The 20th player selected in Thursday night’s NBA draft is due — as set by the league’s rookie-pay scale — a starting salary approaching $2 million.
It’s a predetermined number that doesn’t begin to answer this question facing a Wolves organization that must decide whether to trade the pick or keep it:
Just what is a first-round draft pick really worth?
The quick and easy answer is more than it once was in a league changed two years ago by a new $24 billion television contract that floated a lot of boats.
That deal inflated the salary cap beyond $100 million per team and now leaves the Wolves evaluating — as the luxury-tax threshold looms by 2019 — whether they can pay maximum contracts to already-signed Andrew Wiggins as well as young star center Karl-Anthony Towns and four-time All Star Jimmy Butler and still assemble a competitive roster around them.