Was the entire idea of the supermax ill conceived?

[WuriderX]

I mean it appears that almost no one who is getting is worth it.

[VCBC]

Yes bc in sports, GMs pay players for past performance not expected future, but that’s changing in baseball and you’re going to see the same in other sports.

[HoopsterJones]

Not the entire idea. It was to incentivize star players to stay with the team that drafted them which was supposed to give leverage to small market teams. But this contract hamstrings a team’s salary cap.

They should add a provision of the difference between the super max and Max not counting against a team’s cap which allows them a little more flexibility.

[xdrta+]

It hasn't worked out the way they expected, although, so far, only 4 players have actually signed a supermax, Curry, Harden, Westbrook, and Wall. I'd say 3 of the 4 worked out. IMO, the problem now is, if you're going to make $100M-$200M in your career, and maybe you've already got $100M in the bank, an extra $30-40M is not a difference maker. Other things become more important, winning, culture, etc. Davis is a good example.

[nikster]

It hasn't worked out the way they expected, although, so far, only 4 players have actually signed a supermax, Curry, Harden, Westbrook, and Wall. I'd say 3 or the 4 worked out. IMO, the problem now is, if you're going to make $100M-$200M in your career, and maybe you've already got $100M in the bank, an extra $30-40M is not a difference maker. Other things become more important, winning, culture, etc. Davis is a good example.

I’d say it’s still a difference maker. These players are done making this kind of after 35. Unless they’ve been making active and smart investments they likely won’t make $40 million for the rest of your life. That’s probably 10% boost to these players career earnings

[Domejandro]

I've said since the beginning that the "Super-Max" should only count as a normal max against the cap, albeit I honestly think there probably shouldn't be one in the first place.

[clyde21]

I've said since the beginning that the "Super-Max" should only count as a normal max against the cap, albeit I honestly think there probably shouldn't be one in the first place.

there shouldn't be a cap or a max?

[Wolfgang630]

The Super Trap

[Domejandro]

I've said since the beginning that the "Super-Max" should only count as a normal max against the cap, albeit I honestly think there probably shouldn't be one in the first place.

there shouldn't be a cap or a max?

A Super-Max, I've been leaning towards it being an incredibly ill-advised idea since the start, my only solution is making the "Super" part of the max cap-exempt (making it look like a normal max on the salary sheet). Otherwise, it is just dumb to attach financial benefits to media selected awards. Just my personal opinion, but I think the whole construction of it was poorly thought out.

[Optms]

Not the entire idea. It was to incentivize star players to stay with the team that drafted them which was supposed to give leverage to small market teams. But this contract hamstrings a team’s salary cap.

They should add a provision of the difference between the super max and Max not counting against a team’s cap which allows them a little more flexibility.

So it hinders a team's cap space?

Both eligible player and front office are fully aware of the trade off when asking/giving the Supermax. Want to avoid superteams like GS while also prevent saving idiot GM's from themselves? Then leave it as is.

The only issue I have with it is All-NBA players being eligible for it. It should only be reserved for First and Second team All NBA players. Third-team players are not worthy.

The fact that Kemba Walker is eligible for it is laughable.

[monopoman]

Supermax is a great idea if it had the minor caveat the cap space it holds up should be the exact same as the normal max. It's pretty ridiculous that the team that likely drafted the player have to hinder their future cap space if they do have a loyal player that is not after the next big super team elsewhere.

Why would they make this thing hinder the team more so than a normal max that in most cases drafted the player in question?

[dc]

It hasn't worked out the way they expected, although, so far, only 4 players have actually signed a supermax, Curry, Harden, Westbrook, and Wall. I'd say 3 or the 4 worked out. IMO, the problem now is, if you're going to make $100M-$200M in your career, and maybe you've already got $100M in the bank, an extra $30-40M is not a difference maker. Other things become more important, winning, culture, etc. Davis is a good example.

It hasn't really worked at all. The thing is, all 4 of those guys would've likely stayed in their current situations even w/o the Supermax rule. It has "worked out" in 3 of the 4 cases because those guys have been worth the money and haven't hamstrung their franchises.

The SuperMax rule was simply a knee jerk reaction to KD leaving. Nothing more. The ironic thing is it's probably not going to help the Pels keep AD. The Supermax rule hasn't helped a single team so far. It's going to hurt more teams than it will help.

[the sea duck]

A lot of you have said it and people have said it before. The "extra" part of the supermax shouldn't count against the cap. The whole idea of a cap and tax is that they limit competition so costs don't perpetually rise due solely to that competition. But the supermax already has that built in since it's a max salary (plus) and has other restrictions. So there's no reason to penalize the bonus since it won't affect the scarcity of the option.

[JonFromVA]

It hasn't worked out the way they expected, although, so far, only 4 players have actually signed a supermax, Curry, Harden, Westbrook, and Wall. I'd say 3 or the 4 worked out. IMO, the problem now is, if you're going to make $100M-$200M in your career, and maybe you've already got $100M in the bank, an extra $30-40M is not a difference maker. Other things become more important, winning, culture, etc. Davis is a good example.

It hasn't really worked at all. The thing is, all 4 of those guys would've likely stayed in their current situations even w/o the Supermax rule. It has "worked out" in 3 of the 4 cases because those guys have been worth the money and haven't hamstrung their franchises.

The SuperMax rule was simply a knee jerk reaction to KD leaving. Nothing more. The ironic thing is it's probably not going to help the Pels keep AD. The Supermax rule hasn't helped a single team so far. It's going to hurt more teams than it will help.

Not just KD, but when LeBron left Cleveland in 2010 it was probably an economic wash for him to go to Miami which lack state taxes. Players figured out the extra year on the contract didn't necessarily mean anything in the economics.

There was a time you could trust that a player would just take the biggest deal, but not anymore. So the supermax just can't help as much as some sort of a franchise tag. At least, not without increasing it to an even more ridiculous level. And even a franchise tag isn't perfect as it incentivizes the player to sabotage his value/desirability if he wants to hit free-agency.

[monopoman]

The Supermax would still matter to some players and I have no problem with ring chasers chasing rings overall. Obviously it's pretty lame for competitiveness in the NBA when KD bolts for the best team in the NBA, but that is a very rare event. Franchise tag sounds pretty bad because as you said certain players would just go into a really bad mode in some cases just to get released.

[Patches Perry]

They need to get rid of the max altogether. Just like the previous max created an artificial ceiling too low, the supermax creates an artificial ceiling too high. A supermax is the most you can make, therefore franchise players think they should make the most you can make. Without an artificial ceiling, you'd see much more organic agreements based on actual value.

[-G-]

I mean it appears that almost no one who is getting is worth it.

The idea was to create incentive for stars to stay. Wall, Westbrook, Griffin, Curry - mission accomplished. Other teams have traded guys before hand. Lebron and Durant are worth so much an extra 30-40mill didn't mean anything. Don't think they envisioned guys turning down the extra year and money.

The problem is just because a guy is eligible for the super max doesn't mean you should pay it. No way Kemba should get it.

[bisme37]

I think it really just forces small market teams to pay more than they would otherwise have to. Dame would have stayed in Portland for the regular max, but they had to offer super max just because it exists and they don't want to offend him. Same thing with Kemba, potentially, and even Giannis when his deal is up. Guys are either going to want to stay with their team or not, and teams could already pay their players more than other teams.

[OldSchoolNoBull]

It was ill-conceived. I would say both this and the lotto reform were ill-conceived band-aids for the competitive imbalance caused by the rise of superteams.

The Supermax was a desperate band-aid to try to stop players from bolting their teams for superteams. It hasn't really worked.

The lotto reform came on the heels of an increase in tanking teams, but I would argue more teams were tanking because they felt hopeless trying to compete with superteams. Another band-aid that I fear will make it too easy for a team that only missed the playoffs by a few games to jump into the top 3-4.

The reality is superteams are a problem for the league, PR-wise if not competitively. And it increasingly appears that the only real solution is to eliminate the max salary altogether so that it is no longer financially desirable for superstars to team up. But that's not going to happen.

Anyone who was around in the 90s when we had soft cap+no max salary knows that the league fought for the better part of a decade, culminating with the 99 lockout, to get out of that. They wanted a hard cap, they didn't get it, they settled for max salaries+luxury tax system in lieu of a hard cap.

I'd bet anything the league will never give max salaries up unless they're getting a hard cap in return, and that the players union is never going to give them a hard cap unless the league goes nuclear like the NHL did back in 04 and misses a whole season.

So this is where we are. There's been a problem(perhaps somewhat overblown) with stars teaming up and the league can only attempt band-aid fixes like this.

Perhaps the younger generation in the league, the generation after the Superfriends, the generation of Giannis, Embiid, Jokic, Doncic, Zion, etc will have a a different mindset than the Superfriends and the problem will solve itself.

[Jazz9]

Cap hit + players thinking that being eligible means they should be offered one = bad