DENG'S DEAL
07/03/2008 LUOL Deng officially opened contract talks with the the NBA's Chicago Bulls on Wednesday.

Luol Deng officially opened contract talks with the Chicago Bulls on Wednesday. Here Basketball 24/7 breaks down what that means for GB's resident superstar ....

Q. The Bulls season was over in April, why has it taken until now to open talks?

A. Simple, those are the NBA rules. NBA free agency started on July 1 at which point Luol and his new agent Jason Levien could speak either to the Bulls or any other interested teams.

Q. So Luol is a free agent. That means he can sign for any other club, right?

A. Yes and no, well, no really. Luol is a RESTRICTED free agent as he comes to the end of his rookie contract. Put simply, he can sign an "offer sheet" with any new team but the Bulls then have 15 days in which to match that offer. If they do, Luol must stay with Chicago.

Q. What are Luol's options this summer.

A. Luol and Ben Gordon are in the same boat. They can either sign a new, long-term deal with the Bulls; sign with another team that has room under the salary cap OR sign a one-year "tender" with the Bulls and become UNRESTRICTED free agents one year from now. (They could also be traded away, but let's leave that for now).

Q. What's a one-year "tender?"

A. It effectively amounts to a fifth-year option on Deng's rookie contract and its value was dictated by his position in the draft. In Deng's case, it would mean he would earn $4.45 million in 2008-09 and then become an unrestricted free agent in 2009.

Q. Is that a good option for Luol?

A. Not really, it's a last resort kind of option. Deng is worth a minimum $10 million a year right now so he would be gambling away over $5m in 2008-09 in the hope that he cashes in one year from now. Of course, he runs the risk of injury or a dramatic loss of form hurting him when it comes to negotiations next summer. Incidentally, sources in Chicago tells us this is the course Ben Gordon is likely to take, however. His tender is for $6.4 million and, to be frank, he is in a weaker bargaining position than Deng this summer.

Q. If the tender is one option, what about Deng's other options?

A. The easy one to answer is his re-signing with the Bulls. Last year, he turned down a firm offer of $50 million over five years. It should be noted that Chicago management leaked a figure of $57.5m to local media in an attempt to make Deng look greedy but the only CONCRETE offer he had in writing was for $50m.

Q. That's a lot of money. Why did he turn it down?

A. In purely financial terms, the simple answer is, he calculated he could get a better offer this summer. Certainly, the salary cap rules allow Chicago to pay him far more in 2008.

Q. How much exactly?

A. The figures will be announced on July 9 when the NBA calculates what the salary cap is for 2008-09. BUT based on the 2007-08 figures, the MAXIMUM salary for Deng, and all free agents with 1-6 years service, will be $13,655,000. From there, salary rises at 10.5 per cent per year. That means the maximum Chicago can offer Deng will be around $103 million over six years! This is more than any other team can offer him due to Deng possessing "Larry Bird rights" - the loophole that allows teams to keep hold of their free agents by being able to offer them more cash than rivals can offer.

Q. That is a lot more than $50 million over five! How likely is he to get that sort of money?

A. Not at all. For one, Deng did not have a fantastic year in 2007-08 and, for two, Chicago have a reputation for being "cheap." There is a school of thought that they may only be prepared to offer the same sort of deal they made him last summer. Luol's new agent recently got Kevin Martin a five-year, $55 million extension from Sacramento. We might be in that ball park again.

Q. So what are Deng's other options?

A. This is where it gets complicated. Based on our hypothetical max salary of $13,655,000 in 2008-09, other teams can sign him for a five-year (not six, as Chicago can) contract, increasing at 8 per cent per year. That's a total of $78,880,000 over five.

Q. And any team can make that offer?

A. Of course it's not that simple. Certain teams will have what is called a mid-level exception this year which is a) extremely complicated and b) not attractive to Deng because it will only be worth around $5.5 million for him this year. Aside from that, very few teams are under the salary cap. The LA Clippers were, until the Baron Davis signing. Now, the Memphis Grizzlies, the Philadelphia 76ers and Golden State Warriors (thanks to offloading Davis) are the only clubs who are realistic players as things stand.

Q. How much can they offer?

A. At the moment, neither Phili nor Memphis would have room to offer Deng the max. (Memphis did have but have a deal lined up for Marc Gasol which will cost them around $3m next year). In both instances, as of today, they are both around $11-12m under the cap which is the sort of offer they could make Luol. The Warriors have more cash but have already offered a big chunk to Elton Brand, with Josh Smith their secondary target. Lu does not appear to be on their radar.

Q. So, to sum up, Luol's options seem to be staying in Chicago or signing for Memphis/Philadelphia?

A. Yes, unless there is some dramatic, left-field development that nobody can see coming ... or, of course, a sign and trade deal!

Q. Would Chicago trade Deng then?

A. All the indications and information coming out of Chicago is that while they would listen to offers for Gordon (who is unlikely to agree to a trade because it would mean giving up his Bird rights), they are exteremely unlikely to trade Deng. In practice, a "sign and trade" works exactly how it sounds. The Bulls agree a deal with another team, sign Deng and then immediately ship him out. All of this is done in the open without any chance of any party backing out of the agreement.

Q. That all sort of makes sense, so what is 247's prediction about Deng's future.

A. The two key factors in play here are 1) Deng has a new, extremely good agent working for him and 2) the Bulls seem desperate to keep him. The NBA has a tendency to throw up some real surprises in this area but our best guess is Luol re-signs with the Bulls for considerably more than last summer's offer ... say, $70 million over six years?

Ian Whittell for 24/7