The Philadelphia 76ers made a shocking trade, acquiring All-Star snub Tobias Harris. With this, however, comes major financial implications.

While the hot start he helped the Los Angeles Clippers enjoy proved to be unsustainable, his contributions remained at a high enough level for him to potentially warrant near-max offers this offseason. The competitive market for him this summer scared the Clippers enough to cash in on him for assets now rather than let him enter free agency and risk losing him for nothing.

Meanwhile, the Sixers wanted to pursue Harris via free agency and weren’t afraid of the impending price tag on him and traded their 2020 first round (lottery protected through 2022), the Miami Heat’s 2021 first-rounder as well as organizational favorite rookie Landry Shamet.

Now in Philadelphia, Harris will be joined by a stacked starting five that includes Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons, Jimmy Butler and J.J. Redick. By assembling this cast, Philadelphia sent a message indicating that they are going all in this season and for more to come.

How much usable cap space do the 76ers have this offseason?

Jimmy Butler has a player option for $19.84M that he is expected to decline. When he opts out, he will have a $30.66M cap hold that will be on the Sixers books this summer.

Tobias Harris is entering unrestricted free agency with a $22.2M cap hold. Their 2019 first round pick is currently projected at No. 23 overall at the time of this article, so its current projected cap hold is being accounted for as well.

As such, they will operate over the salary cap to re-sign Butler, Harris, Redick and possibly even T.J. McConnell to long term deals using their bird rights. Ultimately, keeping this roster together will cost the Sixers a historic amount when you consider the future luxury tax implications. They will almost certainly be in the luxury tax next season and for years to come as well.

New deals for Butler, Harris and Redick should push the Sixers very close to the luxury tax. Butler and Harris are both eligible for five-year, $190 million deals with the Sixers with starting salaries of $32.7M.

While there is a chance that Butler and Harris could get slightly less than that, one would assume they come very close to it.

How much money would it cost to re-sign Tobias Harris?

Tobias Harris could be moving toward a maximum-level contract in free agency this summer, something that would've been difficult for Clippers to do with their own free agency aspirations. — Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) February 6, 2019

Before executing this trade, however, the Sixers were entering the 2019 offseason as a fringe salary cap team. By trading for Harris now, the Sixers will forego having cap space team this summer to re-sign all three of their major free agents to multi-year deals. This will be the most significant part of their offseason, especially for first-time general manager Elton Brand.

The current projected salary cap is set at $109M and after acquiring Jimmy Butler, they were looking at having $20.8M in cap space if they renounced every cap hold except for Butler’s.

Harris, however, is eligible for a 30 percent max contract designated for players with between seven to nine years of NBA service. That means his max deal has a starting salary of $32.7M — no matter what team he agrees to join.

If they trade Markelle Fultz into cap space, they can clear his $9.74M cap hit for 2019-20 and get closer to that max figure. However, this is still risky because it is still short of the max for Harris — and there are indications that there will be at least one team that offers it to him.

What sacrifices would have to be made to sign Harris?

ESPN methodology: Tobias Harris deal doubles Sixers' odds to win East https://t.co/1ywSB1BbnH — SixersWire (@SixersWire) February 6, 2019

The Sixers could renounce all their free agent cap holds except for what is owed to Butler, Harris and Redick and they would still be $14.5M above the salary cap.

The other risk Philadelphia takes by being a cap team is that if they do renounce Redick to generate sufficient cap space, they would only be able to offer him the non-taxpayer mid-level exception as their most substantial means to re-sign him. This is currently a $9.24M current projection for Redick. And if they strike out on other max level players, Redick may already be signed by someone else.

Last offseason they played a “wait and see” approach with him where they asked the sharpshooter to wait during free agency while they wanted to utilize their cap space first on a max player and then re-sign him as a fall-back option. It is doubtful he would be willing to do this favor again.

Based on Redick’s current level of play, he should garner a starting salary significantly higher than the MLE. If that is all they offer him, though, he could leave for a different franchise. For the sake of continuity, we have projected him to remain as a member of the core in Philadelphia.

What do the future cap projections look like for Philadelphia?

Let’s assume the market for both Butler and Harris is hot enough that Philadelphia has to give them both max deals to retain them. Let’s also assume the starting salary required to re-sign Redick is equal to his cap hold of $15.92M — although it is possible he will earn more than that.

In this scenario, the Sixers are just $553k below the luxury tax with only eight players on the roster. This is before signing their 2019 draft pick as well as presumably utilizing their taxpayer mid-level exception ($5.71M), then re-signing McConnell to a new deal and filling out the rest of their roster.

The most significant tax implication for the Sixers moving forward is how their roster is likely to become the most expensive roster in NBA history.

If they enter the luxury tax next season, they will likely remain in the luxury tax for the foreseeable future as long as they keep this core together. This is before the Sixers pay Ben Simmons, who is up for an extension this summer that would kick in for the 2020-21 season.

He is inevitably going to earn a 25 percent max contract that is currently projected to start at $29.5M. But if he makes another All-Star appearance next season, he is eligible for the 30 percent max contract instead — which would set his salary to start at $35.4M.

That means it is suddenly possible that the Sixers could commit over $150M to their starting five.

It is doubtful matters will get this extreme financially for the Sixers this offseason — but this is an example of things to come if other teams make competitive bids for their free agents.

If this core stays together as presently constructed, things get even more complicated heading into the 2022-2023 season. At that point, the Sixers could be in the luxury tax for the third consecutive season. This would activate the repeater tax — which adds an additional $1 to each tax bracket. Essentially, their luxury tax payment would literally be off the charts.

For an example of this in recent NBA history, long no further than the Oklahoma City Thunder. If they didn’t trade Carmelo Anthony or reduce any other payroll after re-signing Paul George and Jerami Grant last offseason, their payroll and tax payment would have exceeded $300M.

Will Thunder part ways with Carmelo Anthony due to luxury-tax bill? https://t.co/nxyzguQGh8 pic.twitter.com/yM7foC7oKS — HoopsHype (@hoopshype) July 2, 2018

It is possible that Simmons, Embiid, Butler and Harris will all earn between $33M and $40M over the next three to five seasons. That would eclipse any tax payment Oklahoma City or even the Golden State Warriors have ever approached.

Overall, the length of the contract the Sixers give to Butler and Harris will be critical to their tax management three years from now — particularly with Butler.

For example, next year will be his age-30 season. The Sixers may want to negotiate a three-year deal as opposed to five years in exchange for giving him full max money during the length of the agreement. That way, his contract would expire before the repeater tax kicks in and the front office could negotiate a new team-friendly deal with him as he enters his age-33 season.

As dangerous as the Sixers core is on the court, their finances are equally dangerous. The Sixers made a huge financial commitment after acquiring Harris, and now they will face historic expenses for a historic team.