Post#1383 » by shrink » Fri Jun 21, 2024 4:08 pm
I have been meaning to write a little something about Towns super-max extension. While public perception is that this is an overpay, I disagree, and I like it on principle. Hear me out.
In 1997, when Glen Taylor paid a 21-year old Garnett a whopping $126 mil extension, it shook the other owners, who demanded that the league install max contract rules, based on a percentage of the salary cap. If a kid like KG got paid like this, other owners feared that their stars would demand similar contracts. It set a tentpole for their beliefs, but the important part is that Garnett was so exceptional, he was worth that deal - and likely more!
Flash forward to today. We have maybe 50 players in the NBA making max deals. Why? Because without exceptional players, and more than one of them, teams just don’t have enough talent to win, and draw fans. It is these top 50 players that drive franchise success, not the average or even good players. I believe nearly all max deal players are underpaid, and the evidence supports it.
We tend to use tentpole players like Jokic as a tentpole. If a team pays a max or supermax salary, we look at other players making the same amount, and think “that’s a lot of money for less production!” That is true, but a better way to look at it is, “my max player is underpaid, and a good deal .. Jokic is underpaid too, and an even better deal.” Imagine I was selling cars but the highest price I could offer was $10k. If Denver got there first and bought the Rolls Royce, that doesn’t mean you don’t spend your $10k to get the Audi.
Evidence over the last few years supports this as well. When we looked at players like Westbrook and Harden, we said, “they are so overpaid, they are the worst contracts in the league and untradeable, without giving up picks!” Time and again, this perception is wrong. In the real world, not only do these players get traded, and they bring back positive returns.
I think there is a fallacy that when Towns starts his super-max deal, he becomes a bad contract. No, he is an expensive, highly-skilled player. A player doesn’t even qualify for a supermax without being very good. A supermax player does not need to be a #1 option either for the deal to be worthwhile, and we are fortunate to have such a talented player be willing to sacrifice, and support a rising star, rather than just demand a trade, or walk for nothing. In the playoffs, we faced three teams with elite max players, and other maxes in support. We succeeded because our #2 and #3 maxes generally outplayed theirs.
