Tag: Raptors

If you are a fan of the trade machine, then for the next 10 days, you are a fan of the Toronto Raptors.

While last year’s deadline was headlined by early, big-picture changes in the franchise’s direction, this year’s deadline is more straightforward: They’re rebuilding, they have useful players on expiring deals of various sizes, and they have an enviable cap sheet to play facilitator with in larger, multi-team deals.

It’s extremely unlikely that there’s a return of three first-round picks or a pair of young rotation pieces like in 2024 — get ready to power-rank your favourite newly acquired second-round picks — but there’s something to be said to knowing your place on the development cycle and making the most out of it. This probably won’t be a deadline with big, sexy deals; instead, the Raptors can leverage some of the “optionality” they’ve prioritized the last 18 months to bring in a few extra assets for the future, whether as future players or a stockpile to trade from later.

Whether you’re trying to figure out a trade for Jimmy Butler, get below the second luxury tax apron, or just find a way to make some complicated math work, the Raptors are your pals. Take a useful vet on an expiring deal of a range of sizes, throw some extra salary on to the Raptors’ books, and hey, kick a couple seconds their way, and your complicated trade suddenly looks a little easier.

What follows is an explanation of the different tools the Raptors have available to them, the CBA rules regarding trades, and other areas for clarification that people historically ask about.

Here’s how the Raptors books look today.

Editor’s note: Click and zoom in to read chart on app.

Tool #1 – $10 million in space beneath the luxury tax

One of the biggest assets a team can wield this time of year is simply the ability to take on money in a trade. As of Tuesday morning, the Raptors have an estimated $10 million in space beneath the luxury-tax line, leaving them clear to take back up to an additional $10 million in salary in a trade.

With so many teams needing to shed or re-route money because of tax and apron rules, that should make Toronto an attractive trade partner. Detroit, Utah, Washington, and San Antonio are similarly rebuilding teams who could rent out their tax space, while Oklahoma City and Houston are win-now teams with space, as well.

In theory, the Raptors could go into the tax, but it wouldn’t make a ton of sense to. Not only does paying the tax mean you don’t get the end-of-season payout from luxury-tax teams — currently estimated to be about $18 million per team — but you also avoid starting the clock on repeater penalties if you intend to be a tax team in the next few years as the team gets more competitive. Mostly, though, if you’re close to the tax line, you should always try to duck it.

A note on the luxury tax apron for the Raptors

The Raptors’ salary number cited for tax purposes above does not include $6.1 million that is on the books for “unlikely incentives” for RJ Barrett, Immanuel Quickley, and Jakob Poeltl. Technically, unlikely incentives count toward the tax for now, but all three players are extremely unlikely to achieve those individual bonuses, so they won’t end up counting toward their final tax number at the end of the season.

Those unlikely incentives, however, do count toward the luxury-tax aprons, whether they are achieved or not. (This is to prevent teams from circumventing apron rules by loading up unlikely incentives that are, uh, less unlikely.) The Raptors probably won’t go over the tax, anyway, so this won’t matter; if the right deal came along where they did exceed the tax, they would quickly be close to the first apron, where they are hard-capped this year (due to prior moves).

You don’t really need to worry about this, other than that it will help explain why you might see different tax and apron numbers depending on what source you look at.

Editor’s note: Click and zoom in to read chart on app.

Tool #2 – Mid-Level Exception as a Trade Exception

Under the new CBA, if a team does not use its mid-level exception to sign players, they can use it in-season as a trade exception. That means the Raptors could take on $12.8 million in salary without sending anything back out, which, combined with their tax space, is a helpful tool.

This exception can’t be aggregated with player salaries for a larger trade. For example, you couldn’t use Bruce Brown’s $23 million and the $12.8-million exception and take back a $35-million salary; you can only use the exception to absorb salary below the $12.8-million mark. Still, very useful!

Cleveland, New Orleans, and the Clippers are all teams close to the tax line who could look to duck under with a small trade sending out money, while Indiana, Atlanta and Brooklyn are right up against it. More notably, Boston, Milwaukee, Phoenix, and Minnesota are all over the second luxury-tax apron, which makes trading extremely difficult. Milwaukee, in particular, could want to unload a salary to duck below the second apron line, freeing the Bucks up for more trade flexibility. The Knicks are also very close to the second apron.

In these cases, the Raptors would look to absorb a salary and pick up an asset for their trouble.

Toronto may not want to use the entire mid-level this way, however. Saving a small piece of the exception would allow the Raptors to sign a player to a deal beyond the 2025-26 season. If, say, they wanted to convert Jamison Battle to a standard NBA contract after the deadline, they’d only be allowed to sign him for this year and next; if they still have some of their mid-level, they could sign him for this year and up to three more.

Tool #3 – Good players on expiring contracts of all sizes

Cap flexibility aside, the best thing you can have at the deadline is good players. If they’re on affordable contracts, all the better, and many teams will appreciate the flexibility that expiring contracts provide.