Now that all 30 regular-season rosters have been set, 10 teams project to be taxpayers, tweets ESPN’s Bobby Marks. The Warriors, Nets, Clippers, Lakers, Bucks, Jazz, Sixers, Celtics, Trail Blazers and Raptors are currently over the luxury tax threshold.
Some of those teams are in better shape than others. While the Warriors ($159.9M) and Nets ($110.4M) project to have nine-figure tax bills, the Raptors are barely into tax territory and should be able to sneak below the line, perhaps by waiving one of their two players who has a partially guaranteed deal.
Besides Golden State and Brooklyn, the Clippers, Lakers, Bucks and Jazz all have projected tax bills exceeding $33M, according to Marks. The Sixers, Celtics, Blazers and Raptors would owe less than $8M each based on the current numbers.
Of course, these numbers can and will change over the course of the season as teams make roster moves, since tax bills are determined by the team’s year-end salary. For now though, the 20 non-taxpayers project to receive year-end payments of $12.7M, Marks notes.
Here are a few more cap- and contract-related notes from around the NBA:
More must-reads:
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