The Official 2025-2026 NBA Regular Season Discussion Thread

erikthredd · July 9, 2025 9:45AM

Looks like OKC's countdown clock as a title favorite with this current core of SGA, Holmgren & Jalen WIlliams has officially started after Chet just signed this rookie supermax https://www.hoopsrumors.com/2025/07/thunder-chet-holmgren-agree-to-max-five-year-extension.html

Jalen Williams rookie deal has just this '25/26 season left on it and if he gets voted All-NBA again (2nd time over a 3yr stretch) he then becomes eligible for a Supermax on par with that historic recent contract extension that SGA just signed. The Thunder would then be facing some difficult roster decisions similar to what Boston has dealt with this offseason due to the NBA's idiotic second apron restrictions.
With SGA & JDub each in that 70M range and Chet in the high 40's, those three would likely account for almost all of OKC's entire salary cap number. They basically have a two year window before all of these extensions kick in fully and at that point, its either give up one of your homegrown stars from the three names above or jettison the rest of their playoff rotation role players (Hartenstein/Caruso/Dort/joe/Wiggins) that just helped you win the Finals. Its possible that they could end up going both routes.

Its a real shame that some teams can do everything right by putting together a championship winning roster and as soon as you reward the players for their part in helping you win, it automatically starts a countdown clock to when you'll need to start trimming salary or face heavy tax fines & numerous trade restrictions. Most NBA owners are too cheap to do what is needed to see their own team be successful but they sure as hell hate seeing other teams have prolonged success which likely means the age of dynasties are pretty much over as long as the current CBA is in effect. This is the first offseason where the league's new tax provisions are all on the table and the players group as a whole saw their total salaries number drop by close to 500M. IIIRC it was just over 480M-ish but may drop a bit with some mid level free agents still on the market.

Its ironic that the owners cried about parity for years to the point that they changed the rules around roster building to help create more parity, yet by the time those rules fully kicked in, the league just watched the 7th different champion over that 7 year stretch. Talk about cutting off one's nose to spite one's face lol, its really not that surprising to see so many teams change ownership in recent years, might as well cash out while the getting is good. The Portland Trail Blazers are now the most recent team to go up for sale and once sold will mean that 1/3 of the 30 team league will have changed ownership since 2019-20.

SanctionII · July 9, 2025 5:07PM

I wonder how many years it will be before an NBA player (or other professional athlete) will sign a contract that will pay him or her 1 BILLION DOLLARS?

Whenever that happens I suspect that fans attending a game will have to pay $1,000.00 for a beer and $500.00 for a bottle of water.

erikthredd · July 9, 2025 5:46PM

SGA just signed his 4yr/272M extension that starts kicking-in in '27/28 that sees him making 75M in '30/31 but that's just an estimate right now. All Supermax contracts count for 35% of a team's salary cap and if the recent NBA/TV money cap increase comes in higher than expected then that 4th year for SGA could easily jump to 80+M, maybe even higher.

We're not too far off from the possibility of an NBA player making 100M/yr and I just can't see some owner paying that type of money for one player especially not when you factor in all of the new CBA salary tax restrictions. With this new financial landscape that the NBA is heading into, there's likely going to be some sort of reckoning between owners and the player's union and we may have already seen that first step towards it with the new Dallas ownership choosing not to sign Luka to his next longterm deal which would have been the same contract that SGA just signed.

erikthredd · July 9, 2025 6:04PM

To add to my second paragraph above, just look at what Milwaukee just did with Dame Lillard and what the Suns are about to do with Bradley Beal's 2yrs/110+M getting bought out real soon. If these superstars get injured, get old or just don't live up to their crazy salaries, it could end up crippling your team for years.

Between those two buyouts, the Bucks & Suns have basically just negated their entire cap increase for each of the next 5 seasons and those two salaries were both roughly 55M a season. Now just imagine when they're 70 to 80+M, talk about yikes lol.

CheckYourDiaper · July 10, 2025 10:48PM

I don’t understand what you think the Bucks should have done with Lillard. It sucks but it’s the best option to keep Giannis. Lillard is out all year and who knows how long the road back is. Stretching the buyout at least allowed them to use cap to bring talent in. Everyone in MKE knows how Giannis feels about winning now.

The Beal buyout is a different story.

I don’t think the Bucks had any other option. Beal had a down season and maybe he’s a bad fit. Suns had bigger problems than Beal. That seems more about luxury tax than anything. I don’t know the contract details but I saw the Booker extension was the largest ever YoY or something. Big. Huge. Whatever. I bet the suns end up rebuilding in a year or two and Booker is in LA.

erikthredd · July 11, 2025 7:00AM

@CheckYourDiaper said:
I don’t understand what you think the Bucks should have done with Lillard. It sucks but it’s the best option to keep Giannis. Lillard is out all year and who knows how long the road back is. Stretching the buyout at least allowed them to use cap to bring talent in. Everyone in MKE knows how Giannis feels about winning now.

The Beal buyout is a different story.

I don’t think the Bucks had any other option. Beal had a down season and maybe he’s a bad fit. Suns had bigger problems than Beal. That seems more about luxury tax than anything. I don’t know the contract details but I saw the Booker extension was the largest ever YoY or something. Big. Huge. Whatever. I bet the suns end up rebuilding in a year or two and Booker is in LA.

They had to do it but honestly it was pretty much an act of desperation to appease Giannis. Saying that, I completely understand the logic behind the move though even before you replied in this thread (so take that fwiw.)

I was just pointing out how a salary that high could really hurt your team if something goes wrong. The NBA's new TV deal starts this season which means all of that new money flowing in is expected to increase the cap each season by 10% (not sure how on many years it will keep doing that, thought I read 7yrs somewhere.) That roughly 15M in extra cap in '25/26 won't even cover Dame's 22M-ish that will be on their books this season, now multiple that by 5yrs in a row.

It's a crappy spot to be in but if that's what it takes to keep Giannis around, I totally get it. I honestly don't believe he wants to leave the Bucks, he just needs to play that leverage game to guarantee that the front office keeps trying to improve the team (something that Lebron pretty much does every season in LA.) I do like the Myles Turner addition, he can pretty much do everything that Lopez gave them while being 8yrs younger and slightly cheaper.

The issue with Beal was, outside of Lebron, he was the only other player with a No-Trade clause and he pretty much used at this past trade deadline to nix some potential trades out of Phoenix (IIRC,including one that would have brought him to the Bucks.)
The Suns are the perfect example for new owners to come into the league and not repeat their same mistakes. Matt Ishbia buys the Suns and proceeded to trade away, pretty much, every single tradeable asset that the team owned in order to build a contender around Durant, Beal & Booker. By opening night, those first two will be completely off their books and all they'll have to show for their time in Phoenix is one playoff series win, one rookie and two mid level rotation players.
In that original KD trade w/ Brooklyn, the Suns gave away (4) unprotected 1sts plus Mikal Bridges who was later traded for (5) 1st round picks in total w/(4) unprotected. Rather than owning all of those picks to buld around Booker, they went all-In and failed miserably.

One last thought on Devin Booker, he's sort of in the same position as Giannis where he's shown loyalty to the team that drafted him. Both teams mortgaged their future to try building a winner around their superstar but at least the Bucks can say that they have a championship to show for it.

Its going to be interesting to see how it all plays out in the East this season, I'd say that the Cavs & Knicks are probably the favorites but that's far from guaranteed.

erikthredd · July 11, 2025 7:14AM

OKC locked up their 3rd star for the forseeable future. https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/45711264/jalen-williams-thunder-agree-max-rookie-extension

Add in backup center Jaylin Williams who also got re-signed and that's roughly 850M that OKC has spent since their championship parade. Its a great time to be a Thunder fan.

CheckYourDiaper · July 11, 2025 3:41PM

I don’t disagree at all with your assessment on salaries. The cap in the NBA has been a bit of a joke. The Bucks, and I don’t recall the exact numbers so just shooting from hip, are like 15M over the cap and would need to spend another $100M to catch GSW. It’s hard to take it seriously anymore.

erikthredd · July 11, 2025 4:39PM

Edit: Everyone tends to point at GS like they were the posterchild for bad/over spending for years but that wasn't the case at all.
Outside of that one offseason where GS used the cap increase to sign KD, a signing that every single GM would have made in that same situation. the majority of all of that tax money that they spent during their prime dynasty years was to keep Steph, Klay & Draymond together longterm, three players that they originally drafted themselves.

Its hard enough for teams to draft & develop one elite superstar and the list of teams that found two could be counted on one hand in Den/Bos/OKC (the last three Finals winners,) GS managed to find three then paid to keep them together without the need of mortgaging most of their future picks to add a star player on the way to winning a title.

If a player wants to make the really big bucks in the NBA they'll need to either get voted MVP, DPOY or make All-NBA twice over a 3yr stretch, and all three of Steph, Klay & Dray qualified for the Supermax. That was the reason why they're tax bills were always so high.

CheckYourDiaper · July 11, 2025 6:36PM

I think they’re a prime example and used as such because they’ve led NBA half of the last decade.

erikthredd · July 11, 2025 7:09PM

They were a dynasty that made six trips to the Finals and winning four of them. Less than a year after winning #4 the other NBA owners went and changed the salary tax rules so the Dubs couldn't keep building around their big three. They became the model NBA franchise over a 10yr stretch which ended up leading to a lot of hate & jealousy.

CheckYourDiaper · July 11, 2025 8:05PM

I don’t know that the apron has done too much to dissuade some owners. Dynasty maybe…. I’m glad they got what they paid for. Good for them. They’re still a great example.

erikthredd · July 11, 2025 8:44PM

@CheckYourDiaper said:
I don’t know that the apron has done too much to dissuade some owners.

All of the harsher tax restrictions didn't go into full effect until the new league year started last week soon after the Finals ended. The league parcelled out the restrictions in two parts, some last offseason and the majority of them in this one.

Now you get locked into a certain cap level long before the season starts and you'll have limited flexibility depending on your cap situation. If you finish this new league year over the 2nd apron, you'll get hit with numerous harsh penalties. Those new penalties are no joke and a owner would have to be a complete moron to throw away tens of millions along with a future 1st round pick. Its why Boston immediately traded off two starters the day after the Finals ended which freed up 280M in tax money this season.

Dynasty maybe…. I’m glad they got what they paid for. Good for them. They’re still a great example.

They’re really the only example other than Steve Ballmer with the Clippers. No other owner has a history of continuous spending high into the luxury tax like those two teams did and it made most other owners look cheap in the eyes of their fanbases when they weren't willing to spend on salaries like that. GS did it for multiple Rings where all LA got out of it was one trip to a conference finals which they lost.

erikthredd · July 17, 2025 3:39PM

Dude literally got waived and managed to increase his salary by 20M to go rehab in Portland, with a No-Trade thrown in for S&G. 🤣🤣🤣

SanctionII · July 17, 2025 6:58PM

Dame has GOTS TO GET PAID!!!!!!!

And he has; and he will.

More power to him and other NBA players.

If owners and management are willing to pay up, then the players deserve to be paid up. The market (demand) for the product of NBA basketball on a global scale apparently keeps going up, with ever increasing revenue streams being created and tapped.

If the viewing (consuming) public turns their attention away from the NBA and demand for the product shrinks, then a retraction will happen. When it does the players will have to accept lower contract offers made to them by NBA teams (which they will accept because where else will they be able to market their skills and command multi million dollar wages???).

The Official 2025-2026 NBA Regular Season Discussion Thread

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