Orlando currently has $193,386,181 in salary committed to 13 players. This figure includes Moe Wagner, Caleb Houstan and the 25th pick in the 2025 NBA Draft.
That puts them $5,491,181 OVER the luxury tax, $1,325,729 UNDER the first apron and $13,204,729 UNDER the second apron. They are currently hard capped at the second apron due to the aggregation of contracts in the Desmond Bane trade. These apron figures include Bane's unlikely to be earned incentives for 25-26 which are $1,233,090 (unlikely to be earned incentives DO count against the tax aprons, but DO NOT count against the cap sheet or luxury tax itself).
The Magic will become hard capped at the first apron ($195,945,000) if they 1. get access to their full midlevel exception ($14,105,000) and use more than the taxpayer midlevel ($5,685,000) out of it, 2. use their bi-annual exception ($5,135,000) or 3. execute any sign-and-trade.
Orlando would normally become hard capped at the second apron ($207,824,000) by using their taxpayer MLE ($5.685M). However, this doesn't apply as the Magic are already hard capped at the second apron via the Bane trade.
If the Magic decline Moe Wagner's $11,000,000 team option, they will dip from $193,386,181 to $182,386,181 in committed salary. That will put them $5,510,819 BELOW the luxury tax and will give them access to the full $14,105,000 non-taxpayer midlevel exception.
However, as stated above, if the Magic do use the full $14.105M MLE, that will trigger a hard cap for them at the first apron ($195.945M). But they would only be $12,325,729 below the first apron. So they would actually be $1,779,271 short of being able to use the full $14.105M MLE due to the hard cap at the first apron.
So...
The only way the Magic can access *and* use the full $14.105 non-taxpayer MLE would be to decline Moe Wagner *and* shed another $1,779,271 million. They could do this a variety of ways - declining Houstan or (more likely) trading Jett Howard, Jonathan Isaac, Goga Bitadze or Wendell Carter for less money than they bring back.
Now...
If the Magic decline Moe Wagner's option *and* opt to use their MLE before they decide whether or not they are bringing Moe back (this is not how the order of operations would go down, but bear with me), they would have to also renounce Moe's bird rights at the same time which would mean he would only be able to return on a veteran minimum contract at that point unless they did even more cap maneuvering to access the full BAE which is slightly more than a veteran minimum for Moe.
The more likely scenario is they decline Moe's contract at $11,000,00 and then resign him to a new contract for less than he is set to make currently BEFORE they officially make whatever MLE signing they intend to make. If Moe were to sign for $5,500,000 in Year 1 (I have no idea if he would agree to this), that would move the Magic below the luxury tax and give them access to the full $14.1 MLE. They would still not be able to use all of it without moving off another contract, but it would maximize the amount of money that they could pay Moe instead of being limited to only being able to offer him the veteran minimum.
Does any of this make sense?
