The Detroit Pistons are fairly restricted financially this offseason. The Michigan-based franchise, even before signing guard Langston Galloway to a three-year, $21 million deal, had around $97 million in guaranteed salaries. With the Galloway deal becoming official, the Pistons are already around $6.2 million over the confirmed $99 million salary cap.
Due to this, per Rod Beard of The Detroit News, they aren't expected to match a possible max contract offer sheet for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope if a team braves to do so. If Pope gets that offer, it will likely be similar to the offer sheet Wizards forward Otto Porter signed with the Nets, around $100 million over four years. The Pistons simply cannot match that offer as they would go over the hard cap ($125.3 million) — an apron that NBA teams cannot cross.
However, there are solutions that can help the Pistons keep their young guard. The obvious one would be trading away guys like Jon Leuer, Tobias Harris, or Reggie Jackson to create serious cap room. There have been talks about trading Jackson, who has disappointed last season, and Leuer is a strong candidate for a salary dump as well. The latter signed a four-year, $41 million deal last summer and had a career year, but Pope is probably more valuable to the team than the 28-year-old power forward.
As for potential suitors for Pope, the Brooklyn Nets have been the team that is expected to offer Pope a max contract. However, that is only going to happen if the Wizards match the Porter offer sheet. If Porter ends up going to the Nets, Brooklyn would only have around $7 million in cap room, which is clearly not enough for Caldwell-Pope.
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