There's a downside to OKC's massive Westbrook extension
— -- Will Russell Westbrook's extension be a good deal for the Oklahoma City Thunder?
The Thunder had little choice but to offer Westbrook a maximum five-year extension because the reigning NBA MVP could have become an unrestricted free agent next June. Keeping Westbrook was crucial to the Thunder's chances of remaining competitive in the Western Conference.
Yet Oklahoma City has also agreed to give the richest contract in NBA history to a player who will turn 30 early in the first season of the deal. Might the Thunder ultimately regret paying Westbrook so much money as he's potentially declining as a player?
Projecting Westbrook's future
The tricky part of projecting how Westbrook will age over the life of his extension is that there's virtually no recent player who's truly like him. After all, last season Westbrook became the first player in more than five decades to average a triple-double. My SCHOENE projection system gives just one player since 1990 a similarity score of greater than 90 to Westbrook (on a 100-point scale) at the same age: Dwyane Wade during his 2009-10 season, the year before he joined forces with LeBron James and Chris Bosh. Typically, a similarity score of 90 is the lowest I use when projecting player development.
If we expand the cutoff to the 10 most similar players to Westbrook who played enough seasons thereafter to evaluate their performance over the life of his extension (cutting out LeBron James, Chris Paul and Deron Williams), that leaves the following group of comps:
On average, these players contributed 12.8 wins above replacement player (WARP) at the same age as Westbrook will be in the first season of his extension. By the age that Westbrook will be the end of his extension, they had declined to an average of 9.0 WARP -- a little bit shy of what typically merits an All-Star selection.
Looking at the averages tends to omit the incredible player-to-player variation. While Michael Jordan, Jason Kidd and Kobe Bryant remained elite players in their mid-30s, the crash was hard for Gilbert Arenas -- who had already lost much of the 2007-08 and 2008-09 campaigns to knee injuries -- and Baron Davis, who tore his ACL during what would be the third year of Westbrook's extension. Neither All-Star point guard was even in the NBA by the age Westbrook will be at the end of his new contract.
There are a few reasons to be concerned about how Westbrook will age. First, there's his history of knee surgeries. Westbrook tore the lateral meniscus in April 2013 and ultimately underwent three surgeries on his left knee, one of them to remove a loose stitch from when the meniscus was initially repaired. Repairing the injury rather than simply removing the meniscus typically yields better long-term results, and Westbrook hasn't missed a game due to injury the past two seasons, but that remains a concern as he enters his 30s.
Beyond that, Westbrook's all-around game is particularly reliant on his otherworldly athleticism. While there's no indication of decline there yet, Westbrook's skill set might not age as well as those of players who are bigger and shoot more accurately. (Westbrook made a career-high 34.3 percent of his 3s last season but shot worse than 30 percent the previous two campaigns.) The better shooters include Bryant and Jordan, as well as eventually Kidd, who managed to remain a valuable player as his athleticism waned by dramatically improving as a 3-point shooter.
None of this is to say Westbrook can't still be an All-Star by the end of his extension. Players as good as he is have the room to slip due to age while remaining incredibly valuable. However, the risk of injury and decline projecting six years ahead is significant. And Westbrook's salary will be increasing as his value potentially decreases.
The high cost of Westbrook's contract
During the final season of his contract, at age 34, Westbrook will make an estimated $46 million. (The exact value of Westbrook's extension won't be determined until next summer, when the NBA sets the salary cap for the 2018-19 season.)
The salary cap might not keep pace with the annual raises in Westbrook's contract, which will be set at 8 percent of his 2018-19 salary -- currently estimated at $2.65 million. The cap increased 5.25 percent this season and is projected by the NBA to increase less than 2 percent in 2018-19. (By 2019-20, the NBA is projecting growth in the cap of nearly 8 percent.)
As a result, by the end of his extension, Westbrook will probably be making more than the 35 percent of Oklahoma City's salary cap he'll start at next season. That will make it difficult for the Thunder to maintain flexibility to add around him -- which could be necessary if Paul George and/or Carmelo Anthony depart via free agency next summer.
Even if George and Anthony both opt for free agency and leave, Oklahoma City would have only modest cap space to replace them. Shedding smaller contracts would give the Thunder more than the midlevel exception to spend but still wouldn't allow the Thunder to be a player for the other top free agents on the market.
Looking forward, Oklahoma City will be committing more than $70 million a year to the trio of Westbrook, Steven Adams and Andre Roberson. Continuing to surround Westbrook with the kind of talent necessary for the Thunder to compete in the West will require general manager Sam Presti to hit on the team's remaining draft picks and keep making the kinds of favorable trades and quality signings in free agency we saw this past offseason.
Unless Oklahoma City is able to re-sign George, we might look back on 2017-18 as the high point of the post- Kevin Durant era for the Thunder.
Of course, the outlook is still more favorable with Westbrook signed up for the next six seasons. If he instead departed, along with George and Anthony, Oklahoma City would have been starting from square one rebuilding around Adams. Extending Westbrook allows the Thunder to stay relevant and remain a desirable destination for players like George and Anthony via trade.
Nonetheless, paying so much money to a player past his prime could prove costly down the road.
