Jamal Crawford opting out of his $4.54 million player option for the 2018-19 season is sad news for JCrossover truthers, as it means Crawford returning to the Minnesota Timberwolves for a second season is an unlikely proposition.
For the Wolves, it means gaining important flexibility that could keep them below the league’s luxury tax line.
Next season alone, the Wolves have nearly $94 million of salary dedicated to five players — Andrew Wiggins ($25.3), Jimmy Butler ($20.5), Jeff Teague ($19.0), Gorgui Dieng ($15.2), and Taj Gibson ($14.0). This puts the team up against a financial wall when the rookie scale salaries of Karl-Anthony Towns, Justin Patton, Tyus Jones, the $2 million of guaranteed money on Cole Aldrich’s contract and the $1.3 million cap hold for Kevin Martin’s waived contract are factored in. Entering this summer, the Wolves’ cap sheet already sits $9 million over the projected salary cap ($101 million) with numerous roster spots still needing to be filled.
| Player | 2018-19 Salary |
| Andrew Wiggins | $25,250,000 |
| Jimmy Butler | $20,445,779 |
| Jeff Teague | $19,000,000 |
| Gorgui Dieng | $15,170,787 |
| Taj Gibson | $14,000,000 |
| Karl-Anthony Towns | $7,839,435 |
| Cole Aldrich | $6,956,021 ($2 million guaranteed) |
| Justin Patton | $2,667,600 |
| Tyus Jones | $2,444,053 |
| Kevin Martin | $1,360,304 (waived and stretched) |
| Nemanja Bjelica | Restricted Free Agent |
| Marcus Georges-Hunt | Restricted Free Agent |
| Derrick Rose | Unrestricted Free Agent |
| Aaron Brooks | Unrestricted Free Agent |
| Amile Jefferson | Unrestricted Free Agent |
| Anthony Brown | Unrestricted Free Agent |
| Guaranteed Total: | $110,233,979 |
Given this financial landscape that makes getting beneath the salary cap nearly impossible, the Wolves are essentially left with only exceptions to add any player to their current roster. And with Crawford now officially not one of those players, the salary cap exceptions are his only route back.
Bringing Back Crawford
Butler is already pining for Crawford to return but given the four routes that could retain Crawford, Butler’s hope is more pipedream than demand.
Minimum Player Salary Exception
As technically now an unrestricted free agent, Crawford could sign with the Wolves for the veteran minimum. The minimum would pay Crawford approximately $2.4 million for next season, given his status as a player with more than 10 years of experience in the league. This signing would have almost no impact on the Wolves other expenditures, which would be very helpful. However, the beneficial leverage on Crawford’s side is practically nil; essentially just a self-imposed $2 million pay-cut.
Bi-Annual Exception
The Bi-Annual Exception is also extremely unlikely as it could only pay Crawford up to $3.3 million; again, a pay cut. The BAE is also a useful end-of-roster tool that can only be used every other year and given the marginal salary difference, it makes almost no sense for the Wolves.
Non-Bird Exception
Given that Crawford was only on the Wolves for one season, the team does not have his full Bird Rights. This means to re-sign him at a dollar value higher than his previous salary, without using the mid-level exception, the only path is the non-bird exception. This exception allows the Wolves to offer a salary for 120 percent of Crawford’s 2017-18 salary — $5.2 million, up from his $4.33 million last year. Being as this is only a raise of $700,000 from his player option, the move of opting out and taking this route seems unlikely given how strapped the team is with their finances. If the Wolves brass wanted Crawford they would have pushed very hard for him to take the player option — something they might have done.
Mid-Level Exception
The most likely path for bringing back Crawford is probably the mid-level exception. With the MLE scheduled to be somewhere around $8.5 million, this would not only be a notable pay increase for Crawford but could theoretically sign him for up to four years. From the Wolves side, using the MLE on Crawford would be a wildly underwhelming use of that exception — even for Crawford believers as it would kill the Wolves ability to add bench depth beyond minimum salary-level players.
Had Crawford opted into his player option, the Wolves could have used his bench scoring and still possessed the optionality of using the MLE on help elsewhere. The MLE is Minnesota’s strongest tool for obtaining wing depth or, really, anything not currently on the roster.
Crawford’s best value to the team — for salary purposes — was that he was already on it. Now he’s officially off of it, forcing the team to bend in the same ways they would have to for any other free agent if they want to sign him.
Bringing him back using (up to) $8.5 million of the MLE rules out many other free agents who are looking to make more than minimum — including Derrick Rose, who is also an unrestricted free agent without Bird Rights.
Moving Forward Without Crawford
From a salary cap standpoint, Crawford’s departure means the looming luxury tax threshold ($123 million) slides a notch further away. That is very good big picture news. And in the short-term, that notch shift could be the difference in the team retaining Nemanja Bjelica this summer.
With Crawford gone, the likelihood of Bjelly returning increases.
Bjelica is a restricted free agent which means he has the freedom to test the market this summer. His exact value will be determined by which teams wind up having money to spend and those team’s desires. The Wolves possess Bjelica’s restricted rights, meaning they can match any offer he receives on the open market and force him to accept that same deal to play in Minnesota.
If Crawford and his $4.5 million were still in the picture, the Wolves willingness to match an offer of, say, 3 years and $21 million would be less likely. Now, the Wolves, to some degree, are better set up to make that $7 million a year work.
Even if this extra flexibility isn’t used on Bjelica, it is still flexibility nonetheless. At their Monday afternoon press conference, Wolves President of Basketball Operations, Tom Thibodeau, and his General Manager, Scott Layden, eluded numerous times to the notion that the Wolves will be “aggressive” this offseason. If that aggression implies trading a starter — which it could given the lack of other resources the team has to be aggressive with — then even $4.5 million could be the difference in making a deal work.
How Daunting Is The Luxury Tax?
Flexibility to stay underneath the luxury tax line feels like a pretty weak tradeoff for a player like Crawford who, despite his flaws, is a legend. But that tax is no joke.
There has been no shortage of ‘who cares about the tax, Glen Taylor is rich’ quips in Wolves-fan corridors of late. However, a stone that often goes unturned in those conversations is that the tax has more penalties than just Taylor writing an extra check; it also comes with spending restrictions.
If the Wolves are over the tax they cannot use the full mid-level exception (for $8.5 million) as they become restricted down to the taxpayer mid-level exception, which only allows up to $5.3 million to be spent on free agents.
That could be a critical difference between signing a player like P.J. Tucker or Rudy Gay (who signed with Houston and San Antonio for the full MLE this offseason) and a player like Nick Young or Patrick Patterson (who signed with Golden State and Oklahoma City this offseason for the taxpayer MLE).
And at some point, that tax is real — even for the richest of the rich.
Sure, Glen Taylor, who is worth $2.6 billion, should pay the luxury tax over the course of Towns and Butler’s primes. But staving off that time — as late as logically possible — makes sense. This is true because the luxury tax now has teeth that grow intensely if you exceed it in consecutive seasons.
While exceeding the cap by a measly, say, $4 million this season and paying the required additional $6 million in tax this season seems harmless; it isn’t. Dipping into the tax at all could be killer given the notion that both Towns and Butler are up for massive contracts entering the 2019 season and almost assuredly going to be in the tax that season.
Towns and Butler will be making a combined $65 million in 2019 if they both receive their maximums. That is $37 million more annually than they are making in 2018. Alone, those pay increases could conservatively put the team $25 million over the luxury tax line. And the repeater tax bill when exceeding the luxury tax by $25 million is $88.8 million.
That is money that doesn’t go to any players, coaches, jumbotrons, or mascot outfits; it just goes to the league’s escrow account to be distributed amongst non-taxpaying teams. Taylor would never allow his managerial team to spend that much. Which means other players would need to be dumped and that would cost assets — picks and young players, given away as penance.
The biggest advantage Crawford — and his money — departing presents is in the notion that the Wolves now have more flexibility to avoid the tax this summer. Rather than having $115 million in salary for nine players, they have $110 million in salary for eight. And in a race away from the projected $123 million luxury tax line, Crawford comes through in the clutch once again.
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