Warriors owner Joe Lacob has been fined $500,000 for publicly discussing the NBA’s collective bargaining talks, per Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.
Lacob committed the infraction on the Point Forward podcast, hosted by NBA players Andre Iguodala and Evan Turner. Iguodala is a former Finals MVP with the Warriors and currently an unrestricted free agent after winning another title with the team this past season.
During the interview, Lacob referred to the league’s luxury tax system as “very unfair,” as relayed by Wojnarowski.
“The hardest thing of all is navigating this luxury tax, unfortunately,” Lacon said, via Wojnarowski. “I went back to New York this week for labor meetings. I’m on the committee. And you know, obviously, the league wants everyone to have a chance and right now, there’s a certain element out there that believes we ‘checkbook win…’ We won because we have the most salaries on our team.
“The truth is, we’re only $40 million more than the luxury tax. Now, that’s not small but it’s not a massive number. We’re $200 million over in total because most of that is this incredible penal luxury tax. And what I consider to be unfair and I’m going to say it on this podcast and I hope it gets back to whoever is listening. Obviously, it’s self-serving for me to say this, but I think it’s a very unfair system because our team is built by….all top eight players are all drafted by this team.”
The Warriors are projected to pay a record $181 million in luxury tax next season, Wojnarowski reported.
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