Jay

[Philadelphia 76ers @sixers]

on sale now 🚨

https://t.co/L06BWF4UVZ

[Sam Quinn @SamQuinnCBS]

Yesterday, Brad Stevens mentioned how much harder it would have been to build around the Jay's at 70% of the cap compared to the 47% they made when they won at title.

As part of something I'm working on, I looked at how much the last 10 champions spent on their top two players.

What I'm discovering in this process is that there's no cheat code in the NBA like underpaying your best player. Notice that the best player on the 2026 Knicks, 2024 Celtics, 2019 Raptors or 2017 Warriors is not listed in this graphic.

Similarly, notice how the only team above that 70% figure Brad Stevens cited are the 2022 Warriors... who were probably the single team most responsible for the CBA environment we now exist in. Remember when Windy called one of their Finals games a "checkbook win." He was absolutely right. The 2022 Warriors paid just under 124% of the cap to their top four players.

[Jay @JM1849]

@Keefe21 Serious question. Are you dumb?

[Tipping Pitches @tipping_pitches]

put another way: we have a CBA so punitive that we can’t keep the second best player we’ve developed in the last two decades, even though he signed a contract to stay here two years ago!

[Jay @JM1849]

@Ndinsanity Jaylens contract was signed right as the new cba was being negotiated. I don’t think Brad realized how bad it was gonna be until it was too late.

I still think this trade is the worst trade in nba history. To your point, PG essentially makes the same money.

[Jay @JM1849]

The apron rules killed the nba. Silver needs to be fired

[New York Basketball @NBA_NewYork]

Celtics president Brad Stevens: "The new CBA coincided 7 years after the supermaxes were instituted…We may not be sitting here if there was a rule in the CBA that said guys you drafted & signed to 35% supermaxes count 25% against cap, bc that would allow you to build out toward the aprons with a lot more flexibility…47% of the cap is what (Jaylen Brown & Jayson Tatum) were when we won it all and that's just going up & up, and that's tough"

Q: "So you would say [Jaylen Brown trade] is primarily a move to restructure the books?"

Stevens: "No. I would say it's a move to keep us at a very competitive level and give us optionality moving forward"

[Jay @JM1849]

@Ndinsanity The PA takes some blame. But I don’t really expect a fair negotiation for them vs the owners and their army of quants/lawyers.

It’s a tragedy that teams can no longer keep homegrown talent and every team who drafts well will have to be blown up once they’re off rookie deals.

[Sam Quinn @SamQuinnCBS]

It's the biggest NBA story non-cap nerds aren't talking about. The death of local TV revenue is having massive roster-building implications. There was a minute there where we thought cap growth (up to 10% annually) would outpace contract growth (up to 8%). Now, it's the opposite.

[Jay @JM1849]

Adam Silver ruined the league

[Evan Lazar @ezlazar]

Brad Stevens pointed directly to the roster restrictions of having two players taking up 70% of the cap today.

I’m not sure the idea behind the new CBA was to break up homegrown duos due to second apron concerns. Doesn’t feel like a good thing for the league.

[Boston Celtics @celtics]

He went to war for our city 😤

[Jay @JM1849]

Go back and look at all of the totally rational and totally normal posts on r/politics about Graham Platner over the last few months

[Jon Favreau @jonfavs]

Platner needs to drop out ASAP - these are awful, credible allegations.

Said on the pod after the (also credible) June NYT story that his biggest problem going forward would be credibility. It's now abundantly clear that he just hasn't been honest about his past and can't be trusted as a candidate for office.

Saving grace is that the party can find a replacement by the 27th as long as he drops by the 13th, which I very much assume he will.

[Boppa 🧟‍♂️ @ihatebbls]

That shit cool and all but ain’t a soul on Belgium meeting Derrick Henry in the A gap in the middle of december

[Mike Zakarian @MikeZakarian]

Now that we’re a couple days removed from the Mookie Betts trade, let’s kinda realize you essentially replaced Betts with Rafael Devers, then added Alex Verdugo, Jeter Downs and Connor Wong.

Andrew Benintendi will get more ABs, Kevin Pillar, and Jackie Bradley Jr gMore ABs. This is a better team.

[Jay @JM1849]

@Ndinsanity It’s the worst trade in nba history. They essentially salary dumped a guy who was finals mvp and finished 6th in mvp voting. Also had a huge connection to the city. More than any current Boston player.

[Swish Street @SwishStreet]

It's pretty wild everyone across the league was saying Jaylen Brown stinks until the second he was traded now the Sixers get an A+ on the trade

[Reggie Saxx @ReggiSaxx]

Then proceeded to trade for Ja?

[Awful Announcing @awfulannouncing]

Andrés Cantor has the Telemundo call of Sidny Lopes Cabral's unbelievable equalizer for Cape Verde. ⚽️💥🎙️ #WorldCup

[Jay @JM1849]

The new apron rules are one of worst things to happen to the league

[kuz @kylekuzma]

After sitting here watching NBA free agency this year and overall NBA movement over the past 2 years somebody has to say it....

The new CBA was sold as parity, but the first and second apron are starting to function like a hard cap on player value, team continuity, and player movement.

Teams are no longer making purely basketball decisions. They’re making fear-based apron decisions. That means good players get squeezed, homegrown cores get broken up, fan-favorite teams lose their identity, and the overall product loses some of the nostalgia and continuity that made people fall in love with the NBA in the first place.

This isn’t about players not understanding business. It’s the opposite. We understand that the NBA is a business. That’s why the @TheNBPA has to operate with elite business acumen, elite negotiating strategy, and real foresight.

The owners and the league walk into these meetings with killers that continue to run circles around us time and time again with elite lawyers, economists, cap experts, media strategists, and long term business operators. Players deserve a PA that is just as sharp, just as prepared, and just as aggressive about protecting our upside.

Too often, it feels like players are informed after the fact instead of being truly educated and empowered before decisions are made. That cannot continue.

The next CBA is a do or die moment for us as players. It's only going to get worse for us. We need transparency, accountability, and a serious re evaluation of who is representing us and how they are representing us.

This is not anti parity. This is pro player, fan, and product. The league is strongest when players are valued properly, great teams can stay together, and the people representing us are operating at the same level as the people sitting across the table.

[Jay @JM1849]

HE WAS THE MVP OF THE NBA FINALS

[Raheem Palmer @iamrahstradamus]

There's a real chance Jaylen Brown could just be Rudy Gay who just so happened to play on a team that had great coaching structure and enough pieces around him for him to be successful & Brad Stevens was ahead of the curve...........OR the advanced metrics simply aren't measuring him properly & the league as a whole is wrong about him. I can't call it right now but I can't wait to see how it plays out.

My gut feel is that PG13 was a more portable player & I'm not sure how Maxey, VJ, Brown and Embiid will fit together and they're probably a 2nd round exit, again.