Bobcats send Drobnjak to Hawks for 2005 pick

[MavsFanFinley]

Bobcats send Drobnjak to Hawks for 2005 pick

August 16, 2004

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- The Charlotte Bobcats traded center Predrag Drobnjak to the Atlanta Hawks on Monday for a second round pick in the 2005 NBA draft.

The Bobcats agreed to select Drobnjak from the Los Angeles Clippers in the expansion draft as part of the deal for the Clippers' No. 2 overall pick in the NBA draft. The Bobcats used that pick to draft Emeka Okafor.

The Bobcats never had an immense interest in Drobnjak, and after sending their 2005 second-round pick to the Clippers in July for Melvin Ely and Eddie House, they were looking to get another draft selection.

``This trade allows us to open up a roster spot and also gives us a second round pick next year that we lost last month,'' said general manager Bernie Bickerstaff. ``We had six players at the power forward and center positions and this will relieve some of the logjam and present more minutes for the guys on our roster.''

Drobnjak, a 6-foot-11 forward from Serbia-Montenegro, was drafted by Washington in the second round of the 1997 NBA draft but remained in Yugoslavia.

He spent the first two years of his NBA career with the Seattle SuperSonics before signing with the Clippers in 2003.

[Male30Dan]

You know, Atlanta is kinda sorta starting to resemble an NBA team these days!

[grndmstr_c]

This is moderately intereesting news in light of the recent charlotte/dallas/gs rumor.

[fin4life]

Originally posted by: grndmstr_c
This is moderately intereesting news in light of the recent charlotte/dallas/gs rumor.

That is excactly what i was thinking... could charlotte be loading enough room so they could send a bigger TE to GS (one that is big enough to cover eschmeyer and Damp). I think i might bring this theory to the trade and draft board.

[Male30Dan]

Is all of this TE swapping legal under the CBA... I read your trade proposal, and I just dont have enough knowledge about it currently, nor the time to learn it. Where is Poindexter when you need him? [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

[fin4life]

Originally posted by: Male23Dan
Is all of this TE swapping legal under the CBA... I read your trade proposal, and I just dont have enough knowledge about it currently, nor the time to learn it. Where is Poindexter when you need him? [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

It is legal... but a TE cant come by itself. It is usually paired with a 2nd round pick (like the kerry kittles deal). This is usually used by bad teams like ATL or the clippers that cant sign FAs because nobody wants to go to bad teams. Right now, about 20-22 teams are over the salary cap, so the other 7-9 can give out TEs up to the amount that they are under the cap. This puts the Bobcats about 9.2 million under the cap... so they can give TEs up to 9.2 mil.

[Dooby]

So Atlanta now has less than $8M in cap room. If Atlanta was planning on paying Dampier 4 years at $40M, that contract would start at $8M; with 15% annual raises, that is $39,947,000.00. Signing Dampier to those numbers put them over the cap, but not by much. It is odd that no media report mentions that.

[fin4life]

Originally posted by: Dooby
So Atlanta now has less than $8M in cap room. If Atlanta was planning on paying Dampier 4 years at $40M, that contract would start at $8M; with 15% annual raises, that is $39,947,000.00. Signing Dampier to those numbers put them over the cap, but not by much. It is odd that no media report mentions that.

I think that is odd, maybe it was overlooked by the media... or maybe ATL and Damp have agreed to a 5 year deal worth 50 mil (i heard that somewhere) which would allow Damp to start off a little bit under 8 mil... probaly like 7.5.

I just did the math... If they start him out at 7.5 on a 5 year deal... it will be worth 50.5 mil.

Would 7.5 mil put ATL over the cap??????

[kg_veteran]

grndmstr hit the nail on the head. Charlotte appears to be clearing cap room. Could they have a deal in the works with the Mavs? As pointed out by Tyler on LMF, if the Mavs deal Henderson to Charlotte along with 3M cash, after insurance the Bobcats actually turn a profit on Henderson.

Dampier very well could be a Mav...

[Poindexter Einstein]

DAN .... there is no such thing as TE swapping. Teams trade players. TEs happen. Note that the Drobnjak deal was unrelated to a TE. It was just two teams making a swap, and both are still under the cap.

And yes, this deal appears to get ATL out of the mix for Dampier. By my count they have less than 7M available now (6.74M is my guess)

[Dooby]

$7.75M doesn't work, but it is by dollars. Thing is that no website has salary numbers to the penny, so $7.75 may or may not work, but $7.5 almost certainly does and $8M still might if other salary numbers are off just enough.

Regardless, Atlanta would not have done this deal unless (i) they knew they could still sign Dampier; or (ii) they knew they couldn't and did not care.

[fin4life]

Originally posted by: Dooby
$7.75M doesn't work, but it is by dollars. Thing is that no website has salary numbers to the penny, so $7.75 may or may not work, but $7.5 almost certainly does and $8M still might if other salary numbers are off just enough.

Regardless, Atlanta would not have done this deal unless (i) they knew they could still sign Dampier; or (ii) they knew they couldn't and did not care.

I know that Atlanta stands at about $36,080,000. I think that that is about 8 mil less than the NBA salary cap. Does anyone have the exact salary cap #??????????????

[chumdawg]

Question would be: is Charlotte clearing cap room, or salary, or both? If the answer is both, the Henderson deal makes sense in that it saves them some money this year. They save Drobjnak's salary and they also make some money on Henderson.

But the trouble is, that would seem to cut off a lot of their flexibility this year. They could make a little money on Hendu, but he would still count against the cap, right? Do they want to be in a position where they can't take players in trade at the deadline without sending equal salaries back?

The Bobcats might just be in a salary cutting mode here. They may want to hang on to their cap space for now.

And Atlanta? I would imagine that if Damp does decide to sign there, for whatever reason, then a million bucks or so isn't going to make a big difference in the long run. They can still offer more than anyone else, apparently.

[Poindexter Einstein]

Re ATL CAP ROOM

Exact NBA cap 43.87

Atl ...36.079 currently per hoopshype, plus 3 roster slots to fill @ minimum of 0.385M each or more ...total $37.23M or more (and if they opt to keep Pryzbilla you must add another 2.9M or so)

Cap room .... at most, 6.64M remains for free agent offers

[Dooby]

Originally posted by: Poindexter Einstein
Re ATL CAP ROOM

Exact NBA cap 43.87

Atl ...36.079 currently per hoopshype, plus 3 roster slots to fill @ minimum of 0.385M each or more ...total $37.23M or more (and if they opt to keep Pryzbilla you must add another 2.9M or so)

Cap room .... at most, 6.64M remains for free agent offers

I don't think so. I believe you only have to have 10 on the roster; they are above the minimum salary. Probably closer to $7.5M.

[V]

Room For Erick?
'Cats Could Help Mavs Get Dampier

By David Lord -- DallasBasketball.com

A sign-and-trade for Erick Dampier could happen any day now, and there is circumstantial evidence that the Mavs could be in the mix.

On Monday, Charlotte dealt center Pedrag Drobnjak to Atlanta for a draft pick, opening up cap room for the Bobcats and reducing cap room for Atlanta. Charlotte now has about $7.5M remaining cap room, out of the $29.25M they are allotted, and that amount could make them a major factor as the 3rd team in a 3-way sign-and-trade involving Dampier.

By acquiring Drobnjak, Atlanta seemed to signal that they are out of the running for Dampier, since their cap room for 2004-05 is now around $6.75M. That would be less than the $7.5M or more apparently needed for the reported $40-50M offer that they had been offering the Golden State center.

Rumors that Dallas was at the center of 3-way trade talks for center Erick Dampier from Golden State, with Charlotte the other team involved, first surfaced late last week in an interview on Mike Fisher's radio show.

These rumors fit what we have been saying all along: Golden State is only interested in sign-and-trades that essentially leave their cap room and payroll intact, while sending them something of value like cash or a draft pick or a young unproven player with a cheap short contract (like Stefansson).

Dampier is expected to command a contract starting in the $7-8M a year range. For a team like the Mavs who are over the cap, to accomplish such a feat under the NBA's trade rules, they would have to send away salary that matches Dampier's within 15%, in order to acquire him via trade. Since GS does not want any salary, the solution is to find a way to send away some salary elsewhere in a 3-way transaction, by using a 3rd team with enough cap room and a willingness to take the players Dallas is required to send away.

We first wondered if Golden State might be interested in moving Evan Eschmeyer as part of such a sign-and-trade deal, and then accept even more salary back. Eschmeyer is injured, and is mediocre when healthy. But taking Eschmeyer, who still has 3 more years on his contract, seems to be too high a price for anyone.

By trading Drobnjak, Charlotte is now far enough under the cap that they could completely absorb enough contracts from Dallas to make the deal happen. In addition, Charlotte has a whole roster full of cheap unproven players and may be willing to send one or more to GS in such a transaction, as part of the compensation to GS for making the deal.

There is an interesting “however’’ here: While the move for Drobnjak appears to close the door on Atlanta's pursuit of Dampier, it does leave them enough room to compete with Charlotte to provide 3rd-team cap room in a Dampier sign-and-trade, if they so desired. (While Dampier has expressed apprehension at joining a rebuilding team like Atlanta, prospective teammate Antoine Walker is promising to try to recruit him to the Hawks. And Dampier, a native of Mississippi, already has a home in Atlanta).

Also note that since both of those teams have the needed cap room in its entirety to be that 3rd team, other teams such as Memphis, New York, and Indianapolis now can attempt to utilize the same method with one of those two teams and get Dampier.

Dallas could offer players such as Christian Laettner, who is in the final year of his contract and who was a star at Duke, and Jerry Stackhouse, who starred at North Carolina and has been an all-star in the past. Both might be desirable for a Charlotte team that could use a proven NBA talent and regional star to draw fans, or for a Hawks team needing a short-term infusion of talent. Charlotte may have passed up both of those players in the expansion draft before knowing what cap room they may have left, and Dallas may offer other compensation to make those players even more desirable.

Other players who might also fit for Charlotte could be Shawn Bradley or Calvin Booth, centers who likely would become expendable with Dallas' acquisition of Dampier.

The Mavs continue to refuse to offer any comment on questions related to Dampier. We note that because while up until recently Dallas said unfavorable things about Dampier, team officials now saying nothing marks a change that may be significant.

It should be noted that August 23rd in on the horizon, and after that date Laettner and/or Stackhouse can be traded in a multi-player deal. It has long been speculated that one or both of those players might be destined for a trade at such a date, since neither player has yet to come to Dallas or to be introduced here in a press conference since their acquisition on June 24 during the NBA draft. NBA rules require the Mavs to keep each player for 60 days before trading them elsewhere if they are traded away with other players.

[Nash13]

Since North Carolina is college basketball territory, it would be in Charlotte's best interest to trade for Jerry Stackhouse to try and sell it to fans.

[Poindexter Einstein]

Minimum roster number is 11, but no team ever starts a season with less than 12, which is why I used 3 empty slot charges. If you want to theorize Atl carries 11 only, they hit right at 7m of space currently.

[Male30Dan]

Originally posted by: Poindexter Einstein
DAN .... there is no such thing as TE swapping. Teams trade players. TEs happen. Note that the Drobnjak deal was unrelated to a TE. It was just two teams making a swap, and both are still under the cap.

And yes, this deal appears to get ATL out of the mix for Dampier. By my count they have less than 7M available now (6.74M is my guess)

Thanks for clearing that up PE!

[Dooby]

Originally posted by: Poindexter Einstein
Minimum roster number is 11, but no team ever starts a season with less than 12, which is why I used 3 empty slot charges. If you want to theorize Atl carries 11 only, they hit right at 7m of space currently.

You are right on the 11, and that is the number you should use because the NBA would let the Hawks sign a player for whatever they are under the cap; and then the Hawks could add a player to the league minimum.

[kg_veteran]

Originally posted by: Dooby

You are right on the 11, and that is the number you should use because the NBA would let the Hawks sign a player for whatever they are under the cap; and then the Hawks could add a player to the league minimum.

Agreed.

[V2M]

Given there are now four variables in the equation (Dampier, GS, Mavs, BobCats), can anyone come up with a reasonable deal that would be agreeable to all four of 'em and one that would meet the legal requirements? Thanks.

Can't wait to see what's in store for us come Aug 24th !!