Hollinger: Blazers ‘Making Calls’ to Reduce Luxury Tax Bill

The Portland Trail Blazers are “making calls” ahead of Thursday’s NBA Trade Deadline with the goal of reducing their luxury tax bill, according to The Athletic’s John Hollinger (subscription req.). Hollinger says Portland and Golden State both have similar goals and are teams to watch:

Two teams with tax situations that warrant monitoring are Golden State and Portland. Both are making calls looking at reducing their bill, but may not necessarily get all the way out of the tax — a tricky situation since both are looking at potential repeater bills in future seasons. Portland could reduce its bill by paying a team cash to take one or more of Caleb Swanigan, Skal Labissiere and Wenyen Gabriel; dropping all three and signing minimum rest-of-season contracts to fill the two required roster spots would cut a $9.5M tax bill down to $2.9M.

Thursday’s trade deadline is 12 p.m. PT. Check out Blazer’s Edge’s rumors tracker from a busy Wednesday here.