $10.9 million of cap room if Lebron decides to leave (assuming the team is willing to terminate the contract of Delonte West). If the team were to instead work with James to construct a sign-and-trade, it could gain a trade exception of up to $16.6 million, in addition to a bevy of potential draft picks. Add to that the approximately $5.7 million mid-level exception the team would otherwise have access to.

Why wouldn’t they want to get players, draft picks or a hefty trade exception in return? Out of spite? Because they are pouting? Apparently, Gilbert is more committed to his so-called principles than he is to the $15.4 million of extra spending money a sign-and-trade would create. Read more…

As expected, the Miami Heat has extended a qualifying offer to backup center Joel Anthony.

The move allows the Heat to match any outside offer for the restricted free agent, but also ties up an additional $1,060,120 against the Heat’s salary cap. The Heat will enter the off-season with salary obligations to four players (Beasley, Chalmers, Jones’ buyout and Anthony), in the amount of $8,376,749.

A qualifying offer is essentially a contract offer, which prevents the Heat from not offering Joel a contract and waiting to swoop in when he tries to sign elsewhere. It counts against the Heat’s salary cap as soon as it is offered. The Heat could withdraw its outstanding qualifying offer at any time, in which case Anthony would become an unrestricted free agent. The qualifying offer cannot be withdrawn after July 23 without the player’s consent.

Should the qualifying offer be withdrawn on or before July 23, the Heat would continue to hold Bird rights on the third year player, and he would continue to be charged against the cap at a reduced $854,389. Because Miami would retain his Bird rights, it would be able to utilize all of its cap room on other players and then come back to Joel. At that point, Miami would be able exceed the cap to offer Joel whatever salary he wants – all the way up to a maximum contract for a player with less than seven years of experience. If the Heat preferred to utilize the cap space elsewhere, Anthony would need to be renounced and his Bird rights lost.

If the qualifying offer were to be withdrawn after July 23, which would require mutual consent, Joel would be automatically renounced and the Heat would lose its Bird rights on the player.

While the qualifying offer remains outstanding, Joel has the right to accept it at any time in lieu of continuing to test the free agent market. Read more…

He didn't have to, but James Jones helped out his hometown Heat in a big way

The Miami Heat took another step toward maximizing its salary cap space on Tuesday, when it agreed to buy out the contract of forward James Jones. It was a move that has long been anticipated.

The Heat had a June 30 deadline before the three remaining seasons on Jones’ contract became fully guaranteed. The contract was set to pay him $4.65 million, $4.97 million and $5.29 million, in 2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13, respectively.

Had the Heat invoked its right to terminate the contract, Jones would have received payments of $1.856 million, $1.984 million and $2.112 million, respectively, in each of the next three seasons.

Instead, the Heat did one better.

As suggested this morning, the Heat – even after moving the contracts of Michael Beasley and Mario Chalmers – were projected to fall $198,764 shy of offering each member of a potential Dwyane Wade, Lebron James and Chris Bosh trifecta a maximum contract.

While reports are sketchy at best, it appears as if Riley has cleaned up this issue quite nicely. Jones and the Heat have apparently agreed to a reduced buyout amount which would produce a 2010-11 cap hit of just $1.5 million, a $356,000 savings. The figure appears to be more than enough to accommodate any unforeseen swings in the actual salary cap, which is set to be released on July 7.

The move clears and additional $3.15 million in cap space for next season. This leaves the Heat with only $7,316,629 in contract obligations for 2010-11. Miami figures to have some $48,783,371 of available room. A potential Wade, James, Bosh trio – assuming the Heat can find takers for Beasley and Chalmers – leaves the Heat comfortably shy of the projected $56.1 million cap, with $157,236 to spare. Read more…

The greatest words in the history of professional sport (from Stephen A. Smith):

I got a call last night from a source and I double-checked it with another and they told me essentially that LeBron James and Chris Bosh are going to tag team and go together and join Dwyane Wade in Miami.

Around 10 o’clock last night or so I heard the news and stayed up for a few more hours and made a few phone calls and I felt comfortable enough to go with what I reported.

I believe it’s highly likely, I wouldn’t say anything is a done deal with LeBron James until it’s signed.

Last night I heard emphatically that this is the direction that LeBron James has leaned toward and Dwyane Wade has done a very, very good job of convincing them (James and Bosh) not just about Pat Riley, not just about the fact there are no state (income) taxes in the state of Florida but at the same time he’s there in a tandem and that’s what it’s going to take. Either that or a three-headed monster to win multiple championships and that LeBron James is all in.

This is obviously something of a best case scenario for the Heat.

It’s hard for me to entertain the notion that both Lebron and Chris are unequivocally ready to sign on the dotted line right now and join Dwyane in his quest for basketball immortality. But what if they can be convinced? Then what? Well, let’s review the logistics. Read more…

It’s one of life’s certainties: Athletes need to pay taxes on income earned on the road.

For each of his first seven NBA seasons, Dwyane Wade has worked in Florida, where there’s no state income tax.

Yet, each April, he undoubtedly pays a team of accountants to file hundreds of pages of tax returns, and checks, to as many as a twenty different states, covering taxes on income he earned on the road.

April 15 — tax day — is quite possibly the most stressful day for professional athletes, now that 20 of the 23 states with NBA franchises have laws that require visiting athletes to pay state income tax for each game they play there.

This so called “jock tax” is an income tax levied against visitors to a city or state who earn money in that jurisdiction. Since states cannot typically afford to track the thousands of individuals who do business on an ongoing basis, the ones targeted are typically the very wealthy and the very high profile, namely professional athletes. Not only are the working schedules of professional athletes public, so are their salaries. The state can compute and collect the amount with very little investment of time and effort. Read more…

Note: From 8:00 am on 6/28 to 8:00 pm on 6/28, the Vegas lines in regards to landing Lebron James have changed dramatically. The Heat’s odds have increased to 2/1 from 5/1. At the same time, the Bulls’ odds have reversed to 1/3 from 1/5. This is the first time the Heat has been in the second place in the race for the King!

Three days until free agency begins.

Nine days until the salary cap, luxury tax and mid-level exception numbers are released.

Ten days until players can be signed.

The Miami Heat is poised to make a big free agent splash, but several cap space teams have equally high hopes. Here’s a look at the key competition: Read more…

With free agency set to begin next week, the New Orleans Hornets’ ownership transfer delay could hamper the team’s ability to improve its roster, even though George Shinn has continued to reassure fans of his commitment toward winning.

What else is he going to say? The cash strapped owner needs to sell season tickets.

But the situation in the Big Easy has led to widespread speculation that more than half of the league’s general managers have taken great interest in. The Hornets remain a league-wide curiosity because, even after last season’s virtual giveaways of Rasual Butler and Devin Brown to avoid paying luxury tax, New Orleans is back in tax territory with a projected payroll of more than $73 million in 2010/11.

What do you do when your loss-making team’s two best players play the same position?

One answer, and the easiest, is to trade one of them this summer. There are only 48 minutes available to a point guard, and the Hornets have more pressing needs at hand. Both Chris Paul and Darren Collison would demand a major return on the trade market. The Hornets could move Paul in return for a bevy of solid, young talent and draft picks that could shore up several positions of need. They could also move Collison with a bigger contract to pad his outgoing salary. The Hornets unfortunately have multiple overpaid declining parts still locked up for at least another season.

Rival executives continue to try to convince the Hornets to make Paul available in trades, pointing to the fact that new head coach Monty Williams can simply slide the promising Collison and his modest $1.4 million salary into that spot. When those teams get shot down, they come right back and suggest the Hornets’ make Collison available, conditioned upon a willingness to take back the cap-clogging contracts of Emeka Okafor, James Posey or Peja Stojakovic.

It has always been assumed that the Hornets will trade away one of their two star point guards to get under the tax threshold. Recent history suggests that smaller market teams will do just about anything – even the decidedly stupid – to drop below that magic line. Last season, the salary-dumping Utah Jazz jettisoned the promising rookie point guard Eric Maynor to Sam Presti, perhaps the best young general manager in the league today, and his Oklahoma City Thunder, in a package deal that included the retiring Matt Harpring. Read more…

With the twelve pick in the 2010 draft, the Memphis Grizzlies selected Kansas swingman Xavier Henry. The pick is certainly intriguing, in that it engenders further questions about the length of restricted free agent Rudy Gay’s stay in Memphis. The common perception is that Henry was selected solely because of the Rudy Gay situation. Is it a prelude to a potential trade of the explosive 6’8″ small forward?

Despite the rumors that have flailed about for several months now, Memphis owner Michael Heisley has remained steadfast in his commitment to retaining the budding forward. At least his comments have been. His actions, however, would suggest otherwise.

Heisley said his team was going to make a big move in the draft. They did. Only this time they again moved to the ATM machine to make a deposit. The Grizzlies’ 25th overall pick, Dominique Jones, was dealt to the Mavericks for cash considerations. Instead of getting an experienced junior ready to contribute right away, a player who can score, rebound and pass (the only player in college to average 21 ppg, 6 rpg and 4 apg last season), the Grizzlies got three-million dollars to put in Michael’s back pocket.

You can read into this in one of two ways. You can say that Heisley would rather deflect the loss-making enterprise that is the Grizzlies organization than spend big dollars to build a winner. The folks in Tennessee sure feel slighted, particularly when you consider the team has a solid core in place that is not too far away from being legitimately competitive in a difficult Western Conference. Or, perhaps Heisley is stashing the cash in order to offset the impact of the hugely overvalued contract his highly sought after free agent is certain to command.

The first seems more likely, but consider the second. Read more…

Well, Riley picked up guard Daequan Cook’s team option back in October. It was a mistake which forced the team to surrender its No. 18 overall pick in order to unwind.

At No. 18, both Eric Bledsoe and Avery Bradley were available for the taking. If you believe either had the potential to be a future high-quality starting point guard in this league, then that was the true cost of the Cook blunder. If you’d rather have seen the pick traded for a future pick, then such a pick  – perhaps between Nos. 16 and 20 overall next season – is the true cost.

The Thunder, who took on Cook in exchange, used the No. 18 pick to draft Bledsoe, who was subsequently dealt to the Clippers for a protected future first round pick. So… at the very worst, Riley sacrificed his point guard of the future. At the very least, if he preferred the extra $1.2 million in cap space pick No. 18 eats up, he sacrificed a protected future first rounder. It’s hard to believe that the price to jettison Cook couldn’t have been substantially cheaper. As far as general managers go, Pat Riley got used by Sam Presti on that one.

The Heat did get the 32nd overall pick in the trade, which it used to acquire 22-year old University of Texas senior Dexter Pittman. Pittman is an undersized center, at 6’9.5″ without shoes, with a huge 7’6″ wingspan and the biggest hands in the draft (whatever that means). He tips the scales at over 300 pounds, having already dropped more than 60 pounds during his four seasons with the Longhorns and playing at nearly 400 pounds in high school. His nearly 21% body fat (fourth highest in draft history) suggests he still has a long ways to go with his conditioning. Read more…