Originally Posted by
rydermike
It is still a buyout, regardless of whether the cap hit is retained or not. It's the definition of buyout, you buy (ie pay someone) out of their responsibilities. We're paying Dio out of his responsibilities under the term of his contract. MLS gives each team one "cap free" buyout, but they can always buy out as many players as they want. It's just the additional buyouts retain their cap hit.
Buyout and waiving are the same thing since you're paying out the player to not play for you. Waiving is required to buyout. NBA uses the same terminology - a waived nba player has gotten bought out. Where I think people get confused is because the NHL has two different types of waivers - regular waivers when they want to send someone to the AHL but still keep their contract, but another team can claim them and unconditional waivers for the purpose of a buyout. MLS uses the nba type.
We've decided to rid ourselves of the contract and have to pay Dio's full salary out to get rid of him (unless someone wants him, but no one will). So we are paying his 585k. We get one free buyout, so there's no reason not to have this waiving count as it. If the choice is either A) buyout his deal @ 585k and wipe it from the cap or B) buyout his deal at 585k and keep it on the cap, it's obvious what to do.
The only reason they would ever consider option B is if they are considering buying out a second contract (like Rosted/Petretta) that carries a higher cap hit later this year.