1. They Are Still Avoiding the Luxury Tax
Tom Gores has always said he is willing to spend on a competitive team. He has even said he would go into the luxury tax to re-sign players like Kentavious Caldwell-Pope in the past. That obviously did not happen, but he signed off on the Blake Griffin trade despite the team already being over the cap because he felt it would make them more competitive.
However, the Pistons were very careful to avoid the luxury tax during the offseason. They made their one “splash” by signing Glenn Robinson III to a 2 year, $8.3 million deal using the mid-level exception and then opted to sign Jose Calderon and Zaza Pachulia to the veteran’s minimum.
They could have brought back Anthony Tolliver, but the 1 year, $5 million deal he signed with the Timberwolves would have put the Pistons into the luxury tax. They could have signed somebody like Seth Curry instead of Calderon, but the $2.75 million he signed for this season would have put the Pistons into the luxury tax.
A key wrinkle to the Calderon and Pachulia contracts is the fact that they only count $1.5 million against the cap even though the veteran’s minimum is about $2.4 million. The Pistons were able to pull this off because they are veterans and if they went with somebody like a Seth Curry, they would not have been able to structure the contracts like this. This further shows that Ed Stefanski knows what he is doing and was able to find a creative way to stay under the luxury tax.
This all goes to show that they could have gone for better players than what they signed, even with their lack of cap room, but those players would have put them into the tax. The Pistons have not won consistently enough to be a team with their current cap situation. It would look even worse to be paying the luxury tax with the lack of results they have had.
