NBA teams have reportedly been advised that the league’s salary cap could rise past the $100m mark as soon as the 2017/2018 season, according to ESPN sources.
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League officials are understood to be anticipating the salary cap to increase from its current $63.1m mark to $67.1m next season, $89m in 2016/17 and then $108m in 2017/18.
That huge increase is largely down to the new TV deal that the NBA has agreed to which is worth $24 billion and will come into effect next year.
The previous largest salary cap rise was $7m in one season, and so the impact is clearly significant and will likely have an influence on how much the teams and players see financially.
However, naturally with more money there will be more problems as not only will the luxury tax threshold be increased too, but the National Basketball Players Association, through executive director Michele Roberts, has already rejected a “cap-smoothing” proposal which suggests that issues could arise if the players don’t feel that they are seeing their fair share of the influx of the new money.
The effect of the TV deal is already being felt and will continue to be felt in free agency this summer as players will be wary of signing long-term deals as they could wait a year and earn significantly more.
However, it is hoped that all parties concerned will come to an agreement at some point to deal with the increase in money and that they will all feel as though they are being adequately rewarded in order to avoid a situation where there is a possible lock-out.
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