I mean, he wouldn’t have opted out of his $42m contract if he wasn’t going to get a comparable contract on the extension

This way they get to re-sign him and don’t have to deal with him becoming a UFA next off-season

They clearly had a previous understanding about the contract he would get and the GM didn’t want to burn a bridge with an agent/player by reneging on a deal

He opted out and waited this long to give them flexibility to make moves. Same deal as Draymond. There was an agreement in place that he would get that deal if he opted out and waited to see if they could make moves. If they reneg on that, they lose trust in future players

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They did it so Koby Altman won’t have the reputation of a liar from Harden just like how Daryl Morey received the title of “a liar” from James Harden

He declined his 42m player option with the intention of signing a lower AAV deal

I really love how fans still cannot comprehend that both parties have to agree to contract lol.

Who gives a fuck if nobody else can give 30 a year to Harden. The Cavs can and Harden knows that.

This sub is just so fucking stupid on so many levels. Do y’all just scam the computer teams in 2k and expect that’s how the real nba is going to play out?

Like this sub would have you believe harden plays like Liangelo ball because he’s 37. He’s making top 50 money and is EASILY still a top 50 player.

Also everyone knew harden and Mitchell were getting extended this summer too, and when it happened people want to act like it’s crazy. The Cavs were LITERALLY just in the ECF, and are trying to keep that core together. While I’m not sure they’re good enough to get over the hump the moves they’ve made have been obvious and pretty good considering their cap limitations.

There is no way Harden would have declined his option without some sort of prior agreement. If the cavs decided to short him out on his money, not only would they start the year with a very disgruntled James Harden (we all know what that looks like), but it would also discourage other players for taking the word of their management in the future.

they had some sort of verbal agreement on the parameters of deal before they traded for him I imagine…. also it would be scummy behavior to just try and force him on the MLE just because no one else had cap space to outbid them and would hurt the Cavs with future players/players with the same agency as Harden

You don’t realize how little that is in 2026. Max player are getting 60m. 33m for someone who averaged 20pts 7 assists. Is not terrible. For reference:

Julius Randle is at 33m a year
Jerami Grant is at 34m
Jordan Poole is at 34m

I think Harden plays better than those 3 this year

I mean, duh?

The fastest way to get blackballed by agents and become “that team” between NBA players is to try and fuck over a player that declined a massive player option, only to try and force them to sign for the MLE.

Did Harden had a handshake deal with the Cavs prior to free agency

Dog, this has been pretty widely reported for months.

Also, this idea that a team always only has to worry about outbidding other teams isn’t rooted in reality. Harden is clearly worth more than an MLE, any person that thinks otherwise is delusional.

As for the deal itself, they probably gave him more $$ overall for waiting and facilitating the Watson trade.

But for the most part, they are just paying him a reasonable wage for a player like him for probably 2 years and the 3rd year he’ll be expiring, so that wage value matters a lot less.

They effectively agreed to both a three year deal and a two year deal, and they both agreed to wait to decide until the Cavs decided what they were going to do in the offseason. This plan was in place in June, if not February.

He’s still a solid player.  He was better overall for the Cavs in the Raps series compared to Mitchell.  Sure Mitchell had a great 1st 2 games, after that Harden had to pick up the slack and was one of the better defenders on Barnes becsuse of his strength.  

To be fair I didnt watch as intensively the rest of the playoff run, but Mitchell better be happy the Raps basically had RJ playing the 4 on defense.  

Overall the contract is fine.  

He turned down his option for an already below market deal to sign an even lower deal to help the Cavs. If it was up to redditors, y’all would say take the MLE or fuck off and he would’ve fucked off. Then you lose him for nothing and you can’t sign anyone else because you’re already over the cap. Letting your best player walk because you think you have leverage sounds like your average armchair GM.

32 million for Harden is good. He’s not even top 50 paid player and I think he plays above that. Plus he could have opted in but gave them an opportunity at Lebron and Watson.

They also could be with garland for 42 & 44 million next year and I would bet Harden is a better player than him for the next 2 years.

By that logic why wouldn’t Harden say that he would take the MLE elsewhere if the Cavs didn’t give him this contract?

Are you a child that doesn’t understand agreements, hand shakes, and not pissing off players/agents needlessly?

The Cavs stupidly gave Mitchell a contract worth ¹⁄₃ of their cap space and are locked into this core for years. They had no choice and at least Harden’s game won’t age that poorly considering he’ll always be an elite playmaker

You tend to not piss off your best players if you can help it.

It’s normal for players to opt out and then get a bigger or longer deal. Harden did what Draymond did with the Warriors. He was going to get this deal regardless.

If you are the GM, its a terrible look to agree to something verbally and then back off last second.

Good luck getting a full year + playoff run out of Harden if, after declining a $42M player option, you give him the MLE.

Probably weren’t outbidding anyone. Seems like Cleveland and Harden had already worked out the framework before free agency.

He only opted out to help the team. If a team told him they would resign him and then didn’t, or lowballed him after opting out, the whole league would know the Cavs are pieces of shit who can’t be trusted to honor handshakes.

Every future free agent they need to try to attract to their not popularly desirable city by demonstrating they are a professionally run organization that can be trusted to respect their players. 

Harden helped them by letting them save money. Give harden the MLE and he will absolutely shit on the entire org and make the place toxic as fuck until he gets traded for pennies relative to his production. Its completely stupid to screw a player over like that.

Harden had a trade clause with the Clippers he would’ve never waved for the Cavs if there wasn’t already an understanding in place for a long term contract. Literally it didn’t matter at all how he performed in the playoffs, his age or whatever, the minute we traded Garland for him we were going to extend him. It was just a matter of how flexible he was going to be in terms of helping us get under the apron and make trades like Watson or trying to sign Lebron before he went to Philly.

He had a handshake agreement to let the Cavs pursue a guy like Watson, and waited to sign to help it go through

Yes, obviously the opt out was conditional on an extension that was already determined.

He took less money and stalled to allow them the flexibility to pursue LeBron and eventually acquire Watson.

The Cavs might as well become a g league team if they did him dirty. No one would ever trust them again.

He was always going to let us figure out free agency and resign for whatever was left.

This is whatever was left. This is the team going in to the season.

It is call a wink wink deal before the trade, now they honor it.

Yes, it’s pretty much common knowledge there was a handshake deal.

Harden had a player option at well above market rate, cavs say “hey, we’re willing to give you a contract with more guaranteed money and years if you opt out and take less money this season to give us more roster flexibility”

It helped them offer more money to LeBron, and then helped their plan b which was to make the trade for Watson.

Probably the Bayi Rockets or the Shanghai Sharks.

Harden is 100% the kind of guy who’d bail to China or some other foreign league for money. He doesn’t care about winning a championship.

Somehow this will be treated differently than the Trae Young contract

Handshake deals! Gotta give Harden some credit for allowing the cavs to even pull this off.

That 31 unprotected pick to Denver is looking like a pretty tasty asset right about now

If one James can’t win you the chip, get another -Cavs maybe

This but Deshaun Watson

Panthers, falcons? Yea right

Harden seems like the type of dude who would just sit at home (strip clubs) instead.

Probably had to give him extra for making him wait.

Why ask a question that you already answer yourself?

You could this same question about lots of deals in the nba

Presumedly before he opted out they had a discussion with him about the general parameters of a potential deal.

They could have renegged, but that would have done a lot of damage to their ability to make similar deals in the future. Also, you probably don’t want a pissed-off Harden on your team. If he feels like you jobbed him out of a fair salary, he’s absolutely willing to be difficult enough to make it a problem.

It was 42 million this year, or 29 million, Cleveland took the 29.

He only opted out so they could pursue LeBron.

Kinda sad! Paying such a premium for mediocrity!

All the talk about the size of the contract makes people not realise this is the last one he’ll sign. Harden will be retiring at the end of this contract at the latest.

I don’t see him playing past 40.

They want him to play in Cleveland for sure and at a lower price he may go somewhere else

The clippers could have matched and exceeded any contract given out this offseason

they have no stars that will sell tickets like Harden (love or hate him) mitchell boring as fuck and has’nt really got much better than his jazz days. Who the fuck else is on this team that a casual fan knows by name?

Who was the Cavs trying to outbid with the 3 yr 97 million deal

Strip clubs

Cavs GM is not a liar. I repeat, Cavs GM is not a liar.

Leverage the market against your top free agents? You’ll be waiting decades before another free agent picks you over an alternative team.

He opted out so hat they can try to get LeBron, they aren’t going to not pay him, he was their best player in the playoffs. It’s like when people though the warriors weren’t going to pay draymond after he opted out to try to get LeBron. Just not using their heads

The Clippers didn’t want to pay him so the trade was done at the trade deadline.

The Cavs are in title contention right now. Can Harden be effective for three more seasons?

Perhaps effective but not take them to a title.

The league is all about players and their agents and money. Agreements were reached a long time ago

These teams do it to themselves. Now we gotta hear the crying about a contract that was unnecessary.

Yeah no shit CHILD. why would he agree to be traded to one of the worst nba cities if there no pre agreed contract extension negotiated by his agents and the Cavs FO beforehand.

It’s called showing respect to the player.

Harden could have just opted into his 42 million contract and the Cavs would have been screwed

Idk about a handshake deal but they he opted out of his contract and then signed this extension. I assume him and the FO had an understanding that if he were to opt out they would offer him something like this contract. Nothing wrong with that 

I mean we gave GTJ whatever it was 20million per year so I suspect harden is actually worth 75million or more per year on that scale.

People forget that you’re also fighting against Harden’s own decision tree whether to play or retire. A good chunk of guys would make the old “that’s not enough money for it to be worth it to me”, same as everyone’s retirement decision at 65. 

I mean obviously to some degree yeah. “If you stay patient and let us make a trade we’ll give you this contract” or something like that.

It’s easier contractually and for NBA cap rules to resign a player than it is to bring on new contracts. both the player and ownership benefit

He looked at the Quickly contract and simply stated ‘I can’t make much less than that guy!’

Yes, you dingus. Of course they had a handshake agreement in place.

How the actual fuck is this post so upvoted

Also, because it’s such Jaylen Brown intellectual type post, it is who were, not who was

Did Harden had a handshake deal with the Cavs prior to free agency?

Very obviously yes and this has been reported since before the regular season even ended.

He opted out of his previous contract to give the Cavs more off-season flexibility, with the understanding that he would sign an extension when they were done.

The Cavs are giving 97 million dollars to a 37 year old Playoff choker. Are the Cavs stupid?

He’s had a handshake deal for his past 3-4 contracts.

The Cavs didn’t outbid anyone. Harden opted out and waited to sign in order to help the Cavs sign somebody (turned out to be Watson) but still be paid what he thinks he’s worth. Harden basically decides where and when he wants to play and he wants to be a Cav (at least for now).

Harden demands a trade every other season from the hopeful title contender he failed to contend with to the next team he’s 100% sure will pay him.

Obv there was an agreement that would see him waiting on them to add someone but he was going to get paid no matter what.

The process was broken, so our traditional analysis is valid but doesn’t apply to their thinking.

Honestly they just need get rid of the salary cap at this point. Nobody follows any rules

Ridiculous bucks are getting investigated and this fuckery doesn’t even bat an eye

The cavs are a championship calibre team 

It’s not just about supply and demand. I’m sure if it’s up to the free market, harden will probably get wayyy lesser. But it’s about making a core player happy, which hopefully in turn will get him playing and training harder for the season.

The real crime was trading for him in the first place.

If you want that kind of clutch playoff production in the biggest games, you have to pay for it. Hahahaha, good luck Cavs.

Maybe Silver can look tough and come down hard on the Bucks and Cavs for these pre-arranged deals while sitting on Ballmer lap and getting patted on the head

Cavs are stupid they should have just cut a side deal like the clippers do. NBA won’t do anything about it.