OK, folks, with two days before the start of free agency I couldn't resist making a spreadsheet to look at the real numbers and to figure out what I'd do if I were GM. I looked up all of the appropriate salary numbers but there were some disagreements in the info I found so hopefully I settled on the correct ones. All salary numbers are obviously in millions of dollars.
Here's my plan.
Moves (not necessarily in chronological order):
* Re-sign Hayward for the max which is 29.7 next year. Part of how I do this is I tell him we're so committed to winning that we're planning to spend 10 million over the luxury tax this coming year.
* Re-sign Hill for a 3 or 4 year deal averaging 18-19/year. Depending on details that'll put his next year's cap number around 17.5.
* Re-sign Ingless for just over the MLE, i.e. 8.5 this year
* Sign Milos Teodesic for the same as Ingles
* Sign all three rookies, or if Williams-Goss isn't good enough in camp sign another minimum level player in his place.
* Trade Diaw (7.5 non-guaranteed), Neto (1.47 non-guaranteed), Hood, and Burks for a starter quality big (4/5) plus other assets. Could be multiple trades, i.e. trade Burks for a 2nd (this can be done at the trade deadline in hopes of increasing his value), trade Neto for a 2nd, then trade Diaw and Hood for the backup big. Diaw and Hood are valuable assets--Diaw for the voidable contract and Hood because he's a starter quality player still on rookie deal--so this should land us a starter quality big that we can use to backup Favors. The main point here is to shore up our bigs, looking for someone about at Hood's level or a little above but playing 4/5 and at a salary of up to 10.5. Since Hood is such a much better deal salary-wise, this trade may also net us a future 1st.
This plan depends on Favors and Gobert being able to play next to each other, which I still believe they can. But if Snyder doesn't want to do that very much, or if Favors has injury problems again, then we've still got that starter quality backup big to rely on.
Here's what the roster, salaries, and minutes look like: (in order of projected minutes)
Hayward $29.7 million; 35 mins at the 3
Gobert 21.224719; 35 mins at the 5
Hill 17.5; 30 mins mainly at the 1 and some at the 2
Favors 12; 28 mins at the 4
Ingles 8.5; 28 mins mainly at the 2 and some at the 3
Milos Teodesic 8.5; 21 mins at the 1
Johnson 10.505; 21 mins split between 3 and 4
Exum 4.992385; 20 mins mainly at the 1 and some at the 2
traded for quality C/PF 10.5; 18 mins split between 4 and 5
Mitchell 2.1844; 14 mins at the 2
Bolomboy 1.312611; 8 mins split between 4 and 5
Bradley 1.1791; 6 mins at the 5
Williams-Goss or other minimum player 0.815615; 1 min at the 1
Total salary = 128.91; luxury tax is 119 so we're 10 million over the tax. Great 8-9 player rotation. (By the way the total minutes add up to 53/player instead of 48/player since players miss games and 53 mins is a common number if I recall correctly.)
I believe this is a substantially better team than this past year. The only major loss is Hood, who I'm replacing mainly with Ingles and Johnson getting time at the 3 and Mitchell (who I think is going to be a very good player) getting time at the 2.
On top of that we've now got Teo as a backup 1, who will be MUCH MUCH better than any of our backup 1's last year. We've got Bolomboy and Bradley as backup 5's, who will be about the same as Withey last year. And we've got the new "quality C/PF" who will be way better than Diaw was last year. This year's Favors will be way better than last year's injured Favors. Plus continued internal development of Gobert, Exum, and maybe to a lesser extent some of the other players.
I think overall this team is about 5 games better than last year's team. Since without injuries last year's team was in my opinion about a 55 win team, I'm predicting this team wins 60 games.
So Hayward stays because (a) more money for him here in Utah, (b) Utah's commitment to winning as demonstrated by going into the luxury tax, and (c) Utah having a real competitive team, a projected 60 win team. Probably good for 2nd team in the West, and if something happens to one of the main Golden State players I think the Jazz could be a real contender for the title. Plus we haven't mortgaged our future; in fact we've added to it with a few draft picks from the trades. Next summer will involve some tough decisions but we have no untradeable contracts should we need to shed a little salary.
Do it, Dennis!
Here's my plan.
Moves (not necessarily in chronological order):
* Re-sign Hayward for the max which is 29.7 next year. Part of how I do this is I tell him we're so committed to winning that we're planning to spend 10 million over the luxury tax this coming year.
* Re-sign Hill for a 3 or 4 year deal averaging 18-19/year. Depending on details that'll put his next year's cap number around 17.5.
* Re-sign Ingless for just over the MLE, i.e. 8.5 this year
* Sign Milos Teodesic for the same as Ingles
* Sign all three rookies, or if Williams-Goss isn't good enough in camp sign another minimum level player in his place.
* Trade Diaw (7.5 non-guaranteed), Neto (1.47 non-guaranteed), Hood, and Burks for a starter quality big (4/5) plus other assets. Could be multiple trades, i.e. trade Burks for a 2nd (this can be done at the trade deadline in hopes of increasing his value), trade Neto for a 2nd, then trade Diaw and Hood for the backup big. Diaw and Hood are valuable assets--Diaw for the voidable contract and Hood because he's a starter quality player still on rookie deal--so this should land us a starter quality big that we can use to backup Favors. The main point here is to shore up our bigs, looking for someone about at Hood's level or a little above but playing 4/5 and at a salary of up to 10.5. Since Hood is such a much better deal salary-wise, this trade may also net us a future 1st.
This plan depends on Favors and Gobert being able to play next to each other, which I still believe they can. But if Snyder doesn't want to do that very much, or if Favors has injury problems again, then we've still got that starter quality backup big to rely on.
Here's what the roster, salaries, and minutes look like: (in order of projected minutes)
Hayward $29.7 million; 35 mins at the 3
Gobert 21.224719; 35 mins at the 5
Hill 17.5; 30 mins mainly at the 1 and some at the 2
Favors 12; 28 mins at the 4
Ingles 8.5; 28 mins mainly at the 2 and some at the 3
Milos Teodesic 8.5; 21 mins at the 1
Johnson 10.505; 21 mins split between 3 and 4
Exum 4.992385; 20 mins mainly at the 1 and some at the 2
traded for quality C/PF 10.5; 18 mins split between 4 and 5
Mitchell 2.1844; 14 mins at the 2
Bolomboy 1.312611; 8 mins split between 4 and 5
Bradley 1.1791; 6 mins at the 5
Williams-Goss or other minimum player 0.815615; 1 min at the 1
Total salary = 128.91; luxury tax is 119 so we're 10 million over the tax. Great 8-9 player rotation. (By the way the total minutes add up to 53/player instead of 48/player since players miss games and 53 mins is a common number if I recall correctly.)
I believe this is a substantially better team than this past year. The only major loss is Hood, who I'm replacing mainly with Ingles and Johnson getting time at the 3 and Mitchell (who I think is going to be a very good player) getting time at the 2.
On top of that we've now got Teo as a backup 1, who will be MUCH MUCH better than any of our backup 1's last year. We've got Bolomboy and Bradley as backup 5's, who will be about the same as Withey last year. And we've got the new "quality C/PF" who will be way better than Diaw was last year. This year's Favors will be way better than last year's injured Favors. Plus continued internal development of Gobert, Exum, and maybe to a lesser extent some of the other players.
I think overall this team is about 5 games better than last year's team. Since without injuries last year's team was in my opinion about a 55 win team, I'm predicting this team wins 60 games.
So Hayward stays because (a) more money for him here in Utah, (b) Utah's commitment to winning as demonstrated by going into the luxury tax, and (c) Utah having a real competitive team, a projected 60 win team. Probably good for 2nd team in the West, and if something happens to one of the main Golden State players I think the Jazz could be a real contender for the title. Plus we haven't mortgaged our future; in fact we've added to it with a few draft picks from the trades. Next summer will involve some tough decisions but we have no untradeable contracts should we need to shed a little salary.
Do it, Dennis!
