Teams with the best cap situations

This is the first part in our two-part series on NBA teams' cap situations heading into the 2011 offseason. Today, we are looking at the teams with the most room to maneuver. Editor's note: The numbers here were compiled and organized completely by ESPN Insider.

The cap is complicated. Just consider all the factors that actually determine a "team salary" for each year. It's no wonder teams have to hire resident capologists to keep it all square. You can't simply add it all up. And dissecting a cap situation can feel like being handed a complex dish and asked to peg the ingredients, and amounts used. Consider some variables:

• The total includes salaries to veteran players on the current roster and money owed to players who have been waived.
• There are cap holds used to replace veteran free agents until they are signed or renounced; there are unsigned past and current first-round picks.
• A rookie minimum cap hold is also included when a roster falls below a combination of 12 players that are under contract and those that have cap holds. For example: A team with just nine players counting against the cap will get three rookie minimum salary cap holds. Those will be eliminated each time a player is signed and the roster gets back to 12.
• Then there's an offer sheet. A team's salary total also will include an offer sheet that has been signed by a restricted free agent.

Easy, right?

The new CBA is bound to have new rules moving forward and will partly determine who will have the most salary cap room. But for now, we'll use the old rules, meaning the same salary cap number ($58,044,000) for 2011-12 that was used for 2010-11. The new collective bargaining agreement will have new criteria for determining salary cap room. However, these teams should have the most to spend regardless of the rules. Listed are the likeliest scenarios for each team. Note that free agents that could be renounced by each team are not listed.

Also: just after we published this, Oklahoma City signed Nazr Mohammed to an extension, essentially eliminating them from this list.

To find out which teams have the most room to spend this offseason, become an ESPN Insider today.

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Chris Sprow

ESPN Insider

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Chris Sprow is a senior editor for ESPN Insider. He reports on the NFL and other sports, works year-round with Mel Kiper on NFL draft coverage and also oversees ESPN's Rumor Central. He's been a frequent guest on ESPN TV and radio.