Scout.com: Mavs Activate Odom Talk; Lakers Deal Do-Able
- From: LA Lakers <nobody@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 8 Jun 2012 03:54:17 +0000 (UTC)
[posted and mailed]
Scout.com: Mavs Activate Odom Talk; Lakers Deal Do-Able
http://mavericks.scout.com/2/1193046.html#.T9FnLSkYmM4.twitter
Conventional wisdom says the Mavs can't trade Lamar Odom back to the
Lakers in expedient fashion. But we've discovered a loophole. Involved is
negotiating with Odom for a revised deadline date - and sources tell
DB.com that the Mavs have initiated talks to do just that. Here's the
inside story of what's up - and what can happen as the Mavs work to turn
Odom into a perfect-fit trade asset:
What will happen with Lamar Odom? The Dallas Mavericks don't want him
back. He loves LA and Lakers coach Mike Brown has recently expressed
interest in having him back. Yet it seems rules are in the way right now
to make it easy for the Mavs to move him, or for him to play for the
Lakers.
But DallasBasketball.com has exclusively learned that the possibilities
and his destination may change significantly, and that the cogs are in
motion so that the change may come soon.
On Wednesday the LA Times' Mike Bresnahan and Mark Medina wrote the
following:
As for Odom, the NBA is standing firm on the relatively new rule that
players cannot return to their old teams for a full year after being
traded, a change made in the new collective-bargaining agreement last
December.
Players formerly had to wait one month before rejoining teams that traded
them, sometimes negotiating quick buyouts from their new team to go back
to their old one, a scheme the NBA thwarted by creating the revision in
December.
(Odom) was traded to Dallas on Dec. 11 for a first-round pick that the
Lakers subsequently sent to Houston in the Derek Fisher trade.
Odom would have to miss about six weeks of the season if he waited to
join the Lakers in December, an unlikely event according to a person
familiar with the situation.
The Lakers could offer Odom the $3-million mini mid-level exception next
season or $1.4 million, the veteran's minimum for a player with his
experience.
All of that is true at the moment -- as Bresnahan and Medina noted, Odom
(as a multi-year contract player) can't be waived by Dallas and signed by
LA until December. But ....
Dallasbasketball.com has learned that the Mavs are working on taking a
significant step that would allow Odom's return to the Lakers this
summer, opening up multiple avenues.
A highly-placed league insider tells us the Mavs are already pursuing a
revision to Odom's contract that would move his deadline to buy out his
last year at $2.4 million from June 29, 2012 to some time in July, a
contractual change that is permitted by the league with mutual agreement
from both player and team.
That would make a major difference in Odom's future possibilities,
especially as it pertains to the Lakers.
The primary difference that revision permits is to open up a trade of
Odom from Dallas to LA, which is not only his simplest route to the
Lakers, but in many ways is the best choice for all parties involved.
That option is currently blocked by the rule that disallows a player to
be traded back to the same team in the same NBA season (which ends June
30), and the Mavs would not want to keep him past the June 29 deadline
and take the chance of being committed to his $8.2 million salary for
next season.
Would Dallas and LA shy away from helping each other? Probably not. At
the moment their path to the top isn't blocked by each other, but by OKC
and SA, and all they are worried about is helping their own cause in
finding a way to pass the Thunder and the Spurs.
Is there a reason for Odom and agent Schwartz to turn down Dallas?
proposal? We don?t think so. One, Jeff Schwartz (who also reps Deron
Williams and Jason Kidd) has a solid relationship with the Mavs. And two,
Odom might want to explore free agency if he thinks he can make more than
his $8.2 million. But the market (and his performance in Dallas) wouldn?t
seem to merit such a raise. Remember, too: Even if the Lakers consider
him worth more than $8.2 mil, all they have available is the
aforementioned $3 million mini-MLE.
This trick is the way for Odom to get his team and his money.
For Dallas, that change opens the door to an eager taker for a player
they no longer want. They wouldn't have to pay his $2.4 million buyout
fee or bribe some other team to do so, because there would be no buyout.
And by moving the time frame to July, a trade to LA could become part of
the salary-matching for the Mavs in a three-way deal. (Think of Marion
coming to Dallas for Stackhouse's similar contract, or Chandler to Dallas
for Dampier.)
July 1 begins a very active free agency environment. For Dallas that time
focuses on Deron Williams. But the transformation of Odom's contract into
an asset (in another form, as just an expiring, we?ve termed it, ?LOAF??)
suddenly ranks high in importance, too.
For the Lakers, they would get Odom for a full season including training
camp, giving him plenty of time to learn the new system under Mike Brown,
a coach he's never played for. In addition, it would allow LA the ability
to preserve their MLE for a different addition.
And for Odom, he gets to the team he wants, and he plays there for $8.2
million rather than $3 million or less.
Everybody wins.
There are other ways this deadline revision could help Odom get to the
Lakers. But even if LA doesn't trade for him, a revision makes it much
easier for the Mavs to trade him, with his large almost-vanishing
contract becoming a huge trade-matching tool. Even if he gets traded to
another team besides LA and then waived, the one-year rule would no
longer prevent him from going to the Lakers, as the restriction from
returning after a trade-and-waiver would then be applied to Dallas rather
than LA.
Odom seemingly has to wait until December if he wants to go to the
Lakers, and has to play there for peanuts? The Mavs have Odom as a
liability rather than an asset? The Lakers can't get Odom until December
and have to use their MLE to do so? Those may have been true yesterday,
but the Mavs are already working to erase all of those and change the
summer landscape significantly for everyone.
.
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