The Los Angeles Lakers spent a lot of money last season and ended up with a team that barely made the playoffs and then lost in the first round. Now they have lost star centre Dwight Howard to the Houston Rockets via free agency. With Kobe Bryant attempting a return from a ruptured achilles, things don’t look good for the Lakers. The team needs a serious rebuild, and with that in mind, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to overpay an underperforming player, especially when his contract puts the Lakers heavily into the luxury tax threshold.
According to Kevin Ding of the Orange County Register, who tweeted the following:
“Sweet a guy as he is,
@MettaWorldPeace will be waived via amnesty by Lakers to save about $30 million, barring some late change.”
Metta World Peace (formerly Ron Artest), carries a contract worth over $7.7 million per season. With the NBA’s heavy luxury tax system and taxing contracts over the threshold anywhere from $1.4 to 1 ratio all the way up to $4.25 to 1 ratio for repeat offenders, and the luxury tax levels still needing to be set for 2013-14, its impossible to know how much exactly the Lakers will save on this deal. However, its not inconcievable that an amnesty buyout of MWP could save the Lakers up to $30 million as Ding estimates when the luxury tax implications are taken into account.
MWP averaged 12.4 points, 5.0 Rebounds, and 1.4 blocks for the Lakers last season. He famously predicted that the 2012-13 Lakers would go 73-9 setting an NBA wins record, showing that at 33 years old, his prognostication skills are declining quicker than his basketball skills.
Earlier in the day, the Lakers signed Centre Chris Kaman to a one year deal to fill in for Howard at the centre position. Its certainly a huge downgrade from what they had last season.
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