Kyle Theige: “As more and more details emerge about the NBA’s new CBA, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: No matter how you feel about the core of Ant, Jaden, KAT, & Rudy, the new CBA makes it damn near impossible to keep all four guys long-term starting next summer. Clock is ticking.”
As more and more details emerge about the NBA’s new CBA, one thing is becoming increasingly clear:
No matter how you feel about the core of Ant, Jaden, KAT, & Rudy, the new CBA makes it damn near impossible to keep all four guys long-term starting next summer.
Clock is ticking.
— Kyle Theige (@KyleTheige) May 17, 2023
by Chubbyklove_
12 Comments
I think its pretty clearly going to be KAT that gets moved. Unless Rudy is back as DPOY next year, he will by far have the most value.
I still think its ridiculous
I’m OOTL, what exactly is up with the new CBA that would make it so much harder to keep them together? Did circumstances from one CBA to the next change that much?
Part of me is morbidly curious to know if they did the math on the financial viability of keeping two guys on supermax contracts, Ant on his rookie extension max, and Jaden on a generous rookie extension contract all together and it checked out, or if they just never did that math and are now realizing how impossible it will be.
Kyle Theige is probably my favorite local media member (alongside Dane), but sometimes I feel like most of media guys really lack understanding of NBA contracts and CBA. Kyle is not quite correct here.
If Ant does not make All-NBA top-4 players will be earning ~$155 M and the tax threshold should be around $185 M, may be even more. Let’s say they sign a $10 M point guard or even keep Conley on a cheap deal, $165 M total for the starting lineup. There can be 3 scenarios:
1) Wolves underperform in 23-24 season. Trade KAT and jump below the tax. KAT will be earning $50 M but there is always a way to grab non-guaranteed contracts.
2) Wolves played very well, let’s say went to the second round, but the owners don’t want to pay the tax. Wolves will have $20 M to assemble the bench – hard but not impossible, this is what Nuggets are doing right now. Wolves will have their pick + perhaps one of Naz/NAW + $5-6 M free agent, and a bunch of minimum deals.
3) Wolves played very well and convinced owners to pay the tax. You have to be below 2nd apron (which is $17 M above the tax this year and will be even more) to avoid severe penalties. Wolves can re-sign Conley, keep all the bench players, and sign one more MLE player (they will have full MLE because they won’t pay the tax in 23-24).
Is Kyle just talking about the luxury tax? Because the way I’m reading things the new CBA stuff incentives keeping teams together or making trades while in the tax increasingly difficult in that:
They won’t be permitted to send out cash in trades.
They won’t be able to take back more salary in a trade than they send out.
They won’t be able to aggregate salary for matching purposes in trades.
That’s not right Kyle. He probably needs to reread the CBA. Damn near impossible is a strong word.
Or he’ll double down on a side topic instead. Nothing on the CBA makes it harder to keep the core “damn near impossible”.
It makes it harder to add more to the core though.
There’s a few teams out there desperate to jump up in the standings, including one under the cap. It’s highly possible this is the best time to trade KAT.
Our increasing team salary, KATs age, injury, his own salary jump, regressing or another poor playoff showing…. There’s a lot of ways for his trade value to drop further if we wait around. I guess he could get better too and increase his trade value, but that seems unlikely considering the skill level and physical profile that he brings into each new season has been pretty consistently unchanged every year. If anything, he’s gotten slightly less athletic and more injury prone.
I mean, I think it was probably going to be untenable anyways, right (even without the extremely punitive new CBA luxury tax changes)?
So we sort of always knew this roster composition wouldn’t work long-term- KAT and Gobert’s cap figures are just too high, especially given their positional overlap (not to mention the existence of one, Naz Reid)- the new CBA’s changes to tax penalties and such just makes it that much more obvious and certain.
The problem is the most obvious/easy one to get rid of- Gobert- is also probably the most difficult one to trade, at least if you’ve your mind setting on getting positive assets in return. I don’t envy the Wolves’ front office, having to figure out a solution here. I guess an abundance of talent is a good problem to have, but still, its going to involve some difficult decisions.
Ant and Jaden are the core. Build a good 3pt shooting and defensive team around them. That’s the formula.
Financially, he’s correct. Although Connelly likely had no definitive insight in to how the new CBA would flesh out, some type of changes like this were inevitable and this just makes the Rudy trade that much more devastating
The only way out is to trade KAT or Rudy
It really depends on how much Jaden will make. I’m guessing somewhere in the 12-18 range?
I mean he’s good, but at best he’s a 3rd option.
I think we see KAT to Portland for the 3rd + picks (maybe Sharpe) or Gobert to Dallas for 10th + future pick (hopefully picks)
Out of those 4, the one to dump is beyond obvious