How far did the Minnesota Timberwolves take their roster in the 2022 off-season? As far as the funding allowed them to, it seems. After all, the team elected to fill their 15th and final roster spot by electing to sign young power forward Nathan Knight to a standard contract, rather than the original plan to sign him to their final Two-Way contract.
While the Minnesota Timberwolves got down to the wire, with the choice of whether to put Nate Knight on the roster or on a Two-Way for one more season, the team clearly had one eye on the finances as well. It turns out that placing Knight on a contract has pretty much exhausted the salary cap wiggle room remaining for the team.
Is the team broke already? Not exactly. It’s more along the lines of painting themselves into a financial corner. The only tool left in the team’s toolbox now is their BAE, or Bi-Annual Exception, valued at $4.1 million.
After the Nate Knight signing, the Wolves cap sheet is looking pretty done (save maybe an extension). $3.1M below the tax.
— Dane Moore (@DaneMooreNBA) July 24, 2022
All the Wolves have left in spending power is the $4.1M BAE -- which if used would seem most likely to be on one of those midseason signings on a buyout guy pic.twitter.com/psK9ZYhgVE
So what is the Bi-Annual Exception?
The BAE is an amount set for an NBA every two years that allows the team to sign a player for more than the veteran minimum if they have exceeded the salary cap. If used, the BAE will trigger the NBA hard cap.
The 2022-23 salary cap for NBA teams has been set at $123.655 million for the 2022-23 season. The upper limit for the luxury tax is currently $150.267 million. The current value of the NBA hard cap for the 2022-23 season is set at or around $156.9 million.
As of July 28, 2022, per Spotrac.com, the Minnesota Timberwolves are now at $147,207,825. That is right around $3 million below the luxury tax level and just under $10 million from the NBA hard camp. For more financial flexibility, the team will either need to look to renegotiating a player contract or, in a worse case scenario, look to move higher cost players off the roster and add players at a cheaper cost.