Minnesota Sports Forum

I know a lot of you use HoopsHype to track salaries, but I think I found another useful tool that updates in realtime.


Here's a http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/link to how much cap space each team has left. The only caveat is that this tool uses cap holds for all roster spots in determining overall capspace. And the Lakers capspace situation is distorted by a hold attributed to Kobe Bryant.

Here's a link to our http://www.spotrac.com/nba/minnesota-timberwolves/cap/2016 and http://www.spotrac.com/nba/minnesota-timberwolves/cap/2017/2017 cap situation.

It looks like only a few teams have more capspace left than us. Look at column marked "Total Salary". The only adjustment to this column is for unsigned rookies. Our total salary is 68.7M So adding Dunn's salary of 3.2 gives us 71.9M. So to reach 94.1, we have left about 22.2 million in capspace this year.

Philly and Brooklyn are the only two teams with significantly more capspace than we have. Dallas technically has more space but that will change after they resign Dirk or sign Barnes. Phoenix will have less capspace than us once they sign both Bender and Chriss.

Great stuff, Ricky...very helpful.

Can somebody help me with the concept of a "cap hold" and how it ties into the ability to dign free agents. Take the Lakers, for example. The schedule shows them as being way over the cap, but this is because of Kobe's and Hibbert's cap holds which aren't going to actually come into play. I'm assuming the only cap holds that have to be considered for purposes of determining cap space are the non-discretionary ones, like rookie contracts. So, in the case of the Lakers, they only have to count Ingram's projected salary against cap space and can ignore Kobe's et al, there by allowing them to sign the free agents they signed.

Is this right, or can even the rookie contacts be ignored in determining cap space? I guess I'm confused as to why we need to keep track of "cap hold". Anybody have the answer?

As far as capholds go, I believe all first round picks automatically create a caphold based on the slotted first year salary. Also, guys on rookie deals that are subject to qualifying offers have a caphold based on the minimum qualifying offer until the team decides to tender or decline. The other caphold is when you have open roster spots. So for instance we don't really have 22.2M to spend on one person but for all remaining roster spots. I think the way this tool was set up is that they use players from the previous season to come up with capholds for the vacant spots. I think once teams fill the rosters, the caphold numbers will reflect reality. We all know Kobe is retired, but this tool doesn't reflect that. That's why I focus on the "total salary" number which is similar to the HoopsHype numbers and adjust as need be (add in the rookie contracts).

Think of it as a more updated Hoopshype. It reflects Aldrich's salary, Dunn's caphhold, and shows the stretch provision for KMart which HoopsHype still doesn't show.

The team has to "renounce" cap holds they no longer want. So the Lakers, if they have not already done so, will renounce the Kobe and Hibbert cap holds. Once renounced, they are no longer FAs of the Lakers, and thus lose any Bird Rights or other advantages for being able to re-sign those FAs.

60WinTim wrote:The team has to "renounce" cap holds they no longer want. So the Lakers, if they have not already done so, will renounce the Kobe and Hibbert cap holds. Once renounced, they are no longer FAs of the Lakers, and thus lose any Bird Rights or other advantages for being able to re-sign those FAs.

Thx Ricky and Tim, but I'm still confused (or is it dense?). Do you think the Lakers have already renounced the Kobe and Hibbert cap holds and sportrac just hasn't updated it yet, and that's why they were able to exclude those amounts from cap space?

longstrangetrip wrote:

60WinTim wrote:The team has to "renounce" cap holds they no longer want. So the Lakers, if they have not already done so, will renounce the Kobe and Hibbert cap holds. Once renounced, they are no longer FAs of the Lakers, and thus lose any Bird Rights or other advantages for being able to re-sign those FAs.

Thx Ricky and Tim, but I'm still confused (or is it dense?). Do you think the Lakers have already renounced the Kobe and Hibbert cap holds and sportrac just hasn't updated it yet, and that's why they were able to exclude those amounts from cap space?

LST, that's a good question and somebody else asked the same question, so I'll repost the conversation. https://www.reddit.com/r/lakers/comments/4qzdo5/salary_cap_question_why_not_immediately_renounce/Here's link.

Looking at Spotrac, we have a ton of cap holds for free agents (basically two huge ones in Kobe and Hibbert). Why doesn't the FO just renounce rights now since both are not returning to the Lakers?
Is there a benefit to holding off?

If I remember correctly, you're able to convert these large cap holds into exceptions as salary filler in trades.

Better question is why bother if you don't need to use that space right away? There's not much reason to not do it but there's also not much reason to do it and you can't take back renouncing rights so you might as well keep them until they are in your way.

There are many good reasons for hanging on to the cap holds. For one, as long as your salary is above the cap number, you also get the midlevel and bilevel exceptions. But if you go below the cap number, you lose those exceptions (and possibly any trade exceptions you have).

Also, what if Hibbert finds a team that is willing to do a sign and trade. You can do it as long as you still have his FA rights. But once renounced, that possibility goes away.

The Lakers will renounce whatever makes sense to renounce when it comes time to sign the dotted line on their new FA contracts.

I had heard of Sportrac, but I didn't realize they did this good of a job.

Are they still doing that thing with "Cap Holds" for guys that are waived and/or don't resign in the last CBA? It seems odd that Hummel would still be listed.