One of the additional anticipated consequences of the NBA's new collective bargaining agreement with its punitive second apron, there will likely be fewer players on an absolute max contract than we have come to expect over the past few decades.
"I think the Clippers are ahead," said Brian Windhorst on The Bill Simmons Podcast. "The Clippers were targeted. The Clippers figured this out first. Number one when they negotiated with Kawhi [Leonard], he didn't get the max. He got close to the max.
"This is in, my view, this is going to be the new normal. The idea that these guys in mid-career, 'Oh, it's time for a contract extension, you want the max, here you go.' They're going to get extended, but they're not just going to be [an] assumption [of the max]. How many guys right now are making the max contract? Now, I'm not talking about their max because this is a thing the agents play. And and we help them with it in the media... But like a player's max is the most he can get versus the actual max. How many guys right now in the league are making the quote unquote max? There's dozens. Three years from now I think there's going to be a third of that amount."
Windhorst and Simmons discussed the Jalen Brunson situation where he extended with the Knicks for his maximum available dollars during the 2024 offseason, but he left money on the table from what he could have signed for if he had waited.
"They're going to get hundreds of millions, but they're not going to all just get the max," said Windhorst.