Does Kawhi deserve a 5 yr max extension

[look_at_g_shred]

Of course he does. 5 years $60 mill and the face of the franchise sounds good to me.

[Drom John]

Kawhi Leonard of the Spurs may be the Jason Heyward of the Braves.
The tendonitis and hand have hurt Leonard ulative value and the hand, appendicitis and jaw hurt Heyward.
Both Heyward and the Braves wanted to sign a longterm contract this offseason, but Heyward wanted to be paid for his potential, the Braves considered playing time to be a projectable stat.

I'd expect a Heyward like medium per/year relative to Leonard's draft class two-year contract with maybe a player option the second year.

[DesignatedT]

12/yr seems like a fair contract. If he wants 14 then you have to give it to him but 12 would be a fair #.

[wildchild]

In these kind of contracts, probably an important role is decided by taxes...for what I red texas is a good place to play (and, for example, canada is not) because of the limited taxes. So a ten million dollars per year offer made by us could be equal or better, for example, of a 11/12 million offer per year made by another team...

Agree. One of the many reasons behind Dwight Howard's choice.

Rare and valuable skills, Leonard is able to impact the game both on offense and defense. Maybe his offense isn't nearly as elite as his defense right now but it's still dangerous, he has proved that last games being a prolific and versatile scorer.

In a league where two-way players are more en vogue than ever, a young and legit two-way player like Leonard can be of tremendous value for a team.

[Baam]

Kawhi has the highest winning % of any player in the league over the past 3 seasons. That in itself is quite impressive and tells you how valuable you are to your team.

I don't think Max deal, but a 5 year 60-65mil is around the ball park the Spurs will be paying. His next contract, assuming he get better and sustains his level of play, will definitely be more.

Who knows, potential has a shelf life...

Also he has missed a lot of games due to injury... Steph Curry got 11M x 4 years...

It's safe to say he's getting north of 10M and yeah Splitter's contract does matter whether some like it or not...

But I don't think he's getting a lot above 10M, 11M seems fair given the injury concern... Anything above 12M would be meh...

[DesignatedT]

Not really an injury concern at all tbh. Getting jumpers knee is pretty common among players and that has fully gone away after a couple months rest this Summer. Breaking a bone in your hand could happen to anyone and probably has if you have played enough basketball in your life. Curry rolls his ankle three times a year.

[r0drig0lac]

if you pay less than 63/5 will be a steal for the Spurs

[Chinook]

Kawhi's not taking less money just so the Spurs have more cap space. Players just don't do that coming off second contracts. It just doesn't happen outside small hometown discounts for mid-tier players like Green. Anyone who thinks former Spurs players did that during their second contract completely misremembers the team's history.

[TheyCallMePro]

Good point on Parker. He expects to be taken care of this summer with a multi-year extension. And a lot of Spurs fans just don't understand how much $$ that's going to entail. He's a superstar PG, only 31, and he's been underpaid his entire career while scrubs like John Wall are getting 5 years/80 million.

Parker is going to get PAIIIIID. Think 4 years/60 million. And he deserves it. He's only been the best PG for the last decade plus.

As for Kawhi, I agree, only superstars get max contracts. Kawhi is not close to a superstar. He'll get something like 5 years/64 million though, and if he won't take that, then he's an idiot.

[Mel_13]

Good point on Parker. He expects to be taken care of this summer with a multi-year extension. And a lot of Spurs fans just don't understand how much $$ that's going to entail. He's a superstar PG, only 31, and he's been underpaid his entire career while scrubs like John Wall are getting 5 years/80 million.

Parker is going to get PAIIIIID. Think 4 years/60 million. And he deserves it. He's only been the best PG for the last decade plus.

As for Kawhi, I agree, only superstars get max contracts. Kawhi is not close to a superstar. He'll get something like 5 years/64 million though, and if he won't take that, then he's an idiot.

That's not true at all. You named John Wall. Rudy Gay is another. There are plenty more.

5/64 is probably a good guess for where is he is now, but Kawhi has performed better in the playoffs than the regular season so far in his career. If he raises his level of play in another deep playoff run, he may be able to get even more.

btw, I don't believe TP gets anything close to that. He'll be 33 with 14 years of year round play on his body when that extension would kick in. He may get close to that annual salary, but more likely for two years rather than four.

[007nites]

5year/60 millions is fair

Sounds good to me.

Year 1: 6mil
Year 2: 8mil
Year 3: 12mil
Year 4: 16mil
Year 5: 18mil

[spurraider21]

I doubt Parker gets that much. Pay him for his age 31-35 seasons. You aren't paying him for previous years. If you think otherwise ask yourselves why teams don't pay retired superstars base on past performance

[Mel_13]

Sounds good to me.

Year 1: 6mil
Year 2: 8mil
Year 3: 12mil
Year 4: 16mil
Year 5: 18mil

That sort of structure is not possible. The maximum raise from year to year is 5.5%.

[Chinook]

That's not true at all. You named John Wall. Rudy Gay is another. There are plenty more.

5/64 is probably a good guess for where is he is now, but Kawhi has performed better in the playoffs than the regular season so far in his career. If he raises his level of play in another deep playoff run, he may be able to get even more.

btw, I don't believe TP gets anything close to that. He'll be 33 with 14 years of year round play on his body when that extension would kick in. He may get close to that annual salary, but more likely for two years rather than four.

I don't think he realizes that there are multiple levels of max contracts and that Kawhi's max would be about $7Million less per year than say Lebron.

Also, it should be noted that Parker will likely not get longer than a three-year contract/extension since he'd be under the over-36 restriction if he had a longer deal than that.

[lurker23]

So, here's some interesting new data on this subject, buried within a Nate Silver article at FiveThirtyEight.com:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/...er-to-the-max/

It's a long article, but the table in question is about 3/4s of the way down:



Based on his regression analysis, players 95th percentile or above deserve max contracts, while those in the 94th percentile or below don't (statistically speaking).

My two major takeaways are this:

1. Kawhi's performance is just as good statistically as it is passing the eye test (something that several others have pointed out at various times this year), and
2. This data supports the idea that he deserves a very good extension, but not a max one.

[Baam]

The way Pop talks about him he will make a point to give him the max, it's almost uncomfortable to listen to Pop talking about his amazing body...

[Old School 44]

Kawhi will get max money if he wants it. He doesn't need to average 20 pts per game, but I do think he's capable. How many guys in this league can defensively go toe-to-toe with forwards James, Durant, Aldridge, George, Anthony, Nowitzki and still have the versatility to guard a Westbrook, Wade, Lillard, Harden, Curry, Paul, Irving, Wall? Not many.

Make no mistake Kawhi will get whatever he wants.