Millsap: Now or never & forget other FA's.

a more modest 5 yr/ $32M. I believe Millsap would accept that since it would be a 600% pay raise. The question is would Utah actually match it. More than likely they will, but at least Presti would have gave it an honest try (without going crazy and overpaying someone).

let it go. If possible, make a trade for Camby or someone like that. Otherwise, try to develop who we have and draft a 5 next year.

Can’t Millsap sign for a 1 year tender? Can’t remember how much but I highly doubt he would do that. Anyone know what the number was?

But I think offer sheets for restricted free agents can’t be signed until July 8 so that would be why Presti is waiting. If an offer was made and verbally agreed upon between OKC and Millsap in the last week it could not be signed until the 8th and as a result Utah would know the figure and have an extra week to try and rearrange salaries or attempt to find another way to sign him so that is what was meant by waiting to give Utah less time.

With all of that being said I’m still against the signing of Millsap. I think Utah matches any “reasonable” offer made to him. While I agree that players like Mullens, Ibaka, and Hardin probably aren’t ready to see significant game action in the League yet I don’t think Millsap upgrades OKC’s roster that much. I think it is important to realize that OKC isn’t winning a championship this year and this year or at least first part of the year is a good time to evaluate some of the younger players on this roster. DJ White could basically be Millsap. A 2nd round pick who seems to score and rebound pretty efficiently. There are only so many minutes to be split between Green Collison White and potentially Millsap. I think you need to get a better look at Green and White before you can fully gauge which direction to go with the PF position. While I think he may be a slight upgrade I think the difference between a Green Collison White rotation and a Green Millsap Collison/White rotation may only be 2 or 3 wins and I don’t think that is worth spending precious cap space on a guy who is essentially taking away minutes from cheap young players already on the roster. Also after this year if Presti determines that White may never be a solid 1st big man off the bench or that Green’s ceiling is nothing more than a 6th man on a playoff team (probably the worst case scenario) then he has 2 likely lottery selections next year to upgrade to position.

seem to have been discussed and mulled over in substantial detail over the weeks. I am puzzled by your reiteration of how important 2nd team/bench players are in one sentence followed up with a notation on how picking up someone like Zaza is a bad thing because he’s basically a bench player?

I’m sure Durant/Green/Westbrook are not so much concerned about winning whatever X number of games Millsap will give you next year, but rather having a FUTURE of consistent, high calibre competitiveness into the playoffs. It’s the age old question of how much Millsap will help and how much he won’t — and what the cost happens to be. If he can be brought in for relatively cheap, then do it (or put the offer forth). If not, then this is a moot discussion and pointless. It is more meaningful to save that money and apply it towards an amalgamation of cheaper, albeit useful, pieces OR turn it towards dynamic surefire dynamite starters. If you’re going to overpay, it should be for someone that you won’t feel stupid overpaying in a few years.

Millsap’s camp initially was seeking a multiyear deal starting at $10 million or more, but there were no known takers when the negotiating period opened and no known offers as of Tuesday night. That leaves a few possibilities, including accepting the Jazz’s $1.03 million qualifying offer for next season and becoming an unrestricted free agent when many teams have more money in 2010, playing for midlevel exception money (a multiyear starting at $5.854 million) or accepting an offer from the Jazz that perhaps would start in the $6 million range.

This would seem to make the 5/35 number much more realistic. If we give him 7.5 in year 1 and then 8% decreases that are allowed by the CBA then he would total out at 5/35.1, problem is that is slightly higher than the MLE. so based on where the MLE is 5/33.8 i believe anyone can offer a similar kind of package and if i was utah i would probably pay the toll of the tax for a year and keep him.