Last Friday the Spurs sent my man Luis Scola from Argentina, along with dead weight Jackie Butler, to the Rockets for the rights to Vassilis Spanoulis, who we are going to go out on a limb and assume is Greek.   We wrote a post about it upon reading this Tom Ziller post on it, but it got eaten by the blog.  So this is definitely a little late.

First off, this is a steal for the Rockets.  They get the best big man not in the NBA right now (Roy Hibbert might be #2), a proven baller.  Luis Scola played a huge role in the 2004 Olympics, leading Argentina to the gold medal.  He had a 10-11 FGA, 25 point, 11 rebound game in the final.  He's got a solid post game, though he's not a first option.  On the Rockets he won't have to be, though, not with Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady.

The Spurs basically gave him away to get rid of Jackie Butler's contract, which still has a few years left on it.  It was a bad signing, as Jackie Butler came to the Spurs out of shape and sat on the bench most of the year.  The reason for the trade, we argued, was for the Spurs to get under the luxury cap number.  The luxury cap threshold this year is $67.9 million; after making this trade, the Spurs' cap number is $67.65 million.  Pretty simple, right?  They get rid of a terrible contract - the Spurs are great at dumping mistakes immediately - and get under the luxury cap, too.  

Only one problem - in doing so they enhanced what has to be their biggest rival.  Aside from the fact that Houston is San Antonio's geographic competition, the Rockets were a team I felt could have competed last year.  The problem, as we argued in the comments over at Free Darko, was that the duo of Yao and T-Mac are good for 55 points, but who was going to chime in and get the other 30 points need to score the 85 points we figured they needed to win?  The rest of the team lacked a decent third option, much less depth.

Now take a look at that Rocket team. The starting point guard last year, Rafer Alston, is best coming off the bench and nailing threes; this season they add Mike James via trade, and we have a feeling he'll do well in new coach Rick Adelman's system.  Shane Battier is a glue guy, the kind every legit contender needs.  And Luis Scola gives them another option, a post guy who can do a little bit of damage.

It should be noted that Scola plays poor defense... no worries, though.  Yao has his back.  Mike James is a solid defender, too, and Battier makes the Rockets a tough team to score on (hence the 85 point goal from last season).  

The Spurs strengthened a key rival just to save a few bucks in the luxury tax (and, admittedly, to get rid of a long contract that sucked... we wish Isiah had done that with Jerome James before everyone realized what a stiff he is).  That a point that Martin Johnson also addresses in his post today for the NY Sun.  He takes on the Phoenix Suns, too, as an example of a team getting cheap and costing them talent.

With this in mind, here are the teams currently above the luxury tax threshold:

Minnesota is at 71.7 million
Phoenix is at 76 million
Denver is at 80 million.
Dallas is at 81 million.
New York is at 89 million. 

The Knicks and Dallas have owners who don't care much about paying the luxury tax.  But watch out for Phoenix again, which might still look to clear out $10 million somehow (hmm... isn't Golden State holding a trade exemption valued at that amount?   Shawn Marion might not make the Warriors happy, but maybe they can offer enough for Amare?)...

For the record, at this point we have the Rockets as our early favorites for next season, though it is far from a sure bet.

One last quick prediction: With Nate Robinson's value at an all time high, thanks to a solid performance in the summer league (where he was named The Most Outstanding Player), and the Knicks currently having 17 players signed, but only 15 roster positions available, look for him to get traded.  The most likely scenario is Robinson gets traded straight up for a future draft pick or gets combined with another Knick in a 2 for 1 deal.  Or maybe look for Dan Dickau or Fred Jones' expiring contracts to get moved....

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