While it flew under the radar amidst a flurry of contract agreements during the first few hours of 2021’s free agent period, the NBA has officially set the salary cap for its 2021/22 season. As expected, the cap increased by right around 3% on last season’s $109,140,000 figure. Here are the details, courtesy of a league press release:
- Salary cap: $112,414,000
- Luxury tax line: $136,606,000
- Salary floor: $101,173,000
- Non-taxpayer mid-level exception: $9,536,000
- Taxpayer mid-level exception: $5,890,000
- Room exception: $4,910,000
- Maximum salaries:
- 6 years or fewer: $28,103,500
- 7-9 years: $33,724,200
- 10+ years: $39,344,900
- Early Bird exception: $10,384,500
- Estimated average salary: $10,335,000
- Tax apron: $143,002,000
The tax apron for the 2021/22 league year will be the hard cap for any team that acquires a player via sign-and-trade, signs a player using the non-taxpayer mid-level exception, or signs a player using a bi-annual exception.
[RELATED: Maximum Salaries For 2021/22]
[RELATED: Minimum Salaries For 2021/22]
[RELATED: Values Of 2021/22 Mid-Level, Bi-Annual Exceptions]
While the 2021/22 figures are essentially what we expected, the NBA has adjusted its 2022/23 projections and is now forecasting a $119MM cap and a $145MM tax line, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).
The most recent projections for ’22/23, from last November, were a $115.7MM cap and a $140MM tax line, so that’s a significant increase and suggests that the NBA’s revenue projections are more positive than initially anticipated.
Why is the apron figure never listed like the cap and tax lines are? It is in effect the hard cap.
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Crazy that the lines keep rising like it did not matter that games had to cancel.
I would’ve listed it alongside the rest if I were 100% confident about the exact figure — it’s trickier to calculate than the others, so I’m not sure about my math. If it’s not $143MM on the dot though, it’s extremely close (possibly $143,002,000).