The Golden State Warriors intend to offer star players Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson five-year, maximum-level contracts, ESPN’s Brian Windhorst reports.
“It is my understanding that in talking to people in the Warriors organization that their intention is to continue and offer Kevin Durant a full, five-year max contract and to offer Klay [Thompson] a full, five-year max contract,” Windhorst said Friday on ESPN’s First Take.
If this is the case, it won’t come cheap for the Warriors as they already have Stephen Curry locked in a super-max designated veteran extension and would be looking at paying the dreaded repeater tax as they’ve been a luxury tax team in three of the last four seasons.
Despite the hefty bill that will be heading the Warriors way, Windhorst said Golden State will have a means to pay for it all.
“Those two decisions would put their payroll next year, including luxury taxes, at over $350 million and they’re gonna be able to pay for it because they’re gonna move across the bay to a cash-cow arena, which will increase their team revenue by enough to pay for it,” Windhorst said.
If the Warriors intend to offer Durant and Thompson these full, five-year max deals the value of the contracts — assuming next season’s salary cap increases to the projected $109 million — would come in at about $221.27 million for Durant because he is eligible for 35 per cent of the cap in a max deal and $189.66 million for Thompson and the 30 per cent of the cap max deal he’s in line for.
More interesting than just the value of these potential deals, however, is the fact the Warriors appear to have shown what their free-agency priorities are even though both Durant (Achilles) and Thompson (ACL) have suffered injuries that will see them miss a lengthy amount of time next season.
The NBA’s free-agent moratorium period begins June 30 at 6:00 p.m. ET.
[relatedlinks]
