Quote:
Originally Posted by TimBone
Damn. Both Jaye Howard and Sean Smith would be huge hits. Do we have the space to sign Berry and one of these two, and then franchise the other?
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The answer, theoretically, is yes and you could sign all 3 to deals instead of using the tag. The tag wouldn't be a very appealing option as you'd further squeeze your ability to retain other key free agents, but cutting Colquitt, Fanaika, Davis, Thomas and so forth could get you another 4-5 million back. Cutting Grubbs after June 1st could free up a few million this year at the expense of next year.
Smith and Berry are easily 9.5 APY players. Howard, who knows really. Given recent contracts, 9.0 APY isn't an unrealistic expectation. You could potentially get 1st year hits in the 6-7 million range on each. Long-term cap ramifications would get interesting though.
Playing around with my spreadsheet for cap hits, I was able to give Smith, Howard, and Berry all identical deals with 1st year hits of 6.5 million. Also re-signed Branch at a first year hit of 2.4 million, D.J. at a first year hit of 3.5 million, Hali on a 1 year deal for 2.5 million, Zombo on a 1 year deal at vet min, and all 4 ERFAs (West, Williams, King, Sorensen) to vet mins and come out right on the cap. How realistic a couple of those deals will be is an unknown, especially DJ and Hali. If I had to pick one or the other to get done under the cap it'd be DJ at this point.
You'd be losing Allen, DeVito, Stephenson, Avant, Moses, Fleming, Abdullah (if you wanted to sub Abdullah for Branch go for it, horse a piece), and Daniel. Not huge losses in my book if you get those other guys done.
Like I said, the only worry is the long-term cap since these guys are going to escalate towards 10 million per cap hits relatively quickly. Houston has a huge contract and you have Poe and Fisher coming up to bat.