Minnesota Timberwolves Salary Cap Projections for 2020 and 2021
By Andrew Ites
We’ve received an update on salary cap projections for the next two offseasons in which the Minnesota Timberwolves are looking to build a championship contender.
The Minnesota Timberwolves have cleaned house and brought in an almost entirely new front office and coaching staff with an eye towards the future.
Under the leadership of Gersson Rosas and Ryan Saunders, the Wolves have built a young nucleus and are hoping to rise to the top-tier of the Western Conference in the next couple of years.
A valuable asset for building that would-be contender is salary cap space, and we received an important update from Shams Charania on what the NBA’s cap numbers will look like in the next two years.
According to Shams, the 2020-21 salary cap is expected to come in at $116 million with a luxury tax line of $141 million and the following year’s cap number is expected to be $125 million with $151 million being the luxury tax line.
Charania adds that the 2020-21 number is $1 million lower than previous salary cap projections.
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Spotrac says that the Wolves currently have 11 players signed for the 2020-21 season with a cap allocation of $107.5 million and eight players signed for a cap allocation of $94.4 million in 2021-22.
The lion’s share of the Wolves’ money will be going to Andrew Wiggins‘ max contract which runs through the 2022-23 season and Karl-Anthony Towns‘ max deal that begins this year and will keep him in Minnesota through the 2023-24 season.
Gorgui Dieng‘s four-year, $62.8 million contract will thankfully come off the books in the summer of 2021 if the Wolves are unable to trade him away before then.
Minnesota won’t have a ton of financial flexibility to make a run at some of the bigger names in the 2021 free agent class unless they are able to offload Wiggins or Dieng. However, they could have a good amount of room in the summer of 2022 if they are able to extend Josh Okogie‘s rookie contract at a reasonable number.
Minnesota has never been a premier free agent destination and it probably never will be. But the front office has done a nice job of building a solid young core and they can find role players to add to this team with their cap space in the coming offseasons.
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If Rosas is able to find a home for Wiggins or Dieng’s contracts, the Wolves could suddenly become major players in free agency. If not, they’ll continue to build this roster through the draft and sign/trade for solid veterans to supplement those promising young players.