Hedo/Hedon't: What It Means To The Mavs

   Because we are selfishly Mavs-centric, we really don’t care whether Hedo Turkoglu’s wife likes Toronto better than Portland, or whether Hedo got his nose bent out of shape or whether the Blazers got Turkoscrewed by Hedo/Hedon’t.

   We only care about what Turkaglu’s last-second decision to leave Portland at the altar to instead marry Toronto means to this  stories’ other bridesmaids. … like Dallas.

   Six issues raised by the Hedo story that involve some exploration of names like Shawn Marion and Anthony Parker:

  ISSUE 2. That means Toronto will have to renounce all their free agents in order to sign him. Bosh and Turk and … who’s on the outs?

    ISSUE 3. Well, it throws Shawn Marion (and other Raptors) back into the pool. And he vaults to the FA spot vacated by yesterday’s Hedo/Artest/Ariza headlines.

    ISSUE 4. So is Marion going to end up going to some team for the MLE or less? He had been negotiating in good faith to return to Toronto, because the Raptors though they’d lost a shot at Hedo. Suddenly, it sure looks like Marion is going to be on the street.

    ISSUE 5. Another intriguing guy on the Toronto outs: What about Anthony Parker to Dallas for the BAE? Marion remains a star-caliber NBA force, Parker would be a starting 2-guard. … but in this market, we say no way is anybody giving him the full MLE or anything close to it. We can keep going. … Carlos Delfino will help somebody … Point being, there are bargains to be had for the right bidder and the right suitor.

     ISSUE 6. Who will Portland now target with their cap room? The Blazers are still in charge of their own FA destiny; they still get first pick of the prizes on the shelf. Maybe they (or OKC) go after Marion. (In theory, maybe they phone Jason Kidd?) But as we keep saying, there are more prizes than there are bidders.

    And the Hedo-to-Toronto move just added two more prizes to the shelf.

   So where do the Mavs go from here with this?

  On the day they sign Turkoglu, the Raptors will "renounce" Marion, Parker, and Delfino and give Hedo a deal using all their resulting cap space. So what will become of those three? Can the Mavs get in on the action? Could they use The Stack Chip here to get Marion, for example?

The Mavs have already committed their MLE to Gortat. If they want any of these Toronto fish being thrown back into the pool, they'll have to persuade that fish to accept their BAE (worth $1.99M) or a minimum salary offer.

How about if Toronto does a 3-way Sign-and-Trade to keep some flexibility on the others, with the core of it being Toronto getting Turkoglu, Orlando getting Bass, and Dallas getting Gortat? All three of those players in such a 3-way will carry Base Year restrictions, making such a deal essentially impossible.

Then how about using The Stack Chip? Couldn't they do a Stack-for-Marion deal? Not really.

When Toronto renounces those players, they will void all rights (including Bird rights) they had on them, which would otherwise have given them an exception to the salary cap limits to re-sign them. So once they sign Turkoglu, they'll have no cap room (and no exceptions to the cap) to do the "sign" part of any Sign-and-Trade on those three (including sending one to Dallas for Stackhouse).

Is there a way around the problem? Technically, yes - but it isn't worth pursuing. It would begin with the Raps delaying the signing of Turkoglu and the corresponding renouncing of rights, and then doing a Sign-and-Trade first. But in order to have enough room afterwards to pay Turkoglu, it would have to be a swap where Toronto ended up netting zero additional salary on their cap. Since Stack will have a $2M buyout and cap charge, that means the Mavs would have to take back at least $2M in junk salary already on the Raps' payroll to make the net result zero. In theory, that could be done if Dallas gave Marion $7.6+M the first year and used the "25% + $100K"  cushion to take back another $2+M in salary.

But is having Marion worth at least $7.6M in salary plus another $2M in junk on the Mavs' roster? We doubt it.

And stepping back from the Stack-for-Marion idea, how is Marion-plus-junk the "All-Star-or-Bust'' payoff Mark Cuban has said he expects in order to use that lauded Stack Chip?

Unless the BAE will buy something of value here, expect the Mavs to look elsewhere.