Nah kawhi already was averaging 25 ppg with elite defense and was a top 3 mvp candidate. He would have gotten that 218m if he asked for it
Kawhi Leonard is holding out for a max deal, as he should
From the October 2014
Tim Duncan has 14 All-NBA honors in 17 seasons. He's made more than $20 million in only three seasons because he consistently signs for less than the max. Just two years ago
he took an $11 million pay cutafter a(nother) All-Star season, all so that the Spurs could keep their other free agents and sign, uh, Nando de Colo. Two years before that, in 2010,
Duncan signed a short deal leaving $11 million on the table to help the Spurs get back to the Finals.
Buford and Pop are reportedly fond of offering Duncan a max contract alongside a presentation showing what they plan to do with the savings if he takes less.)
Tony Parker is a five-time All-Star, four-time All-NBA honoree, four-time NBA champion and one-time Finals MVP. He's never made more than $13.5 million in a season because the Spurs keep convincing him it's in his long-term interest to take less and keep the club together. Manu Ginobili is a two-time All-Star and one-time Sixth Man of the Year, and potentially the third best shooting guard of his generation. He's made $100 million in a 12-year NBA career, or less than what Joe Johnson makes over five years.
As Kawhi Leonard holds firm on his desire for a maximum contract, extension talks with the San Antonio Spurs have failed to gather traction despite a looming Friday deadline, league sources told Yahoo Sports.
Meanwhile,
the Spurs were the sixth-most profitable franchise in the NBA last season.
A year later 2015
Tim Duncan literally left money on the table when negotiating his new deal. According to
Yahoo’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the 15-time all-star agreed to take a $5 million pay cut on Thursday to help his team
land LaMarcus Aldridgeand retain Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green. Duncan’s deal is said to span two years and be worth roughly $10 million, Wojnarowski reports, which amounts to a salary of about half as much as he was making under his previous three-year contract, according to
Sportrac.com.
Two years later
'There's a Crack in the Spurs Way,' But Can the Team and Kawhi Make Peace?
League sources confirmed a key detail in that story: Around the time the Spurs announced Leonard would be out "indefinitely" in January, he had begun consulting with Dr. Jonathan Glashow of Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. Since that time, Leonard has engaged in most of his rehab under the guidance of Glashow, working frequently at the National Basketball Players Association headquarters in midtown Manhattan.
Thus, head coach
Gregg Popovich's public comments on Leonard have been tainted with derision.
"You'll have to ask Kawhi and his group that question," Popovich
told reporters on April 15 when asked whether Leonard would return at some point in the postseason.
Leonard wasn't with the team or even on the bench during the Spurs' 4-1 first-round loss to the Warriors. A league source told B/R that Leonard had planned to rejoin the team as a spectator, but the death of Popovich's wife, Erin, kept the Spurs coach away from the team and in mourning. The devastating news caused Leonard to re-evaluate his plans.
the Spurs also aren't interested in having their franchise player's medical care out of their control.
When Leonard had a wrist injury that wasn't responding to treatment in 2014, his agents, Brian Elfus and Mitch Frankel, pushed for a second opinion. The matter was resolved without any hard feelings going forward, a person familiar with the situation said.
So it’s obvious what happened the Spurs didn’t want to pay him the max. In 2017 the Supermax came to be after KD went to the Warriors. A max contract is 25 percent of the cap and the Supermax was 35 percent of the cap. Because of the revenue split between the players and owners which went down from 57% to the players to 49% now. The teams are required to pay at minimum 90% of the salary cap each year.
Kawhi qualified for the new Supermax by winning DPOY the year before. Kawhi wasn’t going to shift from taking the full Supermax. His uncle started to represent him because his previous agent stopped being an agent. His uncle wasn’t a nobody he was a banking executive. Pop popped shyt like saying Kawhi wasn’t a leader and taking shots at his uncle (If Pop is so smart how can this Uncle Dennis man be smart which was racist.) Kawhi has issues with the leg and the Spurs want him to play on it so if he gets hurt they have a reason to offer less mind you Kawhi lead them to 67 wins (40 wins at home) then 61 wins (Tim Duncan was a carcass). Kawhi was seeing a doctor approved by the players association and practiced and got rehab there. Pop called that out which should’ve gotten him fined at the minimum because the player’s association should’ve stood up also there’s a coach association. Pop tried to pressure Kawhi and Kawhi said fukk that.
Pop called even David Robinson to go and speak to Kawhi (would you talk to a guy who you ain’t ever play with ?) those international guys like Tony Parker probably brought up how Tim took less money and how could he compare to the great Tim Duncan ( Kobe never took less that’s why he’s better also Duncan got divorced when you get divorced they take a lot so if Pop wasn’t Pop then post divorce Tim would’ve literally had more money) then Kawhi plays 9 games the Spurs got cute trading him to the Raptors and he wins the ring and another Finals MVP. Also Pop’s wife died and many thought he would retire.
Kawhi ended up with more leverage and even wanted players better than PG he called KD who had just ruptured the Achilles first, then Jimmy Butler, the Paul George trade swung so many pics in a way it was a butterfly effect. Unfortunately Covid and the bubble. It’s old now but the Lakers and Clippers were going to leave the bubble.
