As teams like the Denver Nuggets navigate the NBA's second apron and are negotiating with would-be free agents with one hand tied behind their back, the San Antonio Spurs became the first team to master paying players what they're worth.
With Victor Wembanyama agreeing to a pay cut in his rookie contract extension, the San Antonio Spurs have a decent amount of financial flexibility moving forward. Even if Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper don't accept similar pay cuts, the only bad salary on the Spurs' books is De'Aaron Fox.
Elsewhere in the Western Conference, the Denver Nuggets seem to be on the verge of losing Nikola Jokic. The Nuggets, despite having a three-time MVP, have only had a single Finals appearance with him leading the way. Overpays to guys like Christian Braun, Michael Porter Jr., Zeke Naji, and even Aaron Gordon and Jamal Murray have caught up to them, limiting their options.
The Spurs, on the other hand, extended players like Keldon Johnson, Devin Vassell, and Julian Champagnie, and signed Tobias Harris in recent seasons. In those negotiations, San Antonio introduced the NBA to a new concept: paying players what they're worth.
Spurs Have Reshaped NBA Free Agency
"Do you want to play for a title contender?" is usually a better sales pitch than "we can give you a lot of minutes on a sub-.500 team." Being good gives the Spurs a leg up, but that isn't the reason why players are signing reasonable deals to come to San Antonio.
Instead of looking at salaries and contracts as a dollar amount, signs point to the Spurs looking at each deal as a percentage of the salary cap.
Last season, 20 players played a total of 19,730 minutes in the Silver and Black. Victor Wembanyama accounted for 9.4 percent of those minutes. Even though he's the most effective player on both ends of the floor for San Antonio, giving someone who, comparatively, plays very little upwards of 35 percent of the salary cap doesn't make much sense.
Wemby understands this, and set an example for everyone else.
Players and agents step into negotiations with an inflated number in their heads. The Spurs, smartly, can counter with "Are you really worth more than 30 percent of our cap?" Plus, with Wemby making less than he probably should, the Spurs can claim that no one on the roster is as valuable as him and therefore won't make as much as him.
It's pretty hard to argue against that.
The Spurs, logically, have started to pay players what they're worth now, based on what they've already shown. Broken teams, like the Nuggets and Cleveland Cavaliers, are paying players based on what they could be.
Winning franches unserstand the differernce.
