The NBA has now released the salary cap numbers for the upcoming 2009 NBA season, and the accompanying luxury tax threshold set at $69.92M. All teams with rosters in excess of this threshold must collectively pay a penalty to the teams below the tax limit. The Miami Heat finds itself balancing precariously on the edge of penalty.
Based upon the to-date spending in the current NBA free agent market, if rosters were frozen today, 13 teams (Boston, Cleveland, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles Lakers, New Orleans, New York, Orlando, Phoenix, San Antonio, Utah, and Washington) would be paying a collective $120M in penalties. A portion of that is automatically distributed to help small market teams,but the remaining total would be divvied in approximate $7 million sums to each of the league’s other 17 teams. If the Heat wants its $7 million share, it must get under the threshold.
Here is the current lineup and their salaries for the upcoming 2009 NBA season:
| Jermaine O’Neal |
23,016,000 |
| Dwyane Wade |
15,779,912 |
| Mark Blount |
7,967,375 |
| Udonis Haslem |
7,100,000 |
| Michael Beasley |
4,638,600 |
| James Jones |
4,320,000 |
| Dorell Wright |
2,887,165 |
| Daequan Cook |
1,362,120 |
| Chris Quinn |
1,074,702 |
| Yakhouba Diawara |
940,000 |
| Mario Chalmers |
756,000 |
| CURRENT TOTAL |
69,841,874 |
The Miami Heat is currently a hair below the $69.92M limit; however, it is required to field a team of 13 players and currently has only 11 under contract. Any two rookies signed at the NBA minimum wage will still put the Heat $837,050 over the tax threshold.
If the Heat wants to limbo under the tax threshold and collect its bonus, it’ll need to shed at least $837,050 by trading off one of its existing players and replacing him with a lower salary. And the most likely casualty is:
* DORELL WRIGHT : Wright has yet to live up to his potential with Miami, but everyone continues to sing his praises. The Heat could easily trade Wright and cash to a cap-friendly team for a meaningless second-round draft pick. This is what Miami did with Shaun Livingston last year to get under the cap. Wright is a potential talent, and the Heat would love to keep him, but he’s not worth the $7 million dollars the Heat would be forfeiting in luxury tax bonus, especially since he’s going to be a free agent at the end of the season anyway.
There’s an outside chance that the Heat might pull a more substantial deal involving Udonis Haslem and use the excess savings to sign a veteran point guard, but the teams likely to get involved in that type of trade will continue to dwindle as free agency moves along. Plus, Miami seems interested in getting Michael Beasley experience at small forward, perhaps in preparation for signing Chris Bosh or Amare Stoudmire in 2010.