No Debating Whether Nets Should Match A Potential Johnson Offer Sheet
As if there were any suspense, the Nets officially extended their qualifying offer to Cam Johnson on Wednesday, making the 27-year old wing a restricted free agent when the market opens on June 30 at 6pm.
While it’s certainly possible that Johnson, who was an integral return piece from Phoenix in February’s blockbuster trade of Kevin Durant, will receive an offer sheet from another team with salary cap space as is his right—Houston and Detroit have been most prominently mentioned as suitors—there also shouldn’t be any question as to how Brooklyn will respond.
Simply put, they have to match. No matter the contract value.
I can’t believe there’s even a debate about this. It’s just how NBA business is done. And Nets General Manager Sean Marks should know that better than almost all of his colleagues, for he was widely known for his, um, generous offer sheets to restricted free agents during his first few years in an impossible job that required outside-the-box thinking. In the end, it was probably a good thing that the original teams matched the offers to Otto Porter Jr., Tyler Johnson, Allen Crabbe, and Donatas Motiejunas. Still, it’s hard to fault those clubs for their asset management process, for it seemed wiser than losing a valued asset for nothing at the time.
The same concept applies here, as I would say that Johnson, at 6-foot 8 and with a 39.3% career three-point shooting rate, has a higher ceiling than any of the above names. He was a rare playoff standout for the Nets, averaging 18.5 points and 5.8 rebounds per game with a 51/43/86 shooting split over the four-game sweep at the hands of the Sixers. No wonder the speculation has him garnering an offer somewhere in the $90-$100 million dollar range over four years.
That price tag is absolutely affordable for Brooklyn, which should be in a rebuilding mode that prioritizes developing young talent to play with Johnson and “Twin” Mikal Bridges. Currently, they have about $146.4 million tied up on 11 players under contract, including a little over $2.2 million on Edmond Sumner’s nonguaranteed deal, per spotrac.com. The site figures the two first-round draft picks (Noah Clowney and Dariq Whitehead) will add another $6 million. Re-signing Johnson for, say, $25 million in Year 1 would put the Nets over the expected luxury tax threshold of $165 million, but still below the dreaded “second apron” that was installed in the NBA’s new collective bargaining agreement for this coming season.
And remember, when it comes to luxury taxes, it’s not where you start, but where you finish. The Nets have all sorts of players with expiring contracts to trade—some of whom are actually fairly desirable. Including the two first-round picks, the Nets are on course to have only have seven signed players for 2024-25, and that’s if they exercise the team options on both Cam Thomas and Day’Ron Sharpe.
Of course, one of those players is Ben Simmons, Marks’ Original Sin who will count approximately $37.9 million and $40.3 million on the cap over the next two seasons. Ugh. According to his own social media postings, which might not be worth taking at face value, Simmons is diligently working out to rehabilitate a back injury that limited him to 42 games last season. His status nevertheless shouldn’t affect how the Nets approach the Johnson decision.
For though Simmons, the beneficiary of the worst contract in basketball, might be untradeable, that also isn’t the end of the world. If the Nets, as I would expect based on their current construction, play like they are destined for also-ran status, they shouldn’t have difficulty offloading enough contracts to get below the tax line should that become a priority.
With a cleaner cap sheet in two years, the Nets, if they properly develop their younger players, can then get back to charting a path toward the ultimate goal of an NBA Championship, just like they attempted in the pre-Durant era.
I don’t know whether Johnson will be part of that—he too can always be traded somewhere down the line—but this isn’t the time for Brooklyn to allow such an asset to so freely depart. Pay him now so you can reap rewards later.