Last Wednesday, Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports reported that the Raptors would look to flip Andrea Bargnani for a "proven scoring post player" this summer. However, according to Spears' latest report, it sounds as if the Raps could also turn to free agency in search of the post player they covet. Spears hears from a source that Toronto may target Carl Landry if he declines his player option with the Warriors.
Landry, who signed a two-year contract with the Warriors last summer, is earning $4MM this season and has an option worth the same amount for 2013/14. Presumably, he'd only opt out if he felt that he could earn more than $4MM in '13/14 or if he thought he could get a similar annual salary on a longer-term deal. As such, it's hard to see the Raptors as a realistic fit.
Assuming the Raptors turn down John Lucas III's modest team option, the club will still have more than $71MM on next year's books for 11 players. Amenstying Linas Kleiza and his $4.6MM salary would get the team out of the tax, but would still make it difficult to use the full mid-level exception. As we saw with the Bulls this season, using more than the taxpayer portion of the MLE means that a club will be restricted by a hard cap for the remainder of the season. If the Raptors don't have the full mid-level available, it will be very difficult for them to make a competitive offer for Landry.
Of course, if the Raptors are able to clear more salary in other moves, the team could create enough flexibility to offer Landry the full mid-level, or perhaps try to acquire him in a sign-and-trade. But even then, I wouldn't be surprised if there were rival suitors prepared to make stronger offers.