WHAT ARE THE RULES GOVERNING THE SALARIES INVOLVED IN TRADES?
If a team making a trade is over the salary cap, the players being received in trade must not have combined salaries in excess of 115% of the combined salaries of the players being traded away, plus some small fudge factor (about $100K). For example, if the players being traded away have combined salaries of $3,000,000, then then combined salaries of the players being received in trade must be no more than 1.15*($3,000,000)+$100,000, or $3,550,000. There are also other rules regarding “base year compensation” players, players in the first year of a contract being included in multi-player packages, players traded twice within a sixty-day period, and other special situations. I must confess a lack of thorough knowledge of these rules, so this version of the FAQ does not explain them. 21. CAN A FREE AGENT BE SIGNED AND THEN IMMEDIATELY TRADED? A team may resign its own free agent and then immediately trade him. The league doesn’t like it, but the right to do so was established by an arbit
