15M a year is alot for Parsons. Doesn't prevent a superteam from forming in Houston by any means, but it does make it more difficult. You're probably looking at a Brooklyn type of payroll, and the NBA had a total luxury tax payment of 151M this year among five teams and Brooklyn had to pay 60% of it.
Asik to New Orleans will get done at 12:01 Sunday "morning" so you'll probably see a weird scenario that David Morey hides from this offer sheet for a little while.
By their own choice... A figure that they understood was not indicative of their value when they signed the contract. Those contracts cannot be barometers.