Oklahoma City Thunder
Guaranteed Salaries: $60,609,261
Draft Pick Cap Holds: $2,033,500
Maximum Cap Space: $30,813,768
The Thunder could have over $30 million in space, but they sure hope they won’t have to. Kevin Durant is obviously their number one priority this summer, and his cap hold of almost $26 million would leave them with a bit less than $5 million. However, if they were to lose Durant, here’s how they could get to almost $31 million in space:
-Waive the non-guaranteed salaries of Anthony Morrow and the newly acquired Ersan Ilyasova. Ilyasova’s contract becomes fully guaranteed on July 1st, so the Thunder will have to decide before free agency begins whether or not they will keep him. If he’s waived, Ilyasova will only count for $400,000 on the Thunder’s books for 2016-17.
-Renounce their Bird rights on Durant, Randy Foye, and Dion Waiters. Waiters is a restricted free agent; retaining his rights would put a $12.85 million cap hold on their books.
-Renounce their Early Bird rights on Derek Fisher.
-Renounce their non-Bird rights on Nazr Mohammed.
-Renounce their trade exceptions for Steve Novak, Luke Ridnour, and Perry Jones III, totaling about $8.54 million.
The Thunder’s best path to a championship contending roster next season is to retain a majority of their current crop of free agents. Oklahoma City can go over the cap to re-sign Durant, Foye, and Waiters and they’ll almost certainly have to in order to bring all three back; Durant is going to command a $26.56 million max salary, Foye still has a role on this team as a backup guard, and Waiters’ restricted free agency means that the Thunder can match any offer sheet he receives from another team. The Thunder wouldn’t have the cap space to sign another player if Durant comes back and they let Waiters go, so we may see the Thunder match on Waiters, especially if they can convince their owners to go into the tax to keep him.
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