by A.J. Coltrane
On Friday Ray Allen signed a 3 year, $9 million dollar contract with the Heat, turning down the Celtics’ offer of two years and $12 million.
It’s a perfect fit for Allen, and it’s exactly what the Heat need to repeat as champions. Allen will likely play 25-30 minutes a game, hang out in the corner, and bomb 3’s. The linked article also indicates that the Heat are pursuing Rashard Lewis, who would function as “Mike Miller is hurt” insurance.. and I’d expect Lewis’ play will improve when he’s healthy and motivated.
That would make for some interesting lineups for the Heat when they “play small” — LeBron, Wade, Allen, Bosh, and Battier/Lewis/Chalmers depending upon the matchups. In the modern NBA the center position isn’t as important as it once was, and the Heat are partly responsible for continuing the marginalization of the lumbering guys.
It’s good for Ray, good for the Heat, and bad for competitive balance in the NBA.
All of which I’m fine with.
FlatbreadGarden 
How the heck to the Heat have any salary cap room? They seem to be signing everyone.
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1. (Without looking) — I think the “stars” (or at least LeBron and Bosh) took a little less to play there together.
2. The NBA’s CBA sets aside some salary slots as “mid level exceptions”, which count against the cap differently somehow, and may be what Allen signed for. (Again, without looking, the exception is something like $5 million, so Allen wouldn’t have even used all of it.) This is (I believe) specially intended to make veterans more appealing as employees, and to allow some movement of older players between teams.
3. Veterans have higher minimum salaries than younger players, but some of that higher salary doesn’t wind up counting against the cap. Related to #2.
The NBA salary cap rules are really convoluted, and I don’t pretend to begin to really understand them, but it’s stuff like I listed above that’s allowing to Heat to bring in more veteran bodies.
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Anything that makes it harder on Clay Bennett getting a championship is okay with me. GO HEAT
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Ding!
Reported four hours ago:
“It is believed Allen will accept the Heat’s mid-level exception that starts at $3.09 million and could be worth a maximum of $9.5 million over three seasons.”
http://espn.go.com/nba/truehoop/miamiheat/story/_/id/8137389/agent-ray-allen-leaves-boston-celtics-champion-miami-heat
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And I thought the NFL salary cap was confusing.
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