Suns, Spurs Making a Play for Odom?

It's July 1st, which means the free-agent season has officially begun in the NBA. While some teams have made legitimate and official contact with players, there are some others where rumors and speculation continue to be all we have in trying to figure out what may be on their minds.

Not every rumor deserves our attention, but a couple that popped up Wednesday regarding the Lakers' Lamar Odom seem to make so little sense, that they need to be, at the very least, touched upon.

Buried deep in an L.A. Times article about Kobe Bryant's upcoming contract extension is a blurb about the Phoenix Suns and the San Antonio Spurs being "interested" in signing Odom.

San Antonio and Phoenix are interested in trying to sign Odom. Both teams are trying to clear salary-cap space to see if they can get a deal done with Odom, who is looking for at least a four-year deal worth an average of $10 million a year.

There are a couple of issues here, and they're pretty big ones.

One, neither team has anywhere close to the cap space necessary to acquire Odom at that asking price, which means that they would need to work some sort of a sign-and-trade to get him, or dump a ridiculous amount of salary to make that kind of an offer. Unrealistic is putting this mildly.

Two, and perhaps most importantly, is the fact that since neither team has the financial ability to offer Odom a deal, they in all likelihood haven't discussed it with him (or his agent) in the less than 24 hours that the negotiating period has been open. So, where did the Times get this information?

Several have speculated (and it's only speculation) that the rumors of the Suns' and Spurs' interest may have been leaked to the paper by Odom's agent. Which also means, that while the teams might be interested, there's nothing imminent coming from either of them in terms of an actual contract offer.

There's nothing wrong with Odom's agent trying to create leverage for his client by letting some "news" appear that some other teams have expressed interest, and there's nothing wrong with the paper printing it, especially in the middle of a lengthy piece on the Lakers' overall free agent situation. But given the respective financial situations of the teams that were mentioned, a quick glance at these rumors tell us that they are, in all likelihood, completely bogus.