With this trade, they actually added another $1M to their payroll which makes it around $63M which is $7M under the luxury tax. The good news is that they have their "non-taxpayer" exception worth $5M to get a free agent. Since they own the rights to McGuire, they could also resign him as well assuming he signs cheap, but I'm not sure they'd want to with Jefferson on the roster.

With Hickson signing in Portland, the next guy I would look at is Yi Jianlian. I still like this kid and still thinks he can produce. He earned $900K last year, so signing him would be pretty cheap. I'd offer him about $800K for 2 years and see what he can do. Athletic 7 footers than can handle the ball and shoot like Yi are still rare. I remember before he was drafted, hie wanted to be in either NY or GS because of the large Chinese community. Maybe being in a place where the wants to be could help turn his career around. For under $1M, he could be worth a shot and for the FO and PR dept, he could fill the seats.

They could then use the rest of the exception on a guy like OJ Mayo. I know there are split feelings about this guy, but he's 24 years old and would be a nice 6th man.

PG Stephen Curry - Jarrett Jack - Charles Jenkins
SG Klay Thompson - OJ Mayo
SF Harrison Barnes - Brandon Rush - Richard Jefferson
PF David Lee - Yi Jianlian - Draymond Green
C Andrew Bogut - Jeremy Tyler - Andris Biedrins - Festus Ezeli

r they looking to sign mcguire?

There's no word on McGuire yet. I hope they do though.

They've already been quoted saying they'll match any offer from Brandon Rush; dunno what some of you guys are trippin about...

I believe they'll try their luck at Sheldon Williams, Anthony Randolph, or other more beefy options at backup 4, before inevitably falling back on McGuire; who should have been their guy all along.

The Jamison rumor isn't dying either... are they serious??

AR would be alright I think, but he isn't beefy at all, though he rebounds and blocks shots at a pretty good rate. McGuire would be better as backup SF before RJ I think.

32 wrote:They've already been quoted saying they'll match any offer from Brandon Rush; dunno what some of you guys are trippin about...

If they plan to sign a free agent using their $5M exception, then they can't match any offer Rush gets without going over the luxury tax which is something Lacob was adamant about not doing. Say they use their entire exception for a guy like Landry and it will take all of it to even have a chance at him, that means they'll be $2.5M under the threshold. That means they could only match offers up to $6.5M for Brandon Rush. If a team comes in and offers Rush $7.5M a year, they won't match as that would put them over the luxury tax.

BayAreaHoopz wrote:

32 wrote:They've already been quoted saying they'll match any offer from Brandon Rush; dunno what some of you guys are trippin about...

If they plan to sign a free agent using their $5M exception, then they can't match any offer Rush gets without going over the luxury tax which is something Lacob was adamant about not doing. Say they use their entire exception for a guy like Landry and it will take all of it to even have a chance at him, that means they'll be $2.5M under the threshold. That means they could only match offers up to $6.5M for Brandon Rush. If a team comes in and offers Rush $7.5M a year, they won't match as that would put them over the luxury tax.

Really? Where'd you hear that?

The most recent time I heard Lacob discuss the luxury tax, he said he was willing to go over:

Lacob told both Steinmetz and Kawakami that he'd be willing to go over the luxury tax, something he said before the season that the Warriors probably would not want to do. However, with the collective bargaining agreement expiring after this season, Lacob may feel comfortable making this claim because there may be no luxury tax when the new CBA goes into place.

http://mobile.bayarea.sbnation.com/gold ... -in-review

Granted, that was from 2011, before the new CBA, but did you read something somewhere where Joe Lacob said he wouldn't go into the luxury tax? Because thus far, I'd heard them promise to retain Rush - publically. And if Lacob has no qualms about a little LT, that doesn't seem like an unreasonable price for a potential 6MoY on a quality team. But, again, if you saw something that says otherwise, I've been wrong before.