The Bucks, who had been hoping to lock up Giannis Antetokounmpo to a super-max contract extension this summer, are one of many NBA teams whose future will be complicated by the current hiatus and the potential loss of revenue associated with it, writes Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report.
As Pincus details, a significant loss of revenue for the NBA would compromise the league’s ability to continue increasing its cap substantially over the next couple years. That would, in turn, create uncertainty about Antetokounmpo’s long-term earning power on a super-max deal that begins in 2021/22, and could have a major impact on Milwaukee’s ability to navigate the cap and the luxury-tax line.
Here’s more from around the NBA’s Central division:
- It fell through the cracks to some extent last week due to the NBA’s suspension, but Pacers swingman Jeremy Lamb underwent surgery to repair his torn left ACL and torn meniscus. He’ll be out indefinitely, according to the team. Given the serious nature of his injury, it seems safe to assume Lamb won’t return until sometime in 2020/21 no matter when the ’19/20 season resumes.
- James Edwards III of The Athletic examines how the COVID-19 situation may specifically impact the Pistons, exploring whether Derrick Rose could now return this season (yes), whether Christian Wood‘s free agency value will be impacted at all by his positive test for coronavirus (no), and more.
- Pacers owner Herb Simon is giving financial add to the part-time workers at Bankers Life Fieldhouse affected by the NBA’s stoppage, tweets Bob Kravitz of The Athletic. Meanwhile, the Bucks announced (via Twitter) that they’ll match the donations their players make to part-time arena workers at the Fiserv Forum.
Can’t see any reason that complicates Giannis super max, you just give it to him as much as you can. Anything else will work out itself, if MIL goes way over tax or they have to play scrubs or whatever, you just give Giannis the supermax, that is the easy part, the rest who cares, is all about him.
Plus, every other team is in the same boat as the Bucks when it comes to losing revenue. The Bucks can still offer more than any other team I believe.
The issue is more about the fact that a player’s earnings on a long-term contract are tied to the salary cap in the year that the contract begins — his raises are based on the first-year salary, not subsequent cap increases.
Giannis’ super-max would go into effect in 2021/22, so if there’s major uncertainty about how much the cap will actually increase by then, it could make him more hesitant to lock in a long-term deal early.