So serious curious Q...
Are only 16 of our local players on more than 150k a year?

Abercrombie
Martin
Kay
DJ
Creek
Goulding
McCarron
Bogut
Lisch
Newley
Cooks
Blanchfield
Ogilvy
Sobey
Gliddon
Jawai

???

Not really clear, but I think what you are asking is "who are the top 6, and bottom 5 for each team?"?

It's interesting for Perth, I've never been completely sure.
I always suspected that Norton was back-ended, but don't know for sure.
Similarly I assumed Martin & Wagstaff re-signed for significantly less.

Obviously there is a reason they signed guys like Vague, WLSLB, and now Travers for next year, as they would give them more space under the bench-cap.

Hunt was clearly not a highly paid import. And Plumlee only coming for 7 games (and being paid $12.5M by the NBA) might not actually be costing that much.

Spot on D2.0!

It's not really clear.
But I thibk it does show that if you mail ypur top 5 paid players correctly, that the other 54 players in the league are all on (ball park) similar small dollars.

What is everyone's obsession with what a bunch of basketball players are making? Head, meet concrete wall.

My top end salary estimates are in this thread

https://www.hoops.com.au/forum/46325-4m-gap-between-kings-and-sixers-wright/#p774103

The bottom 5 players on each team must be on max combined $514,800.

That's players 6-11, or for teams with a Next Star 7-12.

So there must be loads of NBL players on well under 100k.

The conjecture is more about what the top and middle players are earning.

It's interesting to try and ponder creative ways for David to beat Goliath & consider long term sustainability systems for smaller budget teams to compete with the top dogs.

So understanding the value of human resources/assets is paramount to this.

Correction of my above error:

The bottom 5 players on each team must be on max combined $514,800.

That's players 7-11, or for teams with a Next Star 8-12 since they have 12 contracted players.

Salary threads will always be fruitless no one has proof of any salaries and the real figures might surprise us.

Correct my anonymous friend.
People keep forgetting next stars aren't part of the budget.

I'm using the 8 to 12 in terms of player rotations, not contracted players.

Technically this is only true if the Next Star is in the top 7 of your rotation- like with Illawarra and NZ.

Essentially, if you have a Next Star then you have 12 contracted players on your roster. 11 are contracted to you.

If you're a team with a big budget- like Sydney, this gives you an opportunity to have a deeper roster and bury a barely used player on your bench (think Hunter, Walker- who wouldn't get time if the team was at full strength)

Absolutely.

For SEM it wouldn't surprise me to find out that Madgen is in their top 6, he was quite a decent guard for a while and they may have tossed some coin to lure him back and just got unlucky on the quality that returned

For Brisbane, Hodgson would have to be in the top 6 just because of demand. He might not be anything spectacular or even in the running for the all NBL team but there is a lot of value on a good defensive/rebounding local. Almost every team wants one yet there are very few in the league. Bogut and Hodgson with Pinaeu and Kay at a stretch

Based on what I've heard, I think the bottom 5 structure can look something like this:

7: $155,000
8: $125,000
9: $90,000
10: $75,000
11: $70,000

Given how teams fill the end of the bench, I'd expect the 7th player to be paid well above $100k, and presume the 8th guy too.

Simple maths $515K divided by 5 is $103K each.
Depending on team your 10/11 players will get $60-70K each.
7. $140K
8. $125K
9. $110K
10. $75K
11. 65K.

They're estimates of course.
Many of these bench players top up their income with NZBL or NBL1 deals.