2009 Free Agents Out of Luck

[DrReality]

This may or may not be true but . . . . . .

From Hoopsworld:

2009 Free Agents Out of Luck

As if everybody isn't already sick and tired of hearing about how the bad economy is affecting literally everything in American society, it's also going to start affecting the way teams look at their rosters this summer and beyond.

Where in the past there were a few teams looking to dump salary and a whole bunch of teams looking to take advantage of that, this summer we could see the exact opposite. More and more organizations are going to be looking at shedding long-term contracts, not picking them up. This, naturally, is going to cause problems for the free agency class of 2009. Teams will be trying to trade some of the long-term contracts they've already got, meaning it will be difficult for a player trying to sign something long-term at big money.

That means Shawn Marion, Allen Iverson, Rasheed Wallace, Ron Artest, Lamar Odom, Mike Bibby, Andre Miller, and Drew Gooden could have issues making what they think they're worth. It also means that other players with player options or early termination options might not necessarily look to test the waters and keep that last year of their contracts anyway. This includes guys like Carlos Boozer and Jermaine O'Neal. They might not want to wait a year to compete with all the big names in 2010, but even taking that risk might be worth it financially in the long run.

The bottom line is that the way teams look at trades and free agency is going to change. It's going to start looking like baseball, where teams dump big talents with big contracts just to save dough. That's a very bad thing for this summer's free agency crop.

[coachx]

Interesting article.

There was one on realgm that was similar today but focused on 2010 FA being advised to sign extensions with their current teams sine the cap and max contracts will likely fall by 2010, if not 2009.

http://realgm.com/src_wiretap_archives/578...ign_extensions/

[mrhonline]

Another interesting development is the Suns may not exercise Nash's $13M team option for next year.

I can't say I blame them. They're not good enough anymore to win with him, so they might as well sign someone with the MLE and save some serious money.

[AHF]

Every team should prefer Nash over Bibby so that would be good news for the Hawks in getting a decent price on a PG.