Report: NBA Owner Has Been Fined $500,000 For Comments

Golden State Warriors owner Joe Lacob has reportedly been fined $500,000 for his recent comments about the league’s collective bargaining talks, per ESPN NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski.

During a recent appearance on the Point Forward Podcast with Andre Iguodala and Evan Turner, Lacob called the NBA’s luxury tax system “very unfair.”

The league prohibits owners and team officials from engaging in “unauthorized communications regarding collective bargaining.”

The Warriors paid an NBA record $170 million in luxury tax and $346 million in total payroll this past season, per NBC Sports. Lacob feels his team was at this point due to an “incredibly penal” luxury tax.

Here’s Lacob’s full statement on the matter:

The hardest thing of all is navigating this luxury tax, unfortunately. 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 … and 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 league’s new collective bargaining agreement could possibly include more regulations for teams like the Warriors who are well above the luxury tax. But for now, Golden State will continue to benefit from an owner who’s willing to spend money to remain among the NBA elite.