Suns Salary Situation 2023 offseason

[Yuma]

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[Yuma]

Trying to get a place where we can reference salaries and keep tabs on what is happening for posts in other threads.

 

[Mainstreet]

This may help from Spotrac.

Phoenix Suns 2023-24 Salary Cap

Phoenix Suns 2023-24 salary cap table, including breakdowns of salaries, bonuses, incentives, cap figures, dead money and more.

www.spotrac.com

 

[Mainstreet]

I'm wondering if the Suns still have the trade exception for Dario Saric... $4,975,371.

 

[Yuma]

2023 Unrestricted Free Agent (UFA):
Torrey Craig
Bismack Biyambo
T.J. Warren
Damion Lee
Josh Okogie
Terrance Ross

2023 Restricted Free Agents (RFA):
Darius Bazley
Jock Landale
Saben-Lee (two way)
Ish Wainwright (Club Option)

Smaller Contracts:
Landry Shamet (2 years left on 4 year, $42.5 million, non-guaranteed 2024-2025, club option 2025-2026)
Cameron Payne (One year left on 3 year, $19 million deal, UFA 2024)

Major Contracts:
Kevin Durant (3 years left on 4 year, $192.4 million, UFA 2026)
Devin Booker (One year left on five year, $158.2 million deal, 4 year $224 million kicks in 2024-25, UFA 2026)
Deandre Ayton (3 years left on 4 year, $133 million, UFA 2026)
Chris Paul (2 years left on 4year, non-guaranteed 2024-25, UFA 2026 - will be waived and $15 million, possibly stretched 5 years at $3 million per year, or if claimed $0 for Suns)

 

[Yuma]

2026 is the year Suns, as of now, could burn the whole thing down!

 

[Yuma]

Projected Practical Cap Space: -$33, 695,076
This is calculated by determining all guaranteed salaries + any dead cap from non-guaranteed salaries + estimated exercised and declined options + estimated retained cap holds and draft pool cap holds.

Maximum Possible Cap Space: -$3,198,503
This is calculated by determining all guaranteed salaries + any dead cap from non-guaranteed salaries. All other options, cap holds, exceptions are assumed as declined, waived or renounced.

"Super Tax" Apron
2023 NBA Super-Tax Apron	$179,500,000
Super-Tax Apron Space	$28,897,033

 

[Yuma]

That -$33-$34 million range keeps us $28 mill under that Super-Tax Apron. We will pay luxury tax, depending how we build the team, assuming Ayton stays. But we stay below that Super-Tax Apron.

I saw a trade on a podcast with Ayton as the trade piece, where PHX actually gains $12 mil in cap space. However, I don't know how/if that negatively affects our MLE exception size, etc.

 

[Yuma]

This is a good summary of our options due to salaries:

CP3 and Ayton options and how it affects the Luxury Tax and Apron

 

[Yuma]

They would have no issue re-signing Torrey Craig and Jock Landale since they have their Early Bird rights. However, they are limited to re-signing Damion Lee, Josh Okogie, Terrence Ross, and TJ Warren to either a minimum salary or 120 percent of that amount.

 

[Yuma]

I was watching a podcast with a salary expert on it, and they were saying you might see someone like Landale get signed for $10 million contract. Why? you need bigger salaries for trade pieces. That is supposedly why Shammet was signed to his contract at $10 mil per year. Sure enough, it helped in a CP3 trade. He was saying sometimes it isn't about value, but assets that can be used in a trade later. With Landale we have his early bird rights, so we can't do $10 mil per year, but we can do a number of years to get to $10 mil total, which is still helpful in trades.

 

[clyde2tw]

I was watching a podcast with a salary expert on it, and they were saying you might see someone like Landale get signed for $10 million contract. Why? you need bigger salaries for trade pieces. That is supposedly why Shammet was signed to his contract at $10 mil per year. Sure enough, it helped in a CP3 trade. He was saying sometimes it isn't about value, but assets that can be used in a trade later. With Landale we have his early bird rights, so we can't do $10 mil per year, but we can do a number of years to get to $10 mil total, which is still helpful in trades.

It's not sure there is any bargain trade available down the timeline, but in our luxury tax situation, 10m salary may costs us 30m in tax. The expected value for such manuver is extremely low.

 

[Yuma]

It's not sure there is any bargain trade available down the timeline, but in our luxury tax situation, 10m salary may costs us 30m in tax. The expected value for such manuver is extremely low.

The salary guru was making the point, you don't want all vet min guys as your trade chips, because then you are stuck taking back those salaries in trades. We can sign vet min guys on our own. Something to watch for if/when we resign our guys from last season.

 

[Ouchie-Z-Clown]

I was watching a podcast with a salary expert on it, and they were saying you might see someone like Landale get signed for $10 million contract. Why? you need bigger salaries for trade pieces. That is supposedly why Shammet was signed to his contract at $10 mil per year. Sure enough, it helped in a CP3 trade. He was saying sometimes it isn't about value, but assets that can be used in a trade later. With Landale we have his early bird rights, so we can't do $10 mil per year, but we can do a number of years to get to $10 mil total, which is still helpful in trades.

Crazy that a guy can get $5 MILLION more dollars than he’s worth just to make him a more useful tool for future considerations of the team. Must be good to be that guy.

 

[Hoop Head]

I was watching a podcast with a salary expert on it, and they were saying you might see someone like Landale get signed for $10 million contract. Why? you need bigger salaries for trade pieces. That is supposedly why Shammet was signed to his contract at $10 mil per year. Sure enough, it helped in a CP3 trade. He was saying sometimes it isn't about value, but assets that can be used in a trade later. With Landale we have his early bird rights, so we can't do $10 mil per year, but we can do a number of years to get to $10 mil total, which is still helpful in trades.

We can sign Landale for up to $11-12m a year. I'm not saying we will but early bird rights allow a team to resign someone for 175% of their previous salary or 120% of the league average, which is a little over $10m a year as that's the figure used for the non tax payer MLE.

 

[Hoop Head]

Section 25 from CBAFAQ.com

EARLY BIRD EXCEPTION -- This is a weaker form of the Larry Bird exception. It also allows teams to exceed the cap to re-sign their own free agents, but with more limited contracts than the Larry Bird exception. To qualify for this exception the player must play for two seasons without clearing waivers or changing teams as a free agent (see question number 32 for details and nuances to this rule). A team may use the Early Bird exception to re-sign its own free agent for up to 175% of his salary in the previous season (not over the maximum salary, of course) or 105% of the average salary in the previous season3, whichever is greater (see question number 31 for the definition of "average salary"). Early Bird contracts must be at least two seasons in length, which prevents teams from using the Early Bird to sign a one-year contract, then signing the same player with the full Larry Bird exception the following season. Early Bird contracts can be up to four years in length, with raises up to 8% of the salary in the first season of the contract. Early Bird is also a component of the Veteran Free Agent exception, and qualifying players are called "Early Qualifying Veteran Free Agents" in the CBA.

If the player is a restricted free agent with two years of service and qualifies for the Early Bird exception, then the player's prior team may use the Early Bird exception to match an offer sheet he receives from another team under the Gilbert Arenas provision (see question number 43. This is true even if the starting salary for the Early Bird exception is lower than the starting salary in the offer sheet, which is based on the Non-Taxpayer Mid-Level exception.

A team can renounce its Early Bird rights to a player, and instead re-sign him with the Non-Bird exception (see below). They might do this in order to sign the player to a one-year contract, instead of the minimum two years required by the Early Bird exception.

 

[Mainstreet]

I was watching a podcast with a salary expert on it, and they were saying you might see someone like Landale get signed for $10 million contract. Why? you need bigger salaries for trade pieces. That is supposedly why Shammet was signed to his contract at $10 mil per year. Sure enough, it helped in a CP3 trade. He was saying sometimes it isn't about value, but assets that can be used in a trade later. With Landale we have his early bird rights, so we can't do $10 mil per year, but we can do a number of years to get to $10 mil total, which is still helpful in trades.

I heard something similar about signing Torrey Craig to an amount that I thought was more than his market value.

 

[Mainstreet]

It will be interesting to see who got the new CBA right.

I thought the owners had the advantage, but perhaps there are more loopholes than I thought.

 

[Hoop Head]

I heard something similar about signing Torrey Craig to an amount that I thought was more than his market value.

What I worry about is overpaying guys like Craig and being stuck in cap hell because we have a bunch of overpaid role players no one will touch. I know we need smaller deals for trade purposes but generally those salaries are used to match salaries when picks and lower paid rookies are involved in deals. Sort of an equalizer. We don't have low paid rookie deal players and we don't have picks so we end up stuck holding the bag. See Isiah Thomas' Knicks.

 

[Mainstreet]

What I worry about is overpaying guys like Craig and being stuck in cap hell because we have a bunch of overpaid role players no one will touch. I know we need smaller deals for trade purposes but generally those salaries are used to match salaries when picks and lower paid rookies are involved in deals. Sort of an equalizer. We don't have low paid rookie deal players and we don't have picks so we end up stuck holding the bag. See Isiah Thomas' Knicks.

I have the same concerns. Only time will tell. I hope the Suns have some really smart people doing this.

 

[Hoop Head]

I have the same concerns. Only time will tell. I hope the Suns have some really smart people doing this.

I know JJ has gotten creative with contracts in the past but I fear he had to in order to get Sarver to sign off on them. Ishbia won't be watching the payroll as much so JJ won't need to find the middle ground where the player is ok with it and the spend thrift owner sees the potential savings. If JJ continues to write up contracts that are attractive to trade partners and also give the Suns flexibility then we may be in a good spot. JJ doesn't seem proactive in his job though. He seems to do what needs to be done to get by, no more or less, so I have my doubts until he's replaced.

 

[Hoop Head]

I appreciate how @Yuma has tried cataloguing certain things for easy reference this off-season.

Figured this post is important as it pertains to the Suns exceptions this summer when it comes to spending. I posted it elsewhere but will quote here for reference as well.

ESPN+ has an article up talking about who has cap space, who doesn't, who is over the apron and who isn't. The Suns are apparently $7m under the 2nd apron so they WILL have the taxpayer MLE available according to the piece, as well as the BAE.

I'm attaching a screenshot featuring the Suns part, for reference as well as a blurb about first apron restrictions...

NBA spending tiers: How much does every team have available in free agency?

Only a handful of teams have enough space to make a max offer, while others are already over the second apron.

www.espn.com

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[Mainstreet]

Now if the Suns can only find a way to use the $5 million trade exception.

They would have to have a draft pick or cash to use as I understand it to trade for a player.

They have $1.5 million left but I'm not sure how much that helps them.

 

[Hoop Head]

Now if the Suns can only find a way to use the $5 million trade exception.

They would have to have a draft pick or cash to use as I understand it to trade for a player.

They have $1.5 million left but I'm not sure how much that helps them.

They have the full trade exception. What you're referencing is cash to use in trades, which resets when the new league year starts. None of that exception was used, we did send cash to facilitate the Beal trade though, which is why you've seen that figure thrown around. Too many exceptions and of similar sizes which makes it all confusing.

 

[Mainstreet]

They have the full trade exception. What you're referencing is cash to use in trades, which resets when the new league year starts. None of that exception was used, we did send cash to facilitate the Beal trade though, which is why you've seen that figure thrown around. Too many exceptions and of similar sizes which makes it all confusing.

Then I'm not sure why writers are limiting the Suns to the trade exception in many articles, which is more limiting than the MLE.

I think there is some confusion about the new CBA.