This past summer, on the heels of their championship victory, the Golden State Warriors resigned point-guard Steph Curry to a five-year, $201 million "supermax" contract. The largest deal in NBA history. Since Curry had been relatively underpaid during previous seasons, despite being one of the biggest MVP's to ever pass through Oakland, the Warriors had to roll out the dough in order to keep their super team together.
Durant, the team's other prize possession, was willing to take a pay cut, which undoubtedly helped the Warriors roll out Steph's deal. While Durant gets paid a whopping $25 million a year, his eligible max of $34.5 million a year means that a decent amount of money is getting left on the table. Apparently, Warriors owner Joe Lacob wanted to offer Curry less than a max contract, but the team's general manager wasn't going to let that happen.
In his recent article for The Athletic, Marcus Thompson explores the Warrior victory, and how Steph's game has evolved over the last few seasons. In regards to the financial side of Curry's growth, Thompson writes:
On top of that, as the Warriors prepared for the postseason, Warriors owner Joe Lacob was considering offering Curry a contract below the max, even though Curry has been one of the most underpaid players in all of sports over the last three seasons. Warriors general manager Bob Myers kept Lacob from bringing a reduced offer to the negotiating table, but it was enough of a thing that Myers reassured Curry of the franchise’s commitment.
Curry ended up getting the largest deal in NBA history, although some will argue that Durant deserved the max more so than Curry. Before accepting the team's generous offer, Thompson reports that Curry had a suspicion that someone was going to ask him to accept less than the max deal. "Curry knew there were mumblings of possibly asking him to take less than the max. He brushed it off as a meaningless until it was actually time to sign."
Even though $201 million sounds like an absurdity to us mere mortals, it's a good thing he wasn't undercut by the league's effort to save a few bucks. During his incredible performance throughout the 2017 NBA Finals, Curry proved his worth ten times over. After all, the Warriors didn't think that having a superteam of this caliber would be free, right?
