Draymond Green isn’t going anywhere.
Sometimes, as higher-profile players approach unrestricted and restricted free agency, people like to craft urgent narratives that prove or suggest those same higher-profiles players or going to leave. The same has been happening with Green and the Golden State Warriors.
At season’s end, Green with hit restricted free agency, where he’s expected to field a vast array of lucrative offers. The Warriors are in no imminent danger of losing him because they have the right to match any contract he is tendered. If they lose him, it’s because they chose to lose him, deeming him too expensive to keep.
And that’s possible, right? The Warriors have more than $27 million committed to David Lee and Andre Iguodala, and Klay Thompson’s extension will kick in next season. Re-signing Green means dipping into the luxury tax, something they haven’t yet done. If he receives a deal worth $10 million or more annually, if he’s able to nab a max contract, couldn’t the Warriors opt for serious financial savings and let him move on?
Absolutely.
They just won’t.
Per Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group:
Mychal Thompson: Draymond worth $15 mil/yr. "I've talked to some ppl in GSW org. They said they're going to match whatever..Doesn't matter."
— Diamond Leung (@diamond83) March 17, 2015
Nothing to see here, folks, because it’s nothing new. This has essentially been the Warriors’ party line all season: They won’t lose Green, a Defensive Player of the Year contender who can guard all five positions and stretch the floor with his adequate three-point shooting. The cost doesn’t matter.
Truth told, it does matter. Everything comes back to dollars and cents in the NBA. But the dollars and cents also say it’s smart to keep Green.
First, the Warriors have Stephen Curry to worry about. They already sent Mark Jackson, a head coach he bonded with, packing over the offseason. Though the results have been superb—Steve Kerr is amazing—putting a clamp on the wallet after an historically good season would be a good way to rattle his faith. He is not a free agent until 2017, but he’s still their franchise player, and he’s still on a below-market contract himself. Keeping him happy is top priority.
Second, and equally important, the Warriors only need to stretch themselves for a year. The salary cap is set to explode during the summer of 2016, at which point its ceiling could reach $90 million. Not only would next year’s salary commitments fall below that mountaintop, but Lee’s contract comes off the books at that same time. So the Warriors wouldn’t just be able to avoid the tax; they could have cap space to burn.
Imagine that, a title contender like the Warriors, already with Green, Thompson, Curry and Andrew Bogut under lock and key, could have serious cap space in less than two year’s time.
(That sound you hear is Kevin Durant penciling Golden State onto his list of potential free-agent destinations.)
Sure, Green is going to cost the Warriors a pretty penny. But he’s not going anywhere. If the Warriors were interested in cutting salary, they would try like hell to move Iggy or D-Lee before giving up Green. That’s a fact. They have showed their hand, even if subtly, even if inadvertently, even if privately.
Even if they haven’t actually showed their hand at all.
Green’s return is that much of a foregone formality.
