The minimum first year rookie salary is roughly $450K ….. Had the Wizards drafted Blair, they could have offered him a 1-year contract starting at $457,588 (with two team option years)

Davis has played 3 years in the League, so his minimum salary THIS YEAR is $825,497 (or roughly what DeJuan would have cost the Wizards in salary and tax THIS YEAR)….

San Antonio wanted to tie up Blair for 3 or more years… Hence they were willing to pay him more for a 2-year GUARANTEED contract… with two team option years To get those extra years, Blair’s agent negotiated a larger starting salary – but that doesn’t mean that the Wizards would have done the same thing. You assume they would have paid Blair $850K, just because the Spurs did…. The Wizards have shown in the past that they normally sign their 2nd round picks to a 1-year contract , with 2 Team options at the rookie minimum scale, or $457K. That’s what they gave Dominic McGuire – That’s what they paid Andray Blatche – and I assume that’s what they would have done with Blair.

And yes, perhaps I should have said they could have had Blair for the same CONTRACT as Davis ….

The whole point of this post was to compare the relative production of the two “assets” the Wizards and Spurs got from their transactions. The Wizards used their 2nd round pick to get a stack of cash. ($2.5 Million). The Spurs drafted the best College rebounder to come out in the last 20 years.

I don’t think I’m twisting facts…. As a fan, what would you rather have on the team right now? A low post power player that is a beast on the boards – a player that has a proven NBA skill ? OR, a stack of cash, sitting in Abe’s pocket?

We couldn’t have signed Oberto if we didn’t have the cash to cover the luxury tax hit.

Why not? Why couldn’t the Wizards sign Blair AND then go out and sign Oberto? Nothing in the salary cap or Luxury Tax regulations against it. Everyone keeps telling me that the cash we got for the 32nd pick was used to get Oberto….. I already know that….
I HEREBY ACKNOWLEDGE THAT I UNDERSTAND THE WIZARDS USED THE 2.5 MILLION THEY GOT FOR THE PICK TO SIGN OBERTO…… (all caps so that everyone will stop giving me the same argument)

But why didn’t the Wizards just say screw the cash, let’s draft Blair …… AND sign Oberto… ?
Because we don’t have Mark Cuban, Jerry Buss, Dan Gilbert, or Peter Holt as the owner.
Because the Wizards are operating under a budget; even if that budget allows them to go X amount over the lux tax…. it’s STILL a restriction
Because, despite what Ernie Grunfeld says, the Wizards (unlike some elite teams in the League) make some decisions based on financial rather than basketball reasons.

It would have cost them an additional $3.4 Million dollars this year to sign both Oberto and Blair (4.3% of the Wizards overall salary for 2009-2010) – That includes the $2.5 Million…. and Blair’s salary…. and Oberto’s salary…. and the tax hits for both…

The Lakers are far over the Luxury Tax… as are the Celtics, Dallas Mavericks, Cleveland Cavaliers, Boston Celtics, Orlando Magic, and the Utah Jazz….. Five of those teams have a legitimate shot at winning the Championship this year. It just so happens, those same five teams (Celtics, Cavs, Magic, Lakers and Spurs) are also listed by Las Vegas odds-makers as the favorites to win the NBA Championship. Did any of them sell their draft picks for cash?

The Cavaliers, Celtics, Spurs, Lakers and Magic managed to add quality players to their teams without stubbing their toes on the nickles and dimes….

DeJuan Blair’s contribution: Great first game, pretty sloppy second game, decent third game. Decent +/- Seems like any other talented rookie. He’ll have ups and downs. He’ll have some really good games and some really bad games.

I’ve watched all three of the San Antonio games so far this year. When Blair comes in, the energy goes through the roof. Sure, he makes mistakes… He turns the ball over too much, the result of being a Rookie in the NBA… He’s a terrible Free Throw shooter…. And he has some bad habits on defense, but he’s not terrible there (like Nick Young was his Rookie year)… {SMALL SAMPLE SIZE WARNING} but he’s averaging 16.1 ppg per 40 minutes, and 16.1 rpg per 40… Even when he has a poor scoring night, like on Saturday when he only scored 5 points – those points came in transition (like his steal and layup in the 3rd quarter) or on Offensive rebounds and put backs or Foul Shots. He’s not using SA’s regular possessions (17% usage rate)… he’s got a tremendous 24% rebound rate (Dwight Howard was 21.8% last year) and his PER is 19.1 – easily the best of the Rookie class so far.

 and he picks up the crowd when he comes in… Remember, this is not a bottom dwelling organization. This is a first class team used to Winning with a capital W. Popovich seems to think Blair can help his “Championship” caliber team – he’s giving the Rookie 20 minutes a night…

And if, by the end of the year, his knees are injured, will you fault the cash for never having knees in the first place, or will that be a check mark in the cash’s column?

That would be a check mark in the stack of cash column….

On the other hand, if Blair makes it to the Rookie game at the All-Star break, will you put a check mark by his name and acknowledge that the Wizards made a financial decision (rather than a basketball decision) by selling the 34th pick?

It seems fairly obvious to me that the Wizards are operating under some kind of budget and that they found a way to sign a vet player on the front line by selling their 2nd round pick. I think an intelligent discussion can be had about whether they made the right choice by acquiring Oberto and I think a rational argument can be made either way. Personally I think they made the right choice given their obvious desire to maintain roster and salary flexibility.

You seem fairly determined to go with your ‘pile-of-cash’ thing so I won’t try to dissuade you.