The MLE and the mini, or bi-annual can only be used if your over the cap at the beginning of freeagency. Which means that you can't start freeagency 5 mill under the cap, sign a player for that amount, and then use the MLE or Bi-annual. In other words, you can't have your cake and eat it too. Thats one of the reasons for the capholds. Its either s--t or get off the pot. Otherwise teams that are, lets say 20 mil under the cap, would sit on a player like Dalembert, spend the 20 mil on other freeagents, and then resign Dalembert using the Bird exception. So to keep teams from doing that, the league puts a cap hold in excess of the players last salary that counts against the cap until you either resign that player, or relinquish his rights.