[Editor's Note: Beckley Mason has contributed to Wizards player previews on TAI, this is his first piece. You can read more about him here. - Kyle]
In late-September when Wizards owner Ted Leonsis spoke publicly about the NBA owners’ position heading into the 2011 CBA agreement, he quickly learned that David Stern will not accept anyone breaking the company line in the form of a 100 Grand — a fine, not the candy bar. As owner of the Washington Capitals, Leonsis has come to appreciate the benefits of the NHL’s hard salary cap rules.
“In a salary-cap era — and soon a hard salary cap in the NBA like it is in the NHL — if everyone can pay the same amount to the same amount of players, it’s the small nuanced differences that matter,” Leonsis told the press at a breakfast reception he hosted for the business community in Northern Virginia.
The wisdom of that statement has been widely debated around the internet. Notably, ESPN’s J.A. Adande and CBS Sports’ Tim Berger have pointed out some flaws in the hard cap pipe dream.
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Soon it will be official. The Wizards will have used up a decent chunk of their cap space by acquiring Yi Jianlian, 17th pick Kevin Seraphin, Kirk Hinrich and $6 million cash in exchange for Quinton Ross and a future second round pick.
If you’re looking at talent alone, Ernie Grunfeld got one over. But that’s not enough for some people. Those future-thinking couch GMs are concerned about the Summer of 2011, as Hinrich is owed $9 million in 2010-11 and $8 million in 2011-12.
Others feel the Wizards did okay, but failed because they didn’t do ‘enough’ — Daequan Cook had a 39.9% effective field-goal percentage last season for crying out loud, but he would’ve been damn special on the Wizards, right? … at a much cheaper price, I get it. I’m sure Mo Peterson would have been splendid as well.
And some are frustrated that cap space has been spent on basketball ne’er do wells instead of trying to get Boozer or Amar’e or Bosh or Johnson or any other unrealistic free-agent. None of those big names are worth paying before the foundation gets stronger (and the Wizards aren’t desperate or lacking players like the Knicks).
You can’t have it all ways. Grunfeld went after low-risk, high-reward talent that still allows for flexibility and perhaps some competitiveness. It’s actually not a terrible plan.
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