On Lincentives:
Eric Pincus has a excellent, to-the-point tweet:
[tweet]https://twitter.com/EricPincus/status/751440109480796161[/tweet]
"Unlikely bonuses" are explained in that Larry Coon Salary Cap Ultra-FAQ:
http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm (go all the way down to #74). They're more lucrative than "likely" bonuses (maintained player productivity, max 4.5% bonus)
Depending on how "nice" Nets want to be to Lin (did they "know" they were getting a good deal and wanted to build in a little extra bonus into the contract, or are they gonna out-and-out challenge him to "earn" it), they can supplement his salary by up to 7.5% (in this case, Pincus thinks it's more like 6% I guess) without it counting against the cap if he, for instance, hits certain performance parameters. My guess, it's PPG and/or APG. According to Coon, 1 assist over Lin's
last-season average would count as an "unlikely" bonus. So, if they want to reward Lin, they set his assist goal at, like, 4.5 (pfft, Kemba Walker can do it as a scoring guard-type, so you KNOW Lin can). If Marks wants Lin to "earn it", they set it at, say, 7-8. Lin's agents are no fools, presumably, so I'm thinking they set mutually-agreed-upon "unlikely" performance bars where Lin can EASILY hurdle them (13 and 4.5).
Unlikely bonuses become much more likely when you're promoting a last-season 6th man to full-time starting PG minutes.
