That still happens. The top 5 players make $30m-$40m, but they’d probably make closer to $50m+ in an open market. After all, the best players still get multiple

That still happens. The top 5 players make $30m-$40m, but they’d probably make closer to $50m+ in an open market. After all, the best players still get multiple teams trying to get them on max contracts. The current effect of the cap is mostly to redistribute some of that money to top 10-30 players who also get max contracts even as everyone knows they are not quite as good. There are also competitiveness reasons to avoid true maxes like parity between the teams of relatively rich and poor/thrifty owners. But yeah the union does depress the salaries of the very best.