As free agency nears, stars hounded by fans, media
Long before Kevin Durant bristled and Kyrie Irving swatted away questions and Anthony Davis pre-emptively demanded a trade, few NBA stars even reached their “contract year,” especially in the prime of their career.
Michael Jordan once signed an eight-year deal with the Bulls. Magic Johnson agreed to a 25-year contract with the Lakers. They stirred little freeagent drama because there was little chance they actually would become free agents.
“Now you’re having higher-profile players in contract years more often than in the past,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said. “Guys like Michael, Magic and Larry Bird were locked up because that’s what they were going to do.”
This stretches beyond basketball. Bryce
Harper and Manny Machado also waded through rampant scrutiny and speculation last baseball season, fueled by social media and the relentless, all-consuming, 24-hour news cycle.
Clearly, the contract year is more complicated than it used to be.
The final season of a marquee player’s deal creates a potentially combustible mix in the 21st century. Modern professional athletes covet control over their careers, as LeBron James made clear in changing teams three times in eight years. They also seek a giant payday, naturally.
But the flip side is a widening audience of fans more connected than ever to each morsel of news — and borderline obsessed with what might happen after the season ends.
“There is a dynamic to today’s NBA where people are more interested in who’s going where than in who won the game last night,” Kerr said.
The omnipresence of social media plays a prominent role in this phenomenon. Consider the scene in the Warriors’ locker room before and after most games: Nearly every player, head down, stares intently at his phone.
They immediately can scroll through observations and opinions from media and fans (and fellow players) around the globe. The online chatter routinely extends past the result, as Kerr suggested, and focuses on where players might land in the offseason.
Will Durant and Irving really join forces with the Knicks? Where will the Pelicans trade Davis? OMG, what if Klay Thompson leaves the Warriors this summer?!?
“Twitter, Facebook and Instagram have taken it to outer space,” Hall of Fame point guard Jason Kidd said.
Kidd, who grew up in Oakland and played at St. Joseph Notre Dame-Alameda and Cal, recalled some media interest in his free-agent decisions in 2003 (when he spurned the Spurs to stay with the Nets) and ’09 (shunned the Knicks to stick with the Mavericks), but nothing like this. Also worth noting: Kidd signed a nine-year contract after Dallas drafted him No. 2 overall in 1994, before the NBA introduced a rookie pay scale.
As salaries escalated in all pro sports in the ensuing 25 years, the financial impact of a contract year multiplied. One thing that hasn’t changed is the human element, as players chase their next contract while trying not to smother themselves in anxiety.
Take former A’s reliever Dennis Eckersley, another Hall of Famer with Bay Area ties. Eckersley’s deal with Oakland was set to expire after the 1992 season. He was 37 and knew then-general manager Sandy Alderson was reluctant to give him another big contract at that age, even if Eckersley had pitched spectacularly the previous four years.
Eckersley produced another off-the-charts season, pocketing 51 saves on his way to winning the American League MVP and Cy Young awards. He also signed a two-year contract extension with the A’s during the All-Star break, avoiding free agency.
“I think there’s anxiety and pressure, but you can look at it another way: You’re f—ing hungry,” Eckersley said. “It’s only human nature. … I think there’s an edge to guys playing out their contracts, in a good way.”
This generation’s savvy in using the contract year to its advantage became evident in 2010, when James and Chris Bosh joined their friend Dwyane Wade in Miami. The three helped the Heat reach the NBA Finals each of the next four years, winning two championships.
Stars of previous eras occasionally coordinated their freeagent moves, with less success. Charles Barkley parlayed his free agency into an August 1996 trade from Phoenix to Houston, where he teamed with Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler.
The problem: They were all in their mid-30s and the Rockets didn’t make it past the Western Conference finals.
Of course, the NBA’s economics have changed dramatically since then. The salary cap soared in the past three decades, from $7.2 million in 198889 … to $30 million in 1998-99 … to $58.7 million in 2008-09 … to $101.9 million this season.
Several other factors also changed to make the contract year what it is today. Among them:
NBA contracts now max out at five years in most cases (for free agents re-signing with their team) and four years (for those joining a new team), a striking contrast to those crazylong deals Johnson and Jordan had. Not only are high-profile players in their contract year more often, they’re more willing to jump teams than their predecessors.
Those players preferred to renegotiate contracts, as Dominique Wilkins routinely did, or hold out of training camp in pursuit of a better deal, as Julius Erving did.
Because it’s more common for marquee players to reach the NBA or major leagues at a younger age, they’re reaching free agency in their prime years.
Durant was 27 when he bolted Oklahoma City for the Warriors in July 2016, the same age Irving will be when he becomes a free agent this summer. Harper and Machado both were 26 this past winter, when they headlined baseball’s free-agent class.
Social media keeps the “Where-will-he-go-next?” chatter humming. As Kerr put it, former players easily dodged such talk by avoiding the morning newspaper and not turning on talk radio. Now, players see wild speculation every time they look at their phones.
This traces, in part, to the evolving media landscape.
“Writers no longer work hard at writing stories, they work hard at being on Twitter,” said longtime NBA columnist Shaun Powell, who writes for NBA.com. “That’s why the emphasis has shifted. Now it’s, ‘Can I get this on Twitter before anyone else?’ ”
Or, as Eckersley said, “It’s a totally different world, man. There’s a generation gap with these guys. They’re drawn to social media, and the narcissism that goes around is ridiculous. It’s like a drug.”
Free-agent recruiting also has changed with the times. Top players on different teams know each other better than in previous eras, through AAU/ club teams or Team USA.
And they stay connected, given the power of cell phones and convenience of text messages.
“Now players are talking more to each other,” Kidd said. “It’s not about me against you, it’s more, ‘What are you thinking? I’m up this year, you’re up next year.’ ”
Most research, including a 2016 UC Santa Barbara study and a 2011 “experiment” by St. Louis Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak (according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch), found only a moderate improvement in performance in a player’s contract year.
Rickey Henderson, famously conscious of his salary during his Hall of Fame baseball career, offered a vivid example in 1989. He struggled with the Yankees, hitting .247 in 65 games, and found his stride after a June trade to the A’s, hitting .294 in 85 games.
Henderson also dominated the postseason, leading his team to the World Series title by hitting .400 in the American League Championship Series and .474 in the Series. That earned him a four-year, $12 million contract, briefly the richest in baseball history.
And, yep, Henderson was all too aware of his pending free agency — from his slow start in New York to his surge in Oakland.
“I think maybe I put a little too much pressure on myself to do well,” he said last month. “Things weren’t going well, then you try to do some extra and then the media starts getting all over you. It was hectic both ways.”
Bhrett McCabe, a clinical and sports psychologist based in Birmingham, Ala., understands. He has worked with several baseball and football players and now counsels professional golfers, including Graeme McDowell and Billy Horschel. McCabe also works for the University of Alabama athletic department.
The way he sees it, a contract year creates “vulnerability” in athletes — they tend not to view it as a way to gain something, even if that’s the case.
“A lot of athletes enter the contract year from a point of anxiety and stress,” McCabe said. “They feel like they have to sustain what they have. That puts more pressure on their play and takes away from following their formula for success and discipline.
“We try to quiet the noise around them. Athletes have an amazing ability to create more confusion and listen to more people.”
Harper heard the noise during his seven years in Washington’s outfield, all the feverish speculation about where he might head in free agency. Soon after agreeing to terms with the Phillies on March 2, he made it clear his desire to avoid the chatter compelled him to sign a 13-year contract.
Durant took the opposite approach — he signed a twoyear, $61.6 million deal with the Warriors in July, with an optout after this season. Durant made so much money on and off the court during his first 11 NBA seasons (more than $187 million in salary alone), he could afford to choose flexibility over a longer deal. Durant is expected to make as much as $35 million next season, potentially on a deal stretching four or five years.
The psychological cost of maintaining flexibility this season was steep, in some ways. Durant’s contract year weighed on teammate Draymond Green, who memorably challenged Durant about his impending free agency during a heated, on-court argument Nov. 12 in Los Angeles.
Not quite three months later, on Feb. 6, Durant lashed out at the media after widespread speculation that the Knicks, who cleared salary-cap space six days earlier by trading Kristaps Porzingis, were his next destination.
“The problem with this freeagency stuff when a person of substance is approaching … is that sportswriters want to live in the future,” Warriors assistant coach Ron Adams said. “And you can’t operate in sports by not living in the present. It’s always the next thing: shootaround, warm-up before the game, then the game.
“These are immediate things, and the athletes live in this immediate world in which they have to be grounded. So I find it unfortunate that already the thrust of many people is the future. That really doesn’t matter to us and it shouldn’t matter to Kevin. He’s a great pro, and what matters to us is what we’re doing now.”
Durant and the Warriors are chasing another NBA championship now, weathering the turbulence of a modern-day contract year.