"Bosh got paid more but I'm telling you, no state taxes in Texas would have returned much of that $20M that the state of Florida is going to want from him. "

Dude, Florida doesn't have an income tax either.

Really? Damn, you'd think the state with the most crazy expensive beach houses in the entire country would tax the rich residents...

Never mind I guess.

That's why Florida's has one of the worst graduation rates in the country and a higher than average poverty rate.

Even if Florida had an income tax it's not gonna come out to the mega millions Bosh made anyway

Florida is a shitty state to live in in general if you aren't quite rich.

Is Parsons not going back to Houston?

Looks like he'll be a Mav since the Rockets signed Ariza.

I think the Mavs gamble with Parsons backfired. They lost Carter and will probably lose Marion.

Florida has a property tax to tax the rich beach houses, but no income tax

Yeah, but Parsons is potentially a long-term player whereas the majority of their roster, including Vince and Marion as well as Dirk, are aging.

So why did Houston decline Parsons' team option if they weren't willing to match the resultant offers? Just doesn't make sense unless they drastically misjudged the market.

Maybe they didn't get Bosh and they'd rather take a year to restart, though with Harden and Howard on payroll that makes no sense.

Houston obviously misjudged the market for second tier small forwards. Now they're overpaying for Trevor Ariza, who is an upgrade on defense over Parsons but a big step backward on offense. Houston could use the defensive presence, given that Harden couldn't defend his grandmother.

The Wizards really came out on top this weekend after signing Pierce for the fucking midlevel exception. Plus, Otto Porter has been dominating in summer league play so far and now with Ariza out of the way and Pierce playing presumed limited minutes it opens up for Porter to show what he can really do.

And if the East wasn't crazy enough, Lance Stephenson signed with Charlotte. Pacers and Heat are down, Wizards and Cavs are up, but there's no dominant team in the East, just a large group of teams that are good but not *great*:

- Indiana
- Washington
- Charlotte
- Chicago
- Toronto
- Brooklyn

I get the feeling that all these teams are one star away from dominating.

The Hornets are gonna be good. Scary good in a few years. They're young too.

Toronto is underrated. I think they've got a shot at a run this year. They signed Patrick Patterson to beef up inside (and he's a stretch player, which Lowry loves). Derozan is up and coming, Landry Fields and Terrence Ross are big time young players, and Valanciunas is going to have a huge year. I can see them taking the east by storm, honestly. With Fields and Derozan defending, I think they could give the Cavs a run for their money in a long playoff series. All in all, the east is getting turned upside-down. The Pacers are going to have to come back to compete with the Cavs and Bulls in the central, but with PG needing a good year and Roy Hibbert in a contract year, I see both of them playing well. The Wizards will be good but losing Ariza hurts. Pierce only has so long.

Regardless, whoever wins the West is going to win the title. There's no doubt in my mind about that.

Landry Fields...big time...LOL

If Valanciunas takes a big step last year and doesn't disappear every other night like he did in the playoffs then the Raptors have an outside chance of winning a playoff series. PatPat just adds another stretch guy that the Raps roster already has in spades. Lowry is a solid guard and DeRozan is legit but overall I think they lack consistency.

Landry Fields is a defensive nightmare. He handled Lebron a few years back, I'd bet he can handle Wiggins now if Derozan takes Lebron.

"So why did Houston decline Parsons' team option if they weren't willing to match the resultant offers? Just doesn't make sense unless they drastically misjudged the market."

Because they didn't want to pay that much for someone who was their 3rd best player. Now the Mavs are because they got the Dirk discount.

"Pacers and Heat are down"

The Heat got a pretty darn good team. They just signed Miller. They got Deng, Bosh, Wade, Granger, McRoberts. They have plenty of weapons. I'd say they're a deeper team now than when they had Lebron.

Deeper maybe, but they could have added KD and still been down losing Lebron. He's that good. Granger is a shell of his old self, I still hate Josh McRoberts for missing a half-court shot at the buzzer when the Pacers had gone 21-for-21 shooting in the quater which would have been the first 100% quarter ever (and he sucks, by the way, and so does his brother), no one knows what Deng is going to be, and Bosh and Wade are going to have to lead the team again. It's a toss-up as to whether they'll work out.

Sorry, Miller signed with the Cavs. What am I talking about.

Still, the Heat will be contenders in the East.

Also I feel really bad for the Hawks organization. They have a good team with good coaches and are probably one of the most competently managed franchises in the NBA, but they can't get anybody to come play for them. They need to get out of the sports hellhole that is Atlanta and move to a play that actually likes basketball.

There's no way the Heat are able to keep a top 3 seed. Wade is a shell of his former self and they're a team of role players at this point. Even if Bosh gives them 20 and 10 a game, which is unlikely given his production decline in the past four seasons even WITH playing with LeBron, they lost their best player and the person that the entire offense ran through. Their lack of a real PG is going to be glaringly evident this year.

And yeah the Hawks have the worst luck. Nobody wants to play in Atlanta.

"Wade is a shell of his former self "

I mean he's still a 19-5-5 player even when injured. Can't find many of those. Bosh's numbers decline might be a function of having to play a position that isn't his natural position. If the Heat got a decent center, that would help. Chalmers had a decent season at PG he just sucked in the playoffs. Napier hasn't impressed so far in summer league, but it's early. They still got Norris who can be good.

Wade only played 50 games last year. I don't care if he puts up a triple double every game, you can't miss that much time and be counted on to carry your team in any meaningful way. And while it remains to be seen whether Bosh can be the focal point of this offense, I really think he'll miss LeBron's playmaking and creative abilities, especially because Bosh isn't really adept at creating his own shots outside the paint.

Signing Patterson didn't beef up the team considering he is an undersized big man and he was also on the team last year.

Landry Fields is not an up and coming player. He broke his wrist and since he hasn't been able to shoot. Period. He is a great defender but when he's on the court it's 4 on 5 on offense and is never worthwhile.

Terence Ross is a good player, great offensively despite a huge choke in the playoffs. His position forces him to guard some ofthe stars of other teams - he showed he can be beat by a good opposing SF and this was a liability for us last year.

This James Johnson signing is interesting, he seems to have everything but a scoring touch. I would be happy to see him start over Ross and let Ross, Vasquez and Pat Pat dominate other team's backups.

Hopefully Valenciunas keeps improving and Lowry plays like he did in his contract year. With the Heat dismantled and the Nets a year older and apparently in some weird turmoil I think our team is in good shape.

"Wade only played 50 games last year. I don't care if he puts up a triple double every game, you can't miss that much time and be counted on to carry your team in any meaningful way."

54, and in a conference where 40 wins gets you in the playoffs? Sure he can. There are certainly more reasons to be bullish about the Heat than a Wizards team that just gave away one of their leading producers while picking up a 75 year old Paul Pierce. Two of the Heat's biggest rivals in the East (Pacers & Wizards) just got worse. The Nets are a mess. The Knicks just forfeited their chance to improve by paying Melo through the nose. The Heat will be fine.

The Wizards certainly did not get worse. In fact, from a GM perspective, they've had one of the best offseasons so far. They didn't overpay to keep Ariza, they didn't overpay to keep Gortat, and they got Pierce at a midlevel exception. Plus, its not as if they don't have a replacement for Ariza, who is hardly the type of player who is going to swing a game. They've got Otto Porter, a top 5 pick last year who is already killing it in the summer league, and Pierce to mentor him, plus Wall and Beal are both a year older and better from their playoff experience. I'd expect Washington to be solidly in the top 3 of the conference next year.

Summer league. He was supposed to "kill it" last year, he did nothing. He scored 2 ppg. Sure he was injured but when came back he wasn't put in the game because he can't shoot an outside shot and he's not physical enough. Another overhyped Hoya. And the Wizards now have no depth at that position since Webster is out. Ariza is a big loss, especially defensively. Porter is at best, a role player.

Cavs are now open to trading Wiggins and Bennett for Love. Here to comment on the possible deal is userID=34742.

Give Porter some time. They didn't draft him on his NBA readiness. I don't think he'll break out this year but in the next few with more consistent playing time he may.

Either userID=34742 really did his research beforehand or he has an unfortunate (or fortunate) connection to the actual Andrew Wiggins. Kinda like my AD, name was John Walls and when the Wizards drafted John Wall he heard the same joke over and over again, that they woulda thought they were the same person except Walls is an oldish white guy with a mustache..