The Bucks have been hit with a $50K fine by the NBA, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic, who tweets that the club violated league rules related to the timing of player contract comments. According to Charania, the fine stems from the Bucks publicly discussing their plans to offer Giannis Antetokounmpo a super-max contract.
Antetokounmpo is not yet eligible for that five-year Designated Veteran Extension, so league rules prohibit the team from discussing it, as the NBA noted in a press release confirming the fine.
“Under NBA rules, teams cannot commit to offer a ‘super-max’ extension prior to the summer following a player’s seventh season in the NBA,” the NBA said in its statement.
[RELATED: Hoops Rumors Glossary: Designated Veteran Extension]
The comments about a super-max deal for Giannis were made by Bucks general manager Jon Horst at a televised fan event earlier this month.
“The answer for now is that we can’t negotiate anything,” Horst said when asked about Antetokounmpo’s contract status. “So Giannis, basically a year from now will be eligible for a super-max extension. At that time, of course, he will be offered a super-max extension.”
The Bucks technically violated the NBA’s circumvention rules when discussing the reigning MVP’s future, as Jeff Siegel of Early Bird Rights observes (via Twitter). Still, Horst’s comments are pretty innocuous. While the Bucks can’t exactly “tamper” with their own player, I wonder if the NBA is looking to draw a clear line on this sort of public statement in the wake of its introduction of new anti-tampering measures.
Bucks co-owner Wes Edens also recently told TMZ that the franchise wants to keep Antetokounmpo for “the rest of his basketball career,” but given the lack of specificity involved in that statement, it’s unlikely to run afoul of the league’s circumvention rules.
Petty stuff like this will only make the sport more boring in the long run. Just let people be honest about things they’re already thinking anyway
So dumb that this is even a rule. What kind of tampering does this prevent?
Love the picture for this article
Good observation. And $ 50k for the Bucks is like fiddy cents for us common folk …
how could you admit out loud you are going to offer a top 3 player in the game a Super-Max? That’s just crazy..
How is this a rule? Hes under contract with the Bucks. Them saying they will supermax him doesnt precluded him from leaving for a lesser contract. And if he gets injured they arent obligated to give him a supermax. Who gets this fine money I always wonder.
It’s split evenly between the NBPA and the NBA then donated to charities such as UNICEF, Habitat for Humanity, Boys and Girls club of America and Feed the Children. I don’t agree with this fine but at least it goes to good causes.
So on top of fining a team for tampering with their own player, the fine goes to a charity called Feed the Chicken. I think the farmer can well enough get up off his butt and feed it himself.
Okay maybe they mean chicken in the plural sense, and the money is for the CORN. Well that’s FINE then, chicken do need fed.
Feed the chicken is funny and all. As a matter of fact I honestly busted a gut thinking I accidentally typed chicken instead of children, but sadly I did in fact type Feed the Children.
Prolly-cause I doubled down on it! Stand-ups like to do that. I think Conan started the mumbled triple-down.
Actually chicken is what I saw at first. Wait…
So teams can talk to superstars while they have contracts but when a teams gm says we are going to pay him every cent he deserves we get fined?! Not that that’s a lot to them but still crazy.
A $50,000 fine? We are talking about a contract worth over 200 million. I don’t think they will really be sweating this fine. The fine is virtually nothing, but the principle involved is still ridiculous.
Remember, the Bucks are a small market team. It actually is a bigger deal to Milwaukee, especially considering Giannis’ upcoming mega deal.
$50K is like 750 tickets. That’s nothing to an NBA team. They will get that back in the first hour if preseason games.
It’s really easy to see why they fined them for saying this. Publicly offering that contract before they’re even able to pressures Giannis into signing the deal. You can’t let them get away with trying to create that much leverage. This is the kind of thing that makes fans burn jerseys when a player leaves to go play for another team. The team and media created expectation of re-signing.
Do you hear yourself? Pressuring Giannis into signing it? How are the Bucks creating leverage? You’re telling me Giannis’s camp didn’t know a super-max was coming? You must be a joy at work if your boss states the obvious and it pressures you.
That is gotta be the most ridiculous fine ever in the history of the league…. just please abolish all the tampering rules, let anyone speak & say what they want, when they want…
#FREETAMPERING#