What impact will Bradley Beal's extension have on his future, the Washington Wizards and the rest of the NBA?
After months of speculation about a possible trade, ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reported Thursday that Beal agreed to a one plus one extension ahead of Monday's deadline for players with more than one season remaining to extend their contracts. Because Beal got the maximum possible raise in the first year of his extension (20% more than his 2020-21 salary), he won't be eligible for a trade until after the 2020 deadline, ensuring he'll stay in Washington the remainder of this season.
Given how coveted Beal was by contenders looking to upgrade their rosters for a championship run, that last point looms particularly large. So let's break down the implications for everyone involved.
What the extension means for Beal
The biggest impact of Beal's extension is that he won't be eligible for a potential supermax extension next summer. Had Beal made this year's All-NBA Team -- having fallen one spot short last season -- he would have been able to sign a projected five-year, $254 million extension next summer. However, with the Wizards unlikely to be competitive this season with John Wall expected to miss the entire campaign, Beal might have judged his chances of earning All-NBA honors a long shot.
Signing a two-year extension with a player option gives Beal the next-best thing to a supermax. After making $34.5 million in 2021-22, slightly less than his projected max of $37.5 million, he can then opt to hit free agency with 10 years of experience. That would allow Beal, who would be 29 in the summer of 2022, to sign for up to 35% of the cap -- same as the supermax. If he re-signs with Washington, Beal could make up to a projected $266 million on a five-year deal.
The one question is whether Beal would have been better off waiting to try to sign an extension next summer. After all, the Wizards still could have signed him to this exact same deal starting July 1, and that would have given Beal the chance make an All-NBA team (or, much more improbably, win either MVP or Defensive Player of the Year).
There's certainly a benefit to locking in a potential $72 million now. Beal needs look no farther than his own locker room to see from the examples of Wall and new teammate Isaiah Thomas how quickly players' value can diminish because of injuries. But that risk might have been worth taking, depending on how much Beal valued an assurance that he won't be traded this season.
What the extension means for the Wizards
Despite mounting external trade speculation, new Washington GM Tommy Sheppard has been clear since taking the job that retaining and extending Beal was a priority. He told Wojnarowski in July that the Wizards would offer Beal a max extension as soon as he became eligible (on the three-year anniversary of signing his current contract) and were not interested in dealing Beal even if he turned it down.
Now comes the hard part: rebuilding a contending team around Beal and, when he returns from surgery, Wall. Beal's extension gives Washington more time to go about doing that, but not by much given the possibility that Beal can hit free agency just a year later. If the Wizards want to decide on a Beal trade before he enters the final season of his contract, they're still on the clock to compete in 2020-21, when Wall is expected back on the court.
With Wall and Beal set to make a combined $70 million in 2020-21, Washington knows who will be playing guard. The rest of the roster remains in flux. Starting center Thomas Bryant and backup point guard Ish Smith are the lone other players on the roster signed to veteran contracts through 2020-21. The Wizards have three players making at least $7 million in the final seasons of their deals: stretch 4 Davis Bertans, center Ian Mahinmi and wing CJ Miles. Yet the salaries of Beal and Wall will still put Washington too close to the cap to be players in free agency next summer.
As a result, this is a crucial season for the Wizards to develop recent first-round picks Troy Brown Jr., Rui Hachimura and Moe Wagner (the latter acquired with 2018 second-round pick Isaac Bonga from the L.A. Lakers in a trade this summer). Washington needs one or more of those players to step up as future starters to build a lineup capable of competing in 2020-21.
What the extension means for the rest of the league
After seven 2019 All-Stars changed teams this summer, Beal was considered the most likely star to move before the February deadline. Now that he's off the table, it's unclear who might qualify. Barring a surprising shakeup by a team that falls out of playoff contention (say, the San Antonio Spurs with veterans LaMarcus Aldridge and DeMar DeRozan, or the Toronto Raptors with a recently extended Kyle Lowry), it's entirely possible no All-Star-caliber players hit the market this winter.
A relatively quiet deadline would be good news for the teams that went all-in over the summer by trading future draft picks, including the LA Clippers and L.A. Lakers, who wouldn't realistically have been able to deal for Beal now. It's bad news for teams looking to consolidate talent, most notably the Denver Nuggets, who looked like an ideal landing spot for Beal.
Ultimately, patience might be the best option for possible Beal suitors. After all, he could be on the move in 2020-21, and by that point we'll surely have a whole new crop of star players to chase.