At that point, Tatum and Brown would be making a combined 70 percent of the salary cap combined and Porzingis’s $30 million pushes that to about 90 percent of the cap right as the team enters repeater territory with the luxury tax (far stiffer spending penalties for tax teams). To put it bluntly, unless Celtics’ ownership is willing to pay record-breaking money in tax penalties (think Clippers or Warriors the last few years), building a championship-level roster with all those three on the books will be a very stiff challenge starting in 2025. Robert Williams and Jordan Walsh would be the only other players under contract at that point.
It’s a very good bet that Brown’s camp is aware of all this and knows there is a reasonable chance that Brown could be the odd man out in Boston when this spending problem surfaces.
The equation becomes a lot easier if the Celtics win a title in the next two years with Brown. Maybe then, Porzingis is moved and the Celtics build around their star duo. Or they get creative with smaller contracts to build around all three if they are proven winners together. If they aren’t though, reshaping the roster in 2025 may make a lot more sense for Boston’s brass with Porzingis as a cheaper No. 2 option next to Tatum rather than Brown on a supermax deal if he shows he is a good fit this year.
Ultimately, the Celtics should still have the leverage in this spot since Brown would be costing himself tens of millions by playing hardball here on any of these specific terms. However, the math shows it’s far from a sure thing that Brown will remain a Celtic for the entirety of his next deal and the acquisition of Porzingis last month likely reduced those odds.
https://www.masslive.com/celtics/2023/07/how-kristaps-porzingis-trade-to-celtics-may-impact-jaylen-brown-extension-talks.html
