Richard Jefferson Opts Out

[Lamrock]

http://basketball.realgm.com/src_wireta ... _contract/

Add Richard Jefferson to the list of free agents, likely in the washed-up tier with the likes of Shaq, Jermaine and T-Mac. Baffling decision considering his piss-poor play last season, but great news for the Spurs. He may just get lucky and sign a large deal with a mis-managed team like the Wizards.

[J@3]

Lol @ Jefferson

[Andrew]

Memo to PaxMan: please do not bring him to Chicago. Certainly not for anything like his previous salary, at any rate.

[Static]

there's always the option that jefferson might resign with the nets, who have a lot of cap room and not a lot of interested players to fill it up.

[Sauru]

what a stupid fucking thing to do. why would he opt out with all the major free agents out there? does he think anyone will offer him a better deal? i will take him for league min on the celts

[Axel The Great]

If he goes to any team, he'd better hope that there's a Jason Kidd-like player to throw oops to him.

[Andrew]

what a stupid fucking thing to do. why would he opt out with all the major free agents out there? does he think anyone will offer him a better deal? i will take him for league min on the celts

I guess he wants a new deal before the possible lockout next season the same as everyone else, but I agree, he's going to have to rely on a team getting really desperate if he wants another big payday.

[The X]

I laughed when I saw this. This is one of most ill-advised decisions I have ever seen. Great news for Spurs. Funny how the Spurs always seem to come out of most personnel decisions smiling

[|)e8*]

Good decision RJ, you just helped the Spurs

[IcemanOutlaw]

he just wants to be a part of the Free Agents of nba history.

[Static]

yeah but he's putting $15.8mil on the table that he's probably not getting back. the lockout is probably part of the motive for it, but still, he gave up a lot more than he's likely to receive in a new contract.

[Sauru]

what happens to player salaries if they do lock out? do they still get paid or what happens? seems like alot of money to risk when there might not even be a 11/12 season

[Static]

well in the immediate future, the players union has advised nba players to negotiate favorable payment schedules over the next year and a half to two years, in order to make sure that they hold out okay throughout the lockout. more relevant though is that owners are complaining that player salaries have grown too quickly over the last decade and outpaced incoming revenue growth, and so league executives will likely be seeking to make cap rules more stringent during the upcoming bargaining process.

[Sauru]

i would love to see a hard cap in the nba myself. drive player salaries down too. so many players not really doing a damn thing making huge sums of money

[Axel The Great]

Like Rashard Lewis, choking against Boston in the ECF? There's others too, there's too many to name though.

[Andrew]

i would love to see a hard cap in the nba myself. drive player salaries down too. so many players not really doing a damn thing making huge sums of money

I don't think a hard cap is really feasible at this point. I don't think we can fairly place all the blame on the players for wanting their fair share of the revenue and maximising their earnings either; it's the same as any other vocation, except the dollar amounts are significantly higher of course. The people signing the cheques and making the personnel decisions also have to share that responsibility.

[Sauru]

oh i dont blame the players at all. if the players can get 100 mil a year for a 6th man then by all means they should. the fault has to land on the owners for allowing it to get so bad

[The X]

Given the crazy free agency market, Jefferson might actually get closer to his foregone salary now any of us could've expected

[NovU]

Any explanations on opting out from Richard Jefferson? Just curious...

[Andrew]

Most likely the long term security of a multi-year deal before the lockout, but possibly more money and/or shots.

[Martti.]

Says he prefers the Knicks and the Nets. I think he could go back to the Nets, because the Knicks already have Gallinari and Chandler. Even more chance if the Nets don't land LeBron.

[Sauru]

he probably thinks he can make it up in the long run and actually see more court time

[Jeffx]

oh i dont blame the players at all. if the players can get 100 mil a year for a 6th man then by all means they should. the fault has to land on the owners for allowing it to get so bad

Exactly. If someone's willing to pay you outrageous loot, you're not turning it down.

[Static]

Says he prefers the Knicks and the Nets. I think he could go back to the Nets, because the Knicks already have Gallinari and Chandler. Even more chance if the Nets don't land LeBron.

I would've preferred for the Nets to have a more athletic wing like Rudy Gay or Paul Pierce, but now that those two are off the market, Jefferson at a reasonable price might not be such a bad arrangement. He was decent when he played in New Jersey for the first part of his career.

[Andrew]

So long as they don't go crazy and pay him like they would LeBron or another top tier free agent, it needn't be a terrible move by the Nets if all else falls through. At this stage, I doubt he's anyone's priority though.