Why are there so many bad contracts in the NBA?

[Watchman]

2 hours ago, JTB said:

He did at one point when he was a free agent a few years back and wouldn't be shocked if he still does now. 

Unfortunately for him and other traditional centers they're just not valuable anymore no matter who it is. The max a team is probably willing to pay a traditional center in this small ball shooting era is probably 15m and that's probably only for the traditional top of the line centers like Deandre and Drummond and I may be being to generous to say a team would even give them that 

So you'd rather have Millsap manning the center position than say, Dikembe?  I prefer rebounding and shot blocking centers.  Maybe it's because I grew up in the era of real centers, but it's hard for me to get excited about some 6-7 forward playing center.

[Watchman]

1 hour ago, bleachkit said:

The reason is because of the artificial ceiling created by max contracts. LeBron and KD are not worth 25 million a year, they are worth much more than that. Get rid of max contracts. If LeBron is worth 100,000,000 a year on the open market then pony up the cash Mr. Billionaire owner.

To do that, you have to get rid of the entire salary cap system, as Lebron would be making more than the entire salary cap for a team.  Nobody is worth that much.  There just needs to be a hard cap, without all the stupid exceptions.

[Guest]

Because there will always be one team willing to pay when nobody else will.  There was a time when 'MAX' contract meant something....now it's all over the place: any young player coming off a rookie contract with up side that the  team that drafted him is afraid of losing.

[Watchman]

1 minute ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Because there will always be one team willing to pay when nobody else will.  There was a time when 'MAX' contract meant something....now it's all over the place: any young player coming off a rookie contract with up side that the  team that drafted him is afraid of losing.

Right.  The current setup is that after the rookie contract, to avoid losing them you overpay, even if they haven't done anything merit being overpaid.

[NBASupes]

3 hours ago, TheNorthCydeRises said:

Because there are a lot of bad GMs in the league.

BudCox was horrendous at GMing. They get into their emotions. 

[AHF]

3 hours ago, kg01 said:

Does that make JoeJohn's contract any less egregious?

I feel like I'm just being argumentative .. am I turning into AHFsturt?

I think Joe's was close to market value.  LeBron's required them to pay him less while he provided twice the value (at least).

[thecampster]

5 hours ago, Wurider05 said:

My god why do teams overpay guys when everyone knows that they are overpaying  and then try to trade they less than a year later.  The nba needs non guaranteed contracts for when they guys don't live up to the contracts. We all knew that Baze wasn't worth what he was getting but the folks making millions of dollars a year to know that didn't. Same with Plumlee, Melo, Deandre Jordan etc. What the hell is going on??

The biggest culprit (IMHO) is the NBA minimum team salary provisions. There is no benefit to teams saving salary anymore as teams under the minimum are taxed up to the minimum and the amount is divided evenly among the players on the roster.  Teams under the minimum salary get a terrible reputation among the players as being cheap.  Teams have to give their money to someone or they pay it in the minimum tax and in player perception.

[DarnShadyRefs]

3 hours ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Because there will always be one team willing to pay when nobody else will.  There was a time when 'MAX' contract meant something....now it's all over the place: any young player coming off a rookie contract with up side that the  team that drafted him is afraid of losing.

Good point. Would you say the reason contracts being given to mediocre players is because of lack of talent in the league? It's as if there isn't any middle class of solid talented players. 

I guess the experiment to reinstate the 1 year 'players must stay in college rule' hasn't yielded more talent like they had hoped.

 

At some point, nba is going to have to find a away to either collaborate with the ncaa or give graduating high school students the option to make money by being drafted in to the d-league for exposure, development and chance to make money.

College coaches aren't properly developing players anymore. That's in part because you can't develop players in one year. 

[Guest]

2 hours ago, DarnShadyRefs said:

Good point. Would you say the reason contracts being given to mediocre players is because of lack of talent in the league? It's as if there isn't any middle class of solid talented players. 

I guess the experiment to reinstate the 1 year 'players must stay in college rule' hasn't yielded more talent like they had hoped.

 

At some point, nba is going to have to find a away to either collaborate with the ncaa or give graduating high school students the option to make money by being drafted in to the d-league for exposure, development and chance to make money.

College coaches aren't properly developing players anymore. That's in part because you can't develop players in one year. 

Most the contracts are given based on perceived potential since they don't want to lose the player they drafted.  They should be the middle class of talented pkayers instead they are overpaid players still learning the game.