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2020 Training Camp Thread

Udoka was drafted because he agreed to get paid like a second rounder. @stitches is right.

Although...it probably would have made more sense to just trade down again for more seconds and take him in the second round.
I also want to point out that we are in no hurry to get under the tax. We can do it any time before the end of the fiscal year. We can do it at the trade deadline too. Some of those end of the roster guys' salaries have later date for full guarantee of their salary too. So it's possible we start with all of them but cut one or more of them before they become fully guaranteed and before the pro-rated portion of their salary push us over the tax.

Something else to keep an eye on is Rudy's incentives. Imagine if he gets injured and misses 2 months of the season. It's possible some of his incentives that are now deemed "likely" and currently count toward the salary cap and luxury tax, ultimately drop out of the calculation and push us under.
 
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I also want to point out that we are in no hurry to get under the tax. We can do it any time before the end of the fiscal year. We can do it at the trade deadline too. Some of those end of the roster guys' salaries have later date for full guarantee of their salary too. So it's possible we start with all of them but cut one or more of them before they become fully guaranteed and before the pro-rated portion of their salary push us over the tax.

Something else to keep an eye on is Rudy's incentives. Imagine if he gets injured and misses 2 months of the season. It's possible some of his incentives that are now deemed "likely" and currently count toward the salary cap and luxury tax, ultimately drop out of the calculation and push us under.
Solid post
 
I also want to point out that we are in no hurry to get under the tax. We can do it any time before the end of the fiscal year. We can do it at the trade deadline too. Some of those end of the roster guys' salaries have later date for full guarantee of their salary too. So it's possible we start with all of them but cut one or more of them before they become fully guaranteed and before the pro-rated portion of their salary push us over the tax.

Something else to keep an eye on is Rudy's incentives. Imagine if he gets injured and misses 2 months of the season. It's possible some of his incentives that are now deemed "likely" and currently count toward the salary cap and luxury tax, ultimately drop out of the calculation and push us under.
I know I don't fully understand how the luxury tax is figured/applied, but I'm wondering if this is an accurate representation of how things can change in regard to whether we're liable or not for the luxury tax? Are you speaking from expertise or hope here? (Can anyone here speak with expertise? -- sincere question). Particularly:
  • Whether Rudy's (or anyone else's ) "likely" incentives can change throughout the course of the season in terms of luxury-tax impact
  • Whether the non-guaranteed guys can be cut without replacement in a way that allows us to get under the tax? (The only way I've thought possible based on my limited understanding is to cut two non-guaranteed guys within a month of the season starting and carefully use 10-days and 2-week grace periods thereafter to fill in the required roster requirements. But I'm not even sure that this is actually a realistic/valid method.)
 
I know I don't fully understand how the luxury tax is figured/applied, but I'm wondering if this is an accurate representation of how things can change in regard to whether we're liable or not for the luxury tax? Are you speaking from expertise or hope here? (Can anyone here speak with expertise? -- sincere question). Particularly:
  • Whether Rudy's (or anyone else's ) "likely" incentives can change throughout the course of the season in terms of luxury-tax impact
  • Whether the non-guaranteed guys can be cut without replacement in a way that allows us to get under the tax? (The only way I've thought possible based on my limited understanding is to cut two non-guaranteed guys within a month of the season starting and carefully use 10-days and 2-week grace periods thereafter to fill in the required roster requirements. But I'm not even sure that this is actually a realistic/valid method.)
First of all - not an expert, so take it for whatever it is.

From what I know for bookkeeping purposes during the season, at the beginning of the fiscal year the contracts that include incentives include all incentives that are deemed likely, and exclude all incentives that are deemed not likely. if I'm not mistaken "likely" incentive is one that the player did cover the requirements for in the previous season and unlikely are the ones that he did not. For example(not real example, just for illustration purposes), lets say Rudy has incentives in his contract for playing 50+ games. If he did play 50 last year, for bookkeeping purposes they will include that incentive in the salary cap during the season. Lets say he has an incentive for being DPOY. This incentive will be deemed unlikely and won't be included in the calculations during the season because he didn't become DPOY last year. This all is for bookkeeping, for apron and hard cap numbers, etc. Ultimately whether we pay tax or not is decided at the end of the year when we will know which incentives exactly the players hit, which ones they didn't. Note - it's possible that our salary cap drops(if players don't hit some likely incentives), BUT it's also possible it jumps up if they hit some unlikely incentives.

On the second one - I don't know. I would assume yes, BUT, it also is probably very reliant on the exact numbers. I'm still seeing discrepancy in the numbers being calculated by several different outlets so I don't know which one is real. Some say we are 1M over, others 1.7M... some have it at 1.9M.
 
First of all - not an expert, so take it for whatever it is.

From what I know for bookkeeping purposes during the season, at the beginning of the fiscal year the contracts that include incentives include all incentives that are deemed likely, and exclude all incentives that are deemed not likely. if I'm not mistaken "likely" incentive is one that the player did cover the requirements for in the previous season and unlikely are the ones that he did not. For example(not real example, just for illustration purposes), lets say Rudy has incentives in his contract for playing 50+ games. If he did play 50 last year, for bookkeeping purposes they will include that incentive in the salary cap during the season. Lets say he has an incentive for being DPOY. This incentive will be deemed unlikely and won't be included in the calculations during the season because he didn't become DPOY last year. This all is for bookkeeping, for apron and hard cap numbers, etc. Ultimately whether we pay tax or not is decided at the end of the year when we will know which incentives exactly the players hit, which ones they didn't. Note - it's possible that our salary cap drops(if players don't hit some likely incentives), BUT it's also possible it jumps up if they hit some unlikely incentives.

On the second one - I don't know. I would assume yes, BUT, it also is probably very reliant on the exact numbers. I'm still seeing discrepancy in the numbers being calculated by several different outlets so I don't know which one is real. Some say we are 1M over, others 1.7M... some have it at 1.9M.
Thanks for the answer. I'm willing to bet that you know more about these things than I do, so I appreciate you explaining your understanding. It does make some sense if the likely/non-likely incentives are calculated as you suggest. Agree on the second part -- the exact numbers are vital here, and I'm not sure we've seen any numbers that we can fully trust (though I agree with @Handlogten's Heros that Dan Clayton's spreadsheet is probably the most trustworthy public source we have -- I think he's saying 1.9M).
 
Oni and Morgan got official love from the Jazz Organization today. Holy Royce O'Neil.
The Jazz know they need economical end-of-bench guys if they're going to pay out 3 max salaries to Conley, Gobert and Mitchell. Even though that scenario is a year from now, the Jazz FO needs to get cracking on it asap.
 
The Jazz know they need economical end-of-bench guys if they're going to pay out 3 max salaries to Conley, Gobert and Mitchell. Even though that scenario is a year from now, the Jazz FO needs to get cracking on it asap.

They better damn not be paying a max (or anywhere near it) to Conley next season.
 
First of all - not an expert, so take it for whatever it is.

From what I know for bookkeeping purposes during the season, at the beginning of the fiscal year the contracts that include incentives include all incentives that are deemed likely, and exclude all incentives that are deemed not likely. if I'm not mistaken "likely" incentive is one that the player did cover the requirements for in the previous season and unlikely are the ones that he did not. For example(not real example, just for illustration purposes), lets say Rudy has incentives in his contract for playing 50+ games. If he did play 50 last year, for bookkeeping purposes they will include that incentive in the salary cap during the season. Lets say he has an incentive for being DPOY. This incentive will be deemed unlikely and won't be included in the calculations during the season because he didn't become DPOY last year. This all is for bookkeeping, for apron and hard cap numbers, etc. Ultimately whether we pay tax or not is decided at the end of the year when we will know which incentives exactly the players hit, which ones they didn't. Note - it's possible that our salary cap drops(if players don't hit some likely incentives), BUT it's also possible it jumps up if they hit some unlikely incentives.

On the second one - I don't know. I would assume yes, BUT, it also is probably very reliant on the exact numbers. I'm still seeing discrepancy in the numbers being calculated by several different outlets so I don't know which one is real. Some say we are 1M over, others 1.7M... some have it at 1.9M.

$1.7M looks accurate. $1.9M was with Morgan's hold instead of a non-guaranteed minimum that is slightly less than the hold. This all assumes 120% for Udoka, but I have not seen details released on that.

Obligatory, not an expert, but I can't imagine you can have non guaranteed player on roster for a portion of the season and not have it count against the cap. If he was on roster for 1/4 of the season, for example, my expectation is that 1/4th of his contract is on the books. Even 10 way guys are on the books.

I'm still thinking one of Morgan/NWG gets cut and Udoka comes in at less than 120%. That would put us under the tax and explain why it was relevant to trade Tucker instead of a waive and stretch. The Jazz would have saved a ton of headache by being able to trim off some salary on the Clarkson/Favors deals.
 
$1.7M looks accurate. $1.9M was with Morgan's hold instead of a non-guaranteed minimum that is slightly less than the hold. This all assumes 120% for Udoka, but I have not seen details released on that.

Obligatory, not an expert, but I can't imagine you can have non guaranteed player on roster for a portion of the season and not have it count against the cap. If he was on roster for 1/4 of the season, for example, my expectation is that 1/4th of his contract is on the books. Even 10 way guys are on the books.

I'm still thinking one of Morgan/NWG gets cut and Udoka comes in at less than 120%. That would put us under the tax and explain why it was relevant to trade Tucker instead of a waive and stretch. The Jazz would have saved a ton of headache by being able to trim off some salary on the Clarkson/Favors deals.
With how tight lipped they are on contracts we likely never find out on Udoka. Part of me feels the Tucker deal was so weird and the fact that they aren’t upgrading on NWG must mean they are close enough to duck the tax without trading a rotation player. Part of me says nah they are dumb and just kinda fumbling through it.
 
Covid making it impossible to have any training camp coverage is really annoying.
I was thinking this exact thing as I was clicking into this thread realizing it hadn't been very active. I think organizations (far beyond basketball) are going to milk COVID for everything it's worth to lessen public accountability. What a welcome sight that is for a lot of organizations that like to operate with more privacy. Of course, everyone will eat the secrecy up in the name of safety.
 
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