O'Neal was interested in joining the Hawks over the summer. But after Atlanta balked at increasing its offer to more than the veteran's minimum salary, O'Neal signed with the Celtics for the same amount.
In addition to their reluctance to push their payroll above the luxury tax, the Hawks were concerned whether O'Neal would accept a back-up role behind center Al Horford and mesh with a relatively young team. He's one of five Celtics players with at least 12 years in the league. Link
Interesting to hear now that ATl doesn't offered him more than BOS.
What surprises me is that it's like we would have paid Luxury tax if the offer was for more than the Minimum, which is totally wrong.
ATL could offer him more than the Minimum, using BAE or part of the MLE, and stay under the threshold.
So the other argument of O'Neal being a risk behind Horford starting spot is another stupidity, because if they offered him the Minimum, they were agreeing at wanting O'Neal in the roster, and there is no reason O'Neal would have create more problem being paid 2.5M instead of the Minimum for example.
We definitely have some strange owners.
