At least The Sporting News thinks so....... http://www.sportingnews.com/nba/new...-contract-warriors/1nus0wru0zm461uiwlmonhr68p
Funny thing is, he WILL get a max offer from somebody....If the Dubs match, he'll become their highest paid player. That will be awkward as fuck!
Listen to this. At one point they play a game "Max or no max!" where they go through naming players and deciding if, in the new era of crazy money, they get max money. They were saying "yes" no question to players like Nic Batum. Mark Stein even said that he heard Chandler Parsons would get the max. But they were LAUGHING at the idea that Barnes gets the max, given how he vanished without trace in the playoffs. (That said, they also agreed he'd still get a disgustingly large contract. And I just saw somewhere that GState would consider $20 mil a year....)
I would much rather use our cap space to absorb contracts from teams like San Antonio and (maybe, ironically) Golden State as they desperately try to land Durant.
Well I can tell you the players that each team is going to move if they get Durant. For GSW it is not bringing back to Barnes or Ezeli and trading one of either Iggy or Bogut. For SA it is not bringing back Diaw or Duncan (at his price at least) and trading Patty Mills plus getting Durant to accept less than MAX (which strikes them out right there in my mind).
None of that is very intriguing, honestly. Iggy is washed up. Patty didn't have a great year. I guess you could sign-and-trade for Ezeli.
Bogut is injury-prone but has Biyombo-affect on the game at a better salary. And Diaw I would love off our bench but wouldn't give up much (if anything but cap space) for him. But overall I agree.
Bogut's name has been bandied about. He's still an elite defender, and by today's standards he's a total bargain. Iggy would be great. Both of them are older but they would help to teach our young'uns excellent defensive habits. Shaun Livingston would be epic. Danny Green was seen as a huge bargain for the Spurs last Summer, and given that they had their best regular season ever, he can't have hurt them much. Even better would be if, in taking contracts, we got some picks back or the rights to young players like Kyle Anderson or Dejounte Murray.
Iggy+Ezeli would sure be a ho-hum offseason, but it would make us better (albeit marginally.) Dame CJ Iggy Aminu Ezeli With Crabbe/Harkless/Davis/Plumlee off the bench. Maybe Leonard and maybe not.
I'd rather see OKC win than the Spurs with LA win. I'll be honest. Barnes would be better on the Blazers than with the Warriors, but it wouldn't be enough of a bump to really contend in the West.
