I know what you are saying: The Pelicans have been above the cap. You guys just got finished telling me how much Benson spent last season, and it was well over the cap, and it was even close to the tax line.
That is true. However, they went above the cap after dropping below it and using cap space. This is a subtle point, but it’s very important. Using cap space to complete transactions is often much more flexible than using exceptions, and this works in the team’s favor. Since the team seem poised to operate in this fashion for years, depending on how they treat the large bump in the salary cap, I wanted to lay out the basic differences.