Tuesday Bolts – 7.16.13
The Picker of the Tulsa World asks if the NBA is bigger than college football: “As to the games themselves, one football loss can mean the end of a championship rush. Two losses and you’re headed for a basement bowl. A dozen or 20 basketball losses mean nothing. The Thunder has become severe competition for college football. But only if it keeps winning. So winning is everything. Who is more apt to keep winning, our college football teams or the Thunder? College football is still bigger here. But just barely.”
Kevin Pelton of ESPN Insider on the worst offseason moves: “Oklahoma City Thunder trade James Harden to Houston Rockets. OK, this move wasn’t this summer, but has any trade had a bigger impact over the past week? Sending Harden to Houston set up the Rockets to potentially emerge as Oklahoma City’s biggest rival in the Western Conference. Martin’s departure also leaves a major hole in the Thunder rotation that will be difficult to fill externally because the team is up against the luxury tax. Oklahoma City may have to rely on Jeremy Lamb, the centerpiece of the return for Harden, stepping into a much larger role after playing just 147 minutes as a rookie.”
Amin Elhassan of ESPN Insider on the best offseason moves: “Although Houston fell in six games, Garcia proved his value (not bad for a trade-deadline acquisition) as a 3-point shooter (38.6 3P% in regular season, 45.9 3P% in playoffs) with enough length and quickness to cover Kevin Durant.”
Steve Lackmeyer: “A couple of years ago it appeared as if the downtown housing market had hit a standstill. For-sale housing was certainly dead, and rental housing was being built at a pace just a fraction of what had been forecast a decade earlier. But if anyone needed a reminder that those days are over and the housing boom is back on again, look no further than the latest person to buy a downtown home — Thunder star Kevin Durant. What could have attracted the guy to downtown when he already had a home in the gated luxury Gaillardia neighborhood? Downtown is certainly alive with hip restaurants and an increasing number of retail shops.”
Berry Tramel says calls Mo Williams.
David Aldridge of NBA.com: “$82,957,437.25 — Estimated luxury tax, by my calculator, that the Nets will pay next season if they keep their current roster through next summer. Brooklyn currently has 12 guaranteed players under contract next season, totaling roughly $97.7 million (forward D.J. White, who was added to the big trade that brought Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Jason Terry to Brooklyn, is under contract for next season at a little more than $1 million next season, but his salary is non-guaranteed if he’s waived before Aug. 1). Add the minimum salaries for two non-guaranteed roster spots (Tornike Shengalia and Tyshawn Taylor), and the Nets’ current expenditures for salaries is — again, by my calculator, which could be wrong — about $101,267,400, which puts them approximately $29,519,400 above the luxury tax threshold announced last week for the 2013-14 season of $71.748 million. Based on the rising scale for each $5 million a team exceeds the tax threshold, Brooklyn’s current payroll would result in an unprecedented bill for Mikhail Prohkorov. Not that he seems to mind or care.”
