If you’re a big market team (like the Warriors) avoiding the luxury tax like the plague if there’s opportunities to improve your on court product and get the Bay buzzing anywhere near it was during WE BELIEVE makes very little sense.

I think there’s consensus on this point — that the Warriors should be willing to go into the luxury tax if doing so would either create a special team or keep a special team together. I’d define a “special team” as a genuine title contender… others, including Atma, might find an enjoyable consistent playoff team to be sufficiently “special”, and I think there’s an argument for that interpretation.

I think we can all agree that there’ve only been a couple decision points in Cohan’s tenure where you could make the case that the luxury tax was worth going into. Those would be 1) the attempt to trade for KG, 2) trading J-Rich for Wright as opposed to keeping him, 3) letting Baron walk, 4) the attempt to trade for Amar’e. In the first and fourth scenarios, by all accounts, Cohan was willing to go into the luxury tax to get those guys. Neither deal happened, of course, but no account I’ve seen of either has listed Cohan’s hesitation to pay the tax as a factor. In the third scenario, I don’t believe that a refusal to pay the tax was the holdup, either; Rowell (smartly, IMO) was leery of giving Baron too many years, given his age and conditioning. We probably could’ve kept Baron without paying the tax, as evidenced by Maggette’s almost-as-big contract… I don’t think cheapness was behind the decision to dump Baron.

So that leaves one decision: the J-Rich trade. We moved a expensive shooting guard who’d been a team mainstay for a rookie power forward. There’s some reason to believe that this was intended to be a component of a KG trade, but I don’t think this trade was an accident; I think that, barring the acquisition of KG, the team wanted J-Rich off the books so that they could extend Monta and Biedrins the next summer without going into the tax. I think this move was made to avoid paying the luxury tax.

The question is, was that a mistake? Would it have been worth paying the tax to keep the “We Believe” core together?

To answer this question, let’s walk through the alternate universe where we keep J-Rich. We play the ‘07-’08 season with J-Rich instead of Wright. Now, it’s my belief that we would have in fact done no better with J-Rich… that replacing Monta minutes with J-Rich minutes would’ve been a minus, and that we still would’ve missed the playoffs. But let’s say he would’ve helped. Let’s say the continued presence of J-Rich gets us the eighth seed and shot at the Lakers. I think we can all agree we would’ve lost in five games at the most… still, another playoff appearance would’ve been fun. And we wouldn’t have paid the tax for that season. So far, so good.

That takes us into the summer of 2008. Now, the first thing we should stipulate is that, if we keep J-Rich, we’re keeping Baron. If the point is keeping “We Believe” going, there’s no way you let its key guy walk. So let’s say we extend Baron last year at the five-year $65 million deal he got in Clipperland. Then, you’ve also got to assume that we still want to extend Monta and Biedrins… let’s say they get the deals they got, at $11M per and $9M per, respectively. Let’s also be generous and say that we made the same canny Turiaf deal that we made, before extending Monta and Biedrins. Where are you now?

Jason Richardson: $12.2M
Baron Davis: $11.2M
Monta Ellis: $11M
Al Harrington: $9.2M
Andris Biedrins: $9M
Stephen Jackson: $7.1M
Ronny Turiaf $4.5M
‘08 Draftee: ~$1.5M (if we’d had Denver’s pick at #20, I think we’d have taken Kosta Koufos)
Marco Belinelli: $1.4M
CJ Watson: $0.7M

TOTAL: $67.8 million

So here’s where you are. You’re less than four million dollars under the threshold, with zero flexibility and at least four roster spots to fill. Moreover, ’Buike’s still not signed. To match the deal the Clippers gave him, you need to pay him $2.9 million. Even with three minimum guys to fill out the bench, you’re triggering the tax.

“Okay,” you might say. “I’m fine with that — that’s the whole point. If it keeps a good team together, what do I care if Cohan shells out some extra dough?”

Here’s the problem: this team isn’t very good.

PG – Baron Davis
SG – Jason Richardson
SF – Stephen Jackson
PF – Al Harrington
C – Andris Biedrins

Bench: Monta Ellis, Ronny Turiaf, Kelenna Azubuike, CJ Watson, Marco Belinelli, Kosta Koufos

Yes, it’s the “We Believe” team… that’s fine and dandy. But you’re not getting 2007 Baron Davis, you’re getting 2009 Baron Davis, which has proven to be as big of a difference as many had feared. You’ve got a team that’s every bit as horrible at rebounding as last year’s team, and a team that is just about as horrible defensively. You’ve got a team where somebody — J-Rich, Jack or Monta — is coming off the bench, and extremely unhappy about it; you’ve got the some unhappy Al we actually had. There’s no superstar, and the closest thing to one is letting himself go now that he’s gotten his shiny new contract. This isn’t a definite playoff team… with Baron’s regression, I’m not sure that this is a .500 team. You want to pay the luxury tax for this?!

The truth is, the Warriors of recent years have never been good enough to merit the luxury tax. The way to win in the NBA is to acquire a superduperstar and then be willing to do whatever it takes to fill in the pieces around him. Once you have a great player — a Lebron, a KG, a Kobe, even a Nash or a Dirk or a Brandon Roy — then yeah, pay the tax. Whatever it takes. But to pay the tax before you have a superstar is to narrow the odds of your ever getting one. The “We Believe” team above has a 48-win ceiling and, unless you’re willing to trade Jack along with Al, no chance of getting a good player anytime soon. (I actually think packaging Jack and Al was the right move in any scenario, but if you’re a “We Believe” die-hard, I’m guessing you think we need Jack.)

Chris Cohan has shown a willingness to pay the luxury tax for a team built around a superstar, and an unwillingness to pay the luxury tax for anything less. I think that’s the exact right way to play it, not just in a financial sense, but in a basketball sense. He’s a terrible owner, but his willingness to spend is not what makes him terrible. In fact, it’s probably his best attribute as an owner.