Taxing reality is no luxury for Wizards
07/08/09 2:30 PM EDT
With a payroll of $76 million for 13 players, that works out to a roughly $6 million luxury tax penalty for the Wizards.
Just before last month's NBA draft, Wizards president of basketball operations Ernie Grunfeld denied the perception that salary cap concerns were driving Washington's offseason moves. But a reported cash payment of $2.5 million for the team's second-round pick showed the Wizards clearly understood what was on the immediate horizon.
"We're going to do what we need to do to put the best possible product out there," said Grunfeld. "Obviously, we're going to try to be responsible and do things in a responsible fashion. At the same time, we had opportunities to give away players last trading deadline and cut payroll drastically, and we didn't do that because we feel it's important to put a very good product and very competitive team out there."
It's still difficult not to wonder whether the cost of drafting and signing a rookie power forward like DeJuan Blair at a league minimum of just under $500,000 might've helped just as much, considering that Washington's bi-annual exception will end up costing the team nearly double its $1.99 million value due to the dollar for dollar tax penalty.
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