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It’s actually more advantageous for Kyrie Irving to opt-into the final year of his deal and seek a contract extension with the Nets than it is for him to opt-out and seek the full max in Brooklyn.
Welcome to the second installment of the Nets’ Offseason Chronicles, and after covering that costly repeater tax, we’re moving on to address the many possibilities for Irving, the Nets’ super-skilled but equally polarizing star guard.
Irving is entering the final season of his four-year deal in Brooklyn, and he has a player option on that final year, which means he can either opt-out, test free agency and sign a larger contract with the Nets, or opt-in and earn a $36 million salary before agreeing to a four-year extension. He has a June 29 deadline to decide.
The Nets also have a decision to make: whether or not to give Irving a long-term deal.
Irving only played 29 games last season because he refused to get vaccinated against COVID-19. That decision crippled the Nets’ ability to form any cohesion this season, forced James Harden out of Brooklyn, and ultimately rendered Irving unprepared for the playoffs.
That’s only this past season.
The season prior, he took a two-week-long leave of absence after the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection. He later missed time due to family and personal reasons and played just 54 games.
And that’s not including the injuries. In Year 1 in Brooklyn, Irving only played 20 games due to a variety of injuries including a shoulder impingement that required surgery. Not to mention he got hurt in the second round against the Bucks in 2021.
The facts are the facts: Irving has played more than 70 games just three times in his 11-year career, and recently, his absences have been non-basketball related. A max contract for Irving is a wager on his availability. The odds on that wager have historically been poor.
IRVING COULD OPT OUT
Star players with a player option normally do this if their market value exceeds the value of the final year of their current deal. In Irving’s case, opting out would make him eligible for a five-year max contract worth $247.6 million.
But the Nets would have to want to offer that deal, and by testing free agency, Irving would allow other teams to set the market.
The Orlando Magic, Detroit Pistons, Indiana Pacers, San Antonio Spurs and Portland Trail Blazers are the only teams with significant enough cap space to easily create room to sign Irving outright as a free agent. None of those teams are contenders.
Opposing teams can also only offer a four-year deal worth $183M, leaving a potential fifth year and $40-65M on the table over the life of the deal if he re-signed in Brooklyn — just to play for a bad team.
OPTING OUT IS GOOD FOR THE NETS
If he opts out of the final year of his deal and seeks a new, long-term extension in Brooklyn, the Nets can begin baking in incentives for games played.
Irving played in just 29 games last season, which means 30 or more games played next season is deemed unlikely by collective bargaining agreement bylaws. The Nets can incentivize a maximum of 15% of Irving’s salary through unlikely bonuses. They can also tier those bonuses in 5% increments with a contract structure that could see Irving earn 90% of his salary by playing at least 52 games, 95% by playing in 62 games, and the full 100% by appearing in 72 games or more.
These incentives would be included over the entirety of his deal.
If Irving opts out, the Nets could also choose not to offer him a long-term deal at all. They could offer him a deal fully guaranteed (but incentivized) in Year 1 with partial or non-guarantees in Years 2 and beyond.
IF IRVING OPTS IN
If Irving opts in, he will make $36M next season, then be eligible for a four-year extension worth just under $197M. That’s a grand total of $232.7M, which is only $15M less than the max he can command if he opts out.
If Irving opts in, he leaves that $15M on the table, but the Nets would be unable to bake in new incentives based on games played. Because he would be signing an extension on a previous contract, the Nets wouldn’t be able to add new unlikely incentives.
This option has a drawback, however: length of the deal. If he opts in, he will be on a one-year deal until agreeing to an extension. Irving has proven injury-prone, and opting in without the guarantee of a contract extension leaves him susceptible to a depressed market if he suffers a significant injury next season.
WHAT’S KYRIE’S LEVERAGE?
If Irving opts-out, the Nets can let the market dictate his contract value and bake-in incentives for games played. If he opts in, he’ll be in the final year of his deal without long-term stability until Brooklyn offers an extension.
It almost sounds like the Nets have all the leverage. Not quite.
If Irving leaves the Nets in free agency, they have no way to replace him. Teams are allowed to exceed the salary cap to re-sign their own free agents, but if Irving were to opt-out and leave this summer, the Nets would have no cap space with the top portion of the remaining payroll committed to Kevin Durant, Ben Simmons and Joe Harris.
In short, if Irving walks without a sign-and-trade, he would be walking for nothing, which is a worst-case scenario on two fronts: The Nets would no longer have the firepower to legitimately compete for a championship, and they would have shunned Durant’s best NBA friend after he signed a four-year, $198M extension to stay in Brooklyn.
That’s not ideal if they want to keep Durant in town.
Quite frankly, the Nets can’t afford any more missteps, not after everything they’ve given up to create this fringe contender. And Irving can ill-afford to leave as a free agent if he wants to play meaningful basketball.
The outcome is likely somewhere in the middle. When healthy and available, Irving is worth every penny and his presence substantiates Brooklyn as home to perennial championship contenders. So the Nets will likely offer him a long-term deal laden with incentives, and Irving probably won’t haggle over $15M that actually costs more after the Nets pay the tax.
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