JULY 8: The Kings have officially announced their new deal with Barnes, issuing a press release to confirm the signing.
JUNE 30: The Kings will finalize a four-year, $85MM deal with free agent forward Harrison Barnes, according to Sam Amick of The Athletic (Twitter link). The deal will decline annually, accounting for just 14% of the team’s cap during the final season. ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski confirms (via Twitter) that the two sides have agreed to terms.
Barnes, 27, was traded from the Mavericks to the Kings at February’s trade deadline in the third year of the four-year, maximum-salary contract he signed with Dallas back in 2016. For the season, he recorded 16.4 PPG and 4.7 RPG with a .420/.395/.824 shooting line in 77 games (32.9 MPG).
Barnes had a player option for the 2019/20 season that would have paid him more than $25MM, but opted to turn it down. Based on his new deal, it’s clear why he went in that direction — his new contract won’t be quite worth $25MM annually, but it will give him substantially more long-term security than his option would have.
When the Kings acquired Barnes from Dallas during the season, reports indicated that the team viewed him as its answer at small forward. However, head coach Dave Joerger ended up frequently using his new acquisition at the four. Presumably, Sacramento’s front office and new head coach Luke Walton are aligned on how to best use Barnes going forward.
Even after reaching deals with Barnes, Trevor Ariza, and Dewayne Dedmon today, Sacramento still projects to have up to about $13MM in cap space, notes ESPN’s Bobby Marks. However, the team could only create that room by renouncing Willie Cauley-Stein‘s cap hold.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images. Luke Adams contributed to this post.
Massive Overpay!
Is it though? Sure maybe this season it will be unless he can ball out. But he’s making less every year on his contract. This is an underrated move by the kings
Losers do what losers do
Quit hating cause your team has done jack squat lol
Declining money every year so they can dump him easily when they realize they made a mistake. Funny they sign him at all if they know they’ve made a mistake. They now have the team from the second half of the year, not the first with Shumpert. It’s not always about 3pt%.
The contract structure benefits the Kings because they have no use for extra space now, why not save it for the future? Barnes at 14% of the cap should be a pretty good deal
He is entering his prime he looked good in the games I saw last year. We shall see. I think the kings are in the playoffs next year. The Warriors are going to have hard time making the playoffs with just Steph and Green.