How Would You Rebuild the Suns?

[Flagrant Fowl]

Or maybe Vucevic is a guy the Suns are looking at to replace Ayton. He played under Vogel in Orlando.

[Superbone]

If we move Ayton to Dallas and get the #10 pick back, I definitely see James Jones trading it to Chicago for Alex Caruso.

And probably a good move.

[INFORMER]

If we move Ayton to Dallas and get the #10 pick back, I definitely see James Jones trading it to Chicago for Alex Caruso.

And probably a good move.

Ha!

[Split T]

Ok how about this:

Trade Ayton for Turner
Waive CP3 and re-sign at the minimum.
Trade Shamet for Bagley
Split the MLE between Divencenzo and Jalen McDaniels
Use BAE on Shake Milton

Pg: CP3, Payne
Sg: Booker, Milton
Sf: McDaniels, Divencenzo
Pf: KD, Bagley
C: Turner, Jock

[Flagrant Fowl]

I’m fine with a lot of that. I want nothing to do with Marvin Bagley. Maybe he’d be fine enough from Nov-March, but I can’t trust him in real games that matter.

Better off just avoiding that kind of guy all together.

[Split T]

I was just trying to add size and move Shamet…you could make the same trade for Alec Burks with Detroit. Then maybe spend the BAE on someone else other than Milton. Someone with size.

I did also kinda like the idea of rehabilitating Bagley. He’s talented and huge. But ya, he’s always hurt.

[JeremyG]

Ok how about this:

Trade Ayton for Turner
Waive CP3 and re-sign at the minimum.
Trade Shamet for Bagley
Split the MLE between Divencenzo and Jalen McDaniels
Use BAE on Shake Milton

Pg: CP3, Payne
Sg: Booker, Milton
Sf: McDaniels, Divencenzo
Pf: KD, Bagley
C: Turner, Jock

So downgrade Ayton just for the fun of it? I thought the whole point of trading Ayton was to “improve the depth of the roster”?

[Split T]

It frees up 12 million and allows us to use the full MLE which I split between 2 players. Then also the BAE. With Ayton you can maybe get 1 of those guys. So the trade(in addition to lowering CP3’s money) added 2 depth pieces.

And Turner was better last year than Ayton, so not really a downgrade for us. Maybe Ayton will play better for Indy, but I think Turner makes more sense. Better rim protector and better shooter. Played with Vogel in Indy as well.

[Mori Chu]

I'm sorry but these "waive and re-sign CP3 at the minimum" plans are total pipe dreams. There's just no way a guy comes back to a team on a minimum contract after the team just waived him. If your workplace fired you and then offered to re-hire you at minimum wage, for the good of the company/team, would you do it?

[Drewsprocket]

If Book and KD and Vogel think they can turn Ayton into 2021 Playoffs Ayton, I say fuck it let’s go and see who we can pick up on veteran friendly contracts to win a title. CP3 will be held onto for tradebait for anyone tryna move off $$.

[Drewsprocket]

Or maybe Vucevic is a guy the Suns are looking at to replace Ayton. He played under Vogel in Orlando.

Any deal with Chi-town has to include either Caruso or Derozen.

[Split T]

I'm sorry but these "waive and re-sign CP3 at the minimum" plans are total pipe dreams. There's just no way a guy comes back to a team on a minimum contract after the team just waived him. If your workplace fired you and then offered to re-hire you at minimum wage, for the good of the company/team, would you do it?

Ya that’s not even close to the same. He’s already guaranteed 15.8 million. And his minimum wage is still another 3 million dollars. He’s made 360 million dollars just from his basketball salaries in his career. The money might not be as important to him as it would be to us regular people.

It’s possible he may not be interested, but what’s his other options? No one is paying him big bucks in free agency. The only teams that can are rebuilding. Is that how he wants to finish his career? Or maybe he decides to play for a championship at a lower salary. Dirk did it for years in Dallas.

[JeremyG]

It frees up 12 million and allows us to use the full MLE which I split between 2 players. Then also the BAE. With Ayton you can maybe get 1 of those guys. So the trade(in addition to lowering CP3’s money) added 2 depth pieces.

Waiving CP3 gets you the full MLE. You don't have to trade Ayton for less salary.

And Turner was better last year than Ayton, so not really a downgrade for us. Maybe Ayton will play better for Indy, but I think Turner makes more sense. Better rim protector and better shooter. Played with Vogel in Indy as well.

You're going from 18/10 to 18/7.5. But that was a career year for Turner--it's more likely he regresses back to his career averages and that Ayton improves under a new coach. And if it's possible for a center to become great all the sudden in their 8th season, then why not keep Ayton?

I disagree that Turner had a better season. People are forgetting how good Ayton was for most of the season. After a slow start, from mid-November until March 1 (when KD played his first game as a Sun), Ayton averaged 20 and 11 on 60% FG.

[Split T]

Yes you can do it by waiving CP3 as well, but in my scenario I was keeping CP3.

Also Ayton didn’t play defense last year. That’s mostly where he took a major step back. Also his shooting numbers dipped across the board and he took less efficient shots.

Also I think it’s important to note that Turner got to finally play as a C this year. That’s key to why his numbers went up. No more Sabonis clogging up his space.

[JeremyG]

Yes you can do it by waiving CP3 as well, but in my scenario I was keeping CP3.

Keeping him only after waiving him:

Ok how about this:

Trade Ayton for Turner
Waive CP3 and re-sign at the minimum.
Trade Shamet for Bagley
Split the MLE between Divencenzo and Jalen McDaniels
Use BAE on Shake Milton

Pg: CP3, Payne
Sg: Booker, Milton
Sf: McDaniels, Divencenzo
Pf: KD, Bagley
C: Turner, Jock

[Split T]

Yes you can do it by waiving CP3 as well, but in my scenario I was keeping CP3.

Keeping him only after waiving him:

Ok how about this:

Trade Ayton for Turner
Waive CP3 and re-sign at the minimum.
Trade Shamet for Bagley
Split the MLE between Divencenzo and Jalen McDaniels
Use BAE on Shake Milton

Pg: CP3, Payne
Sg: Booker, Milton
Sf: McDaniels, Divencenzo
Pf: KD, Bagley
C: Turner, Jock

Ya you’d need to stretch him to open up enough space to use the MLE. And you can’t keep him if you stretch him.

[JeremyG]

Yes you can do it by waiving CP3 as well, but in my scenario I was keeping CP3.

Keeping him only after waiving him:

Ok how about this:

Trade Ayton for Turner
Waive CP3 and re-sign at the minimum.
Trade Shamet for Bagley
Split the MLE between Divencenzo and Jalen McDaniels
Use BAE on Shake Milton

Pg: CP3, Payne
Sg: Booker, Milton
Sf: McDaniels, Divencenzo
Pf: KD, Bagley
C: Turner, Jock

Ya you’d need to stretch him to open up enough space to use the MLE. And you can’t keep him if you stretch him.

If you waive him before June 28, he only counts for $15.8M against the cap. That gets you well under the tax threshold (first apron is the important number anyway).

[Split T]

Not enough to use the full MLE and fill out the roster and stay under the apron.

I guess you could do it by dumping Shamet for salary relief and waiving Payne. You could even waive and stretch Payne/Shamet and clear enough space.

No point in waiving CP3 and not stretching him though.

[JeremyG]

Not enough to use the full MLE and fill out the roster and stay under the apron.

I guess you could do it by dumping Shamet for salary relief and waiving Payne. You could even waive and stretch Payne/Shamet and clear enough space.

No point in waiving CP3 and not stretching him though.

I thought the point in not stretching him was because you wanted to re-sign him, in your original scenario?

I just ran the numbers and you wouldn't be able to use the BAE, but would likely be able to use the full MLE or very close to it, even with your Bagley trade, and still keep Paul at the vet min. It's difficult to know for sure before the official numbers are out, but I expect the apron to be north of $170M. If you don't trade Shamet for Bagley, or if you trade Shamet for equal or lesser salary, it's definitely doable. You don't have to stretch anyone.

So you're basically trading Ayton for Turner + BAE.

But I agree with Mori that re-signing Paul is very unrealistic anyway. If you waive/stretch him you have full access to the exceptions.

[Split T]

Hmm, I’d be curious to see your numbers. I can’t get it to work. And I thought the apron was 169 million:

KD: 47,654,833
Book: 36,016,200
Ayton: 32,459,438
CP3: 17,800,000
MLE: 12,200,000
Shamet: 10,250,000
Payne: 6,500,000
Ish: 1,997,238

That’s 164,877,709 and only 8 players. You can’t fit 7 more guys in the 5,000,000 left before the hard cap.

If you waive Payne(only 2,000,000 guaranteed) and replace him with a vet min guy, that puts you at 162,374,947 and gives you about 7 million for 7 guys. If you stretch the Payne contract it gives you another 1.2 million to work with and then if you fill the roster with rookie min contracts it’s doable. But we don’t want 7 rookies on the team.

It’s just not feasible without another cost cutting move.