The Cleveland Cavaliers can go all-in on a title next season.
There has been much discussion of the new "second tax apron" and its impact on the Cavaliers. It is certainly a nasty bit of team-building handcuffs from the latest Collective Bargaining Agreement, putting punitive restrictions on teams who exceed a certain salary threshold.
Designed in theory to prevent owners with deep pockets like Steve Ballmer of the LA Clippers from spending through the nose to maintain a super team (reminder that the Clippers have never been to the NBA Finals in franchise history), the second tax apron restrictions are instead forcing teams like the Cavaliers to make difficult financial decisions early in their life cycle as contenders.
Teams above the second apron are severely limited in the kinds of trades that they can make, can only sign new players to a minimum contract, and are paying through the nose in luxury tax payments. What's more, if a team stays in the second apron for multiple seasons, their future draft picks are first frozen, then pushed to the back of the first round.
The Cavaliers are already well above the second tax apron heading into this summer, thank in large part to Evan Mobley's salary increasing when he won Defensive Player of the Year and to a midseason trade for De'Andre Hunter. They are already deep into that punitive prison even before factoring in new contracts for free agents like Ty Jerome and Sam Merrill.
With Cleveland stumbling to an early exit, the calls for significant change have been loud and omnidirectional. Surely this team needs to work hard to get below the second tax apron so that they can maintain a contender for years to come. The top priority needs to be financial flexibility. The second apron is too painful to sit under its yoke.
Yet the reality is that the Cleveland Cavaliers can still push on the gas pedal and go all out this season.
The Cavaliers can stay in the second apron this year
There are certainly restrictions placed on a team that is in the second apron, but they mostly apply to how a team adds talent. The Cavaliers are already loaded with talent, and are a deep team at that. They went 10-deep heading into the playoffs and have players who complement and support one another. Their "Core 4" are not a seamless fit, as has been the case for three seasons now, but the role players surrounding them are the right kinds of players to maximize the team.
That is why this group won 64 games a season ago, and why they were legitimate title contenders heading into the playoffs. They lost early, yes, but that was just as much a factor of Darius Garland's significant injury and the Indiana Pacers' hot shooting as anything else. Losing an All-NBA point guard is a death knell to any team's title hopes.
It has been assumed that the Cavaliers cannot bring back Ty Jerome and Sam Merrill because of how expensive of a team they are, but that's not true. There is nothing about the second apron or the luxury tax that prevents them from bringing back Jerome and Merrill next season; because they only have Early Bird RIghts on Jerome they cannot offer him more than about $14 million per season, but if the market doesn't trump that the team could certainly bring him back. The same is true for Merrill.
Having both players under contract, especially for multiple seasons, has a very real impact on their future. At some point they will need to consider shedding salary to get under the second apron. But they don't have to do that right now!
They can bring the band back and make another run at the title, swapping out a couple of fringe veterans for second-round draft picks, finding a backup center and seeing if they can play even better in year two under Kenny Atkinson. The team that won 64 games can go to war in an even worse Eastern Conference next season and have an excellent shot at making it to the NBA Finals.
It will be expensive, yes, but owner Dan Gilbert has aways been willing to spend to maintain a contender. That is what the Cavaliers are -- a contender. The second tax apron does nothing to limit their ability to keep this team together for another run next year.
This team is not perfect, and there are some intriguing trade ideas out there, but it is hard to manufacture a trade that makes them better and cheaper and set up for the future. If Cleveland wants to maximize their chances at a title next season, they can keep this team together -- and the second apron can do nothing to stop them.