Pressing questions
The Thunder’s general manager plans news conference about the team’s future.
The question came minutes after his season had ended. It wasn’t time yet for an answer from Billy Donovan.
The Houston Rockets had eliminated his team in Game 5 of a first-round Western Conference playoff series, and Donovan was fielding a question about the best kind of scorer to acquire for Russell Westbrook, whether a pick-and-roll threat or a spot-up option would be preferable for the Thunder point guard.
“The only thing I would say is I got an enormous amount of trust and respect and confidence and belief in Sam (Presti) and our front office, and Troy (Weaver),” Donovan said at the time. “Their work ethic and the amount of time and energy they always put into the team is remarkable.”
On Monday, Presti might get some of those questions himself.
The Thunder general manager — the man who will make the decisions about what players to pair with Westbrook, and how to get them — on Monday will hold his annual news conference recapping the season and looking ahead.
Here are some of the topics he’s likely to address:
Under the NBA’s new collective bargaining agreement, Westbrook is eligible for a five-year contract extension worth up to 35 percent of Oklahoma City’s salary cap over that span. That projects to about $219 million.
It’s more than any team other than the Thunder can offer Westbrook if he hits free agency in the summer of 2018. But does Presti feel pressure to get a deal done this summer? OKC can ill afford to let Westbrook walk in a year.
Westbrook has said he loves Oklahoma City. But does the Thunder need to show him that it can get back to title contention in the short term — and show him long-term viability? And how does Presti do that without significant cap room this summer?
The Kanter question
As the NBA has shifted more and more to a small-ball, spread pickand-roll style, the Thunder has remained viable even as a more traditional outlier.
With Kevin Durant gone, it made the playoffs with a team seemingly ill-equipped for the modern NBA. Oklahoma City was 26th in the 30-team league in 3-pointers per game and last in 3-point percentage.
If the Thunder wants to downsize and improve on the wing, its best trade chip figures to be Enes Kanter, who’s due to make $17.8 million in 2017-18 and has a player option for $18.6 million in 2018-19.
Kanter had a strong regular season but was ineffective in limited minutes against the Rockets — the sort of small-ball team against which he struggles defensively — and that can’t help his trade value.
He’s long been a rumored trade candidate, but is Presti ready to move on from the moretraditional big lineup the Thunder relied on in the Durant/Westbrook era?
In-house options
Beyond looking for players to acquire, the Thunder has decisions to make about the free agents on its own roster, including starters Andre Roberson and Taj Gibson.
Oklahoma City didn’t reach an extension agreement with Roberson in the fall, leaving him a restricted free agent. The Thunder can match any offer sheet to Roberson, but Presti will have to decide how much he’s willing to commit to an elite defensive wing on a team that lacks perimeter scoring.
And what of Gibson, who will turn 32 this summer and is on a different career timetable than the rest of the Thunder’s core pieces? Does his return make sense for OKC?
Draft decisions
The NBA Draft has been good to the Thunder in the past, but less so in recent years. Westbrook, Serge Ibaka, James Harden and Steven Adams are among Presti’s draft day home runs.
Recent picks Josh Huestis, Mitch McGary and Cameron Payne haven’t had nearly the same impact, though Payne helped fetch Gibson and Doug McDermott in a February tradedeadline deal.
So how does Presti view this draft?
Can the Thunder find help with the No. 21 pick in what’s considered a deep draft? And, as the youngest team to make the playoffs, does it even want to add rookie help, or might it eye a draftnight trade?
The offseason figures to be filled with questions like that. For the Thunder, Presti’s the man to answer them.
“I think every person in Sam’s position is always thinking about, ‘How do you help your team get better?’” Donovan said. “I’ve got an enormous amount of confidence and trust in him that he’s always trying to figure out how to help our team.”