GeorgeSears wrote:Interesting situation because Glen Taylor has apparently never gone into the tax during his ownership of the team. It's not unusual, the Kroenkes never paid the tax either when it came to the Nuggets. Neither team were ever good enough to be put in that situation until recently. However, after next season, there's going to be a $24M luxury tax bill to keep this team.
They could keep their core intact and not have to pay the tax bill, but that means they'll have to trade players like Naz Reid and gut their bench.
The next ownership group needs to be prepared to spend.
Glen Taylor and the Timberwolves have gone into the luxury tax four times. People assume that Taylor is cheap because it’s only four, but you are correct, like most owners, he doesn’t want to pay lux taxes on a bad team. In fact, one could argue that Taylor is more spendy than most, since he has spent into the lux when his team was
mediocre (50.2% winning percentage). He has also paid those luxury taxes despite having one of the lowest revenues from an NBA team, so that is likely out-of-pocket. And of course, his spending on a massive (for the time) contract for Garnett back in the day scared the other owners so much that they instituted max deal language into the very next CBA.
Regardless of who owns the Wolves, it’s unlikely that they are going to try to dive back under the lux this Summer. They don’t have any big expirings they can let walk, and locked up their expensive players on new deals and extensions for the next few years. Moreover, while all the NBA franchises saw a substantial increase in value last year, MIN’s increase was #2. The 83-year old Taylor has no heirs that want the team, so if ARod and Lore don’t have the money, he will likely look for other buyers for estate planning purposes. And just like when we sell a home, spending a little before the sale helps make the franchise attractive to buyers and raise the price. It’s unlikely he’ll be responsible for a big luxury tax bill two years from now.
