Now that the draft is behind us, NBA teams quickly switched gears Wednesday and began preparations for the 2005 free-agent frenzy. Who will have the cap space to make a difference in this summer's free-agent market? Assuming there's a $49.5 million cap (based on the latest projections with the new collective-bargaining agreement), the Cleveland Cavaliers will have roughly $28 million in cap room. The Atlanta Hawks and Seattle Sonics will have $25 million, the Charlotte Bobcats and New Orleans Hornets roughly $20 million. The Los Angeles Clippers will have about $16 million. The Chicago Bulls will have about $15 million. The Milwaukee Bucks have cleared about $12 million. Will they really want or be able to use it? The Sonics, Bucks and Bulls likely will spend all of their room re-signing their own free agents. The Cavs will use roughly $10 million to $12 million of theirs in an attempt to re-up Zydrunas Ilgauskas. And the Bobcats likely will save much of their cap space for summer 2007. That leaves the Hawks, Cavs (roughly $16 million to $18 million, if they sign Ilgauskas), Hornets and Clippers as the big players in the free-agent market. Since only one of those teams, the Cavs, has shown it can compete for the playoffs (though the Clippers are getting close), the free-agent destinations for top veterans will be very limited. This year's list of free agents isn't top-heavy, but it's deep. Ray Allen, Michael Redd, Shareef Abdur-Rahim, Antoine Walker and Ilgauskas top the list of unrestricted veterans. Of that group, Allen, Walker and Abdur-Rahim are the most likely to bolt for new teams. The restricted free-agent class looks much better, but remember, going after restricted free agents in the summer is always a dicey proposition. Only two top restricted free agents changed teams last summer. The Nuggets swiped Kenyon Martin from the New Jersey Nets (the Nets eventually agreed to a sign-and-trade) and the Phoenix Suns pried Quentin Richardson away from the Clippers. Here's Insider's look at the free-agent class of 2005. The names on the board might leave fans (and GMs) breathless. Whether most of these guys actually will switch teams is another question. --

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