NBA Free Agency 2011: Players Are in for a Rude Awakening

With presumably a new collective bargaining agreement and attitude towards fiscal responsibility, the current free-agent and trade market might be vastly different from those of years past. 

With strict and penalizing luxury taxes kicking in 2013, general managers and owners will be much less inclined to do the type of freewheeling spending they did before. Gone will be the max contracts for mediocre players putting up big numbers on bad teams. Max contracts will be handed out much less frequently and with much more restraint. 

Take this year's FA crop and presumably the top candidates in Nene Hilario and Tyson Chandler. 

Two solid centers seeking max dollars, both near 30. In the old days, these two would command the market. A decent center is hard to find and they probably would go for $12-14 million a piece, which happens to be exactly what each of these players is seeking now. 

But this only goes to show that players (and probably their agents) don't yet understand the true implications of the lockout. It was a wakeup call to all owners. It was a sobering experience that signified the end of the spending spree era and that the party is officially over. 

For years owners spent more on players than they were worth; after years of being overpaid, players got used to it. They expected it. But now they're in for a rude awakening. 

Here's how I see things panning out. With a newfound sense of financial responsibility leaguewide, owners will be unintentionally lowering the market on all non-max players and here's why. 

Say you're at an auction, and you really want the car that's being sold.  You know it's not worth more than 30k, but you're rolling in dough and would be willing to spend up to 100k. You look around and notice there's lots of buyers with similar bankrolls. It was a good year for you and it's been a good year for them. The auction starts and immediately someone bids 30k. 

Well, there goes the true value of the car. Now you're going to have to overbid just to have a crack at it. But with everyone overbidding, not only does the price of the car hit 100k, it goes well beyond it.

Now imagine you're at that same auction and you want that same car, but you only have 40k to spend and even that is partial blood money for next month's rent. You take a look around and there are hardly any buyers and the few people that are there are standing next to their wives who are carefully monitoring their bids. 

The bid starts out low and doesn't move very quickly. By the end of the auction, the car ends up going for something like 28k. The car went for nowhere near its price before—slightly less than its actual value.

The same can be said of these free agents, especially ones that are not quite max players but are well over mid-level talent. Guys like Nene and Chandler just aren't going to command the types of contracts they used to. 

Who's going to pay $12-14 million a year for a center that isn't a go-to scorer and is probably at their peak years athletically and only going to decline? Smart GMs didn't give max contracts to guys turning 30 before and now even the dumber ones won't now. 

As a result, the collective value of these players has gone down. While they're seeking near max money, they'll soon find that there just isn't a market for it. The only teams interested in players like that are teams competing for a championship right now. And yet the only teams with cap room are teams that are very young, aren't competing and have no use for 30-year-old centers that will only be solid for a couple more years. 

None of the teams in championship contention who are in need of a center have anything but the mid-level to offer. As a result, the only contending teams that can offer the types of salaries they're seeking are the teams they're currently on. And why would you offer them that kind of money when you know no one else would be willing to pay it to them?

If Tyson Chandler, Nene Hilario and the other FAs this year expect to get paid like before, they're in for a big surprise. The spending party is over.  Time to join the cutback salary hangover with the rest of America.