The San Antonio Spurs just handed star guard De'Aaron Fox a massive new contract extension, and there is a very simple reason as to why it's an overpay they will live to regret: Fox is not a Top-30 player in the NBA.
The maximum contract in the NBA is meant as a mechanism for teams to properly pay the very best players in the league. How it operates in practice, however, is as something of an anchoring point, drawing contract to itself like a magnet. Players who would deserve more are pulled down the max deal, but on the other side of the line, players who don't deserve that much are pulled up to the max.
Remove the cap, for example, and a player may negotiate a contract for a fair market value of $40 million. Yet if $50 million is the maximum a team can offer, if they come to the table offering $40, it sounds like an insult. They don't think their player is a "max" player which is actually just one specific amount in a wide range of values. Yet because it's the most a team can offer, players expect to get the most -- whether or not they deserve it.
The downstream consequence of this reality is that players who do not deserve to receive a max deal have been awarded one. Overpaying a player in the present is often a manageable reality; overpaying them on a long-term deal creates a cascading stream of problems that can sink a franchise. Many of the worst contracts around the league in the last decade have been max deals handed to players who didn't deserve them.
If you have a Top-15 player in the league, by all means hand them such a deal. That's what a max contract is designed for, and many of those players are worth even more than that number to their teams. Drop into that 15-30 range, however, and paying the maximum amount -- especially in the modern NBA where crossing the tax aprons can be significantly punitive -- becomes more difficult.
Hand a max contract to someone outside of the Top 30 and suddenly you have a disaster brewing. And unfortunately for the San Antonio Spurs, that's exactly what they just did with De'Aaron Fox.
The Spurs gave a max contract Fox didn't deserve
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There are plenty of reasons to justify the four-year, $229 million contract extension that the Spurs agreed to with De'Aaron Fox. It was probably agreed upon at the time of the trade, it's smart to make powerful player agent Rich Paul happy, it builds a culture of rewarding players, they can always trade Fox down the line, etc. None of those are untrue.
Yet the truth of the situation is that the Spurs gave a max contract to someone who is not a max player. Everyone will have their own personal way of ranking the best players in the league, but it's extremely difficult to construct any fair list that places De'Aaron Fox in the Top 25, and it is the opinion of this writer that he is outside of the Top 30.
That is not meant as an insult; Fox is a tremendous player, and he will likely have a great season working off of Victor Wembanyama. He is dynamic with the ball in his hands, has great touch as a finisher, and has improved as a passer. He genuinely tries on defense even if that's not his calling card. He is the type of player who should be in the All-Star mix for the next two seasons.
That level of player is not an automatic max player, however, and especially not a lock to be worth such a contract five years from now. They can handle overpaying Fox right now, but in three years? Four? They will be trying to build and maintain a title contender with an overpaid guard gumming up the works. Fox will make an estimated $61.6 million in 2029-30, a season in which he will turn 33 years old. Is the 6'3" Fox truly going to be performing at the same level at age 33, when Wembanyama, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper will all be on next deals?
The Spurs just handed Fox a max contract he did not deserve. He is not a Top-30 player in the NBA right now, and he certainly will not be in five years. When you have a generational talent like Wembanyama, those are not the sort of mistakes that you want to make.