Morant’s salary is a fraction of what he deserves, which is bad for him and, in the harsh reality of the competitive NBA, magical for his team. To contend for the NBA title, you typically need to win north of 50 games. The Warriors’ math is that if Curry generates 15 wins, then there’s some tap dancing—and cap dancing—to figure out how to afford the other 35-40. After paying Steph, the Warriors had only $67 million left to spend under the salary cap. That would only buy 20 more wins at league-average prices, and who wants to win a measly 35 games? So to leap back into title contention, the Warriors shattered the salary cap and set all-time spending records. Over the broad sweep of NBA history, we see the occasional Joe Lacob, James Dolan, Mikhail Prokhorov, or Paul Allen—billionaires determined to build dynasties with gold bricks. It usually doesn’t work. Even when it does, the league stacks on such punitive luxury-tax bills that everyone eventually loses their appetite for overspending.