There are several common misconceptions about trade exceptions and non-simultaneous trades:
-Teams cannot use trade exceptions to sign free agents; they can be used only to acquire existing contracts from other teams. However, a team can acquire a free agent using a trade exception if he is signed by his prior team and traded in a sign-and-trade transaction (see question number 92).
-Trade exceptions are never traded from one team to another. Sometimes it appears like this is happening when one team uses a trade exception to acquire salary without sending salary away, and the other team gains a trade exception in the same transaction because they sent away salary without receiving salary in return. However, the trade exception the first team uses and the trade exception the second team gains are two distinct trade exceptions.
-Teams cannot combine trade exceptions with other exceptions (such as the Non-Taxpayer Mid-Level exception or a taxpaying team's 125% plus $100,000 margin from another simultaneous trade) in order to trade for a more expensive player. For example, a taxpaying team with a $1 million trade exception cannot combine it with their $2 million player to trade for a $3 million player (see question number 90 for more information on combining exceptions).
-A common misconception is that players cannot be traded together in a non-simultaneous trade. This is not true -- players can be traded together as long as the outgoing salaries are not aggregated. For example, trading two $10 million players for a $20 million player requires aggregation, and therefore must be simultaneous. But trading two $10 million players for a $12 million player can be accomplished without aggregation -- one of the $10 million players would be used to acquire the $12 million player in a simultaneous trade, and the other $10 million player would be traded for "nothing," in a non-simultaneous trade, gaining the team a $10 million trade exception.
