Blount close to signing deal with Nuggets

Marc J. Spears of the Denver Post reports that the Nuggets are close to another signing. After finalizing the Calbert Cheaney signing on Monday, they are expected to sign Boston free agent center Mark Blount to a one-year contract.

Although Blount is a restricted free agent, the Celtics are expected to allow him to sign with the Nuggets. The recent acquisitions of Vin Baker and Bruno Sundov by Boston may have made Blount expendable.

"We're close," said Nuggets assistant general manager David Fredman, whose team brought Blount in for a workout two weeks ago. "There are still some things that need to be done. He's still another team's property."

Counting guaranteed contracts and players expected to be on the roster, the addition of Blount could push Denver's roster to 14. That excludes free-agent guard Voshon Lenard and forward-center Zendon Hamilton. An NBA roster can include 12 active players and three on the injured list.

Denver is considering keeping center Francisco Elson, a 1999 second-round draft pick, and rookie guard Junior Harrington, who recently signed a contract contingent on him making the team. Newly acquired point guard Mark Jackson could be on the roster, traded or bought out of his contract; swingman James Posey has been involved in many trade rumors.

"There are more moves to come," Fredman said.

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Denver Nuggets, Boston Celtics

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Taxing squad of three

Peter May of the Boston Globe tells us that “as of now, three names stand out as the early front-line casualties of the NBA's New Economy”. When all is said and done, Rodney Rogers, Keon Clark and Matt Harpring will have probably been let go by teams that held their rights simply because of the luxury tax.

May concedes that all three will find work in the NBA this year and all three will be paid more than the minimum. But all three represent different ways in which the apparently sure-to-come luxury tax has forced owners and management to retool, rethink, and reconfigure on the fly.

The Celtics offered Rogers a pay cut. Not because they were disappointed in his play, but simply because they decided they could only afford to pay him $1 million. May explains, “The Celtics knew two things: Rogers could not accept their offer and he would not accept their offer. Without a luxury tax, he would have quickly re-signed and Vin Baker would still be in Seattle. But the Baker trade enabled the Celtics to jettison $15 million in salaries for this season while taking on $14 million. That's Paul Gaston's kind of math.”

So Rogers, arguably the fourth-best player on the team, is now shopping and, if he hasn't signed anywhere by September, maybe that $1 million won't look so bad.

Clark and Harpring fall into a slightly different category of tax casualty. Both players were restricted free agents when their team’s tendered the required qualifying offer. As a restricted free agent, the team reserves the right to match other team’s offers and keep the player. This is a gread advantage to the current team in keeping a talented free agent from signing elsewhere.

Both Clark and Harpring are talented. Clark played 81 games for the Raptors and was fifth on the team in scoring, second in rebounding, and first in blocked shots. In any other market, he would have been resigned already. May writes, “Toronto general manager Glen Grunwald said his team wanted to make a fair offer to Clark, but ''fair'' in Grunwald's book has a different meaning than ''fair'' in Clark's book. Had Grunwald not signed Michael Stewart and Hakeem Olajuwon to silly, pre-luxury tax contracts, there'd be money to keep Clark. But now Clark is available to the highest bidder and, theoretically, should get something greater than $2.5 million. The Raptors may have something left over to sign a lesser player, maybe someone like ... Harpring.”

On Harpring, May writes that he "merely started 81 games for the 76ers and was one of the few to make it through the season without some debilitating injury. ''But, with the luxury tax,'' Sixers GM Billy King said, ''it's a different ballgame out there. No one talks about the salary cap anymore. It's all luxury tax.''

According to May, King said Friday that he's taken countless calls from agents begging him to sign their player to the veteran minimum. That's one reason he pulled the plug on the Harpring tender. The other was that if it had been signed, King could not have traded Harpring for a year and Harpring would have been an unrestricted free agent this time next year.

The Sixers already have spent around half of their $4.5 million exception on Dallas free agent Greg Buckner. The other half, or some portion of it, may be offered to Rogers. (King said there was nothing going on with Rogers.) Given the way the summer has gone, Rogers should think long and hard about any offer, even if it's a big dropoff from the $2.6 million he made last year. Given the way things are going, with teams trimming payrolls and rosters, the next offer might be the best one because it also might be the only one.

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Boston Celtics, Toronto Raptors, Philadelphia 76ers

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For what it's worth, price may be right

Peter May of the Boston Globe sounds off on yesterday’s Sonics/Celtics trade, “Isn't it interesting how basketball economics work these days? An owner won't dare spend $3 million to bring back someone who has had a demonstrable and positive impact on his team. But he will turn around and agree to take on more than $50 million owed to someone who, to be charitable, has been a classic underachiever the last four years.”

The Celtics played hardball with Rodney Rogers, whose play off the bench was one of the factors to propel them to the Conference Finals last season. But they open the checkbook for perennial underachiever Vin Baker. This, May explains, is one of the mysteries of the luxury tax. Rogers, re-signed at $3 million would cost more than Baker, making more than $12 million.

While losing Rogers is not a good thing, making a deal to try and replace his production, is. The Celtics recognized that they couldn’t bring Rogers back, but rather than let him go with nothing in return, they traded for some help in the middle. And, if you look at it as a 2-for-1 trade, Baker and Shammond Williams for Kenny Anderson, it doesn’t seem so bad.

Anderson wasn’t the only Celtic traded away, but he was the only one who was important to the team’s success. Joe Forte never played and Vitaly Potapenko missed the playoffs with an injury, but the Celtics never missed him. Williams wan a key factor in the C’s success last season and they have no one to adequately replace him.

So be prepared for the following statement: ''A lot of our offense runs through Antoine [Walker] anyway.'' That will be the party line to minimize the loss.

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Boston Celtics, Oklahoma City

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