Oh to be young and able to drain threes in the NBA. To be three years into a very uneven career and still be seen to have upside.
Oh to be Terrence Ross. There is a certain member of my household who woke up this morning, checked his phone, saw that the Toronto Raptors had reached an agreement on a contract extension for Ross at a reported $33 million over three years (actually $10.5 million a year, but still).
That certain someone, a Grade 7 student, looked up from his phone and said, “That’s crazy! He doesn’t even start!”
It was a teachable moment. It was an opportunity to talk about supply and demand, the value of the corner three and the great U.S. cable television bubble that is driving NBA revenues to unimaginable highs. It was a short trip from innocence to experience over Cheerios.
And then I made him go outside and work on his jumper as part of my retirement plan, which will include a villa in Tuscany and a condo at Pebble Beach as long as he can start knocking it down from deep.
At a glance, Ross’s deal looks kind of crazy. But Masai Ujiri’s record as a general manager in Toronto and in Denver is not to be crazy when it comes to contracts.
So did Ujiri temporarily lose it when he gave Ross, 24, a raise that will more than triple his salary beginning with the 2016-17 season? Or is there method to the madness?
I covered some of this in my column on Sunday where I predicted Ross might be in line for a deal starting at $10 million a year.
The gist of it is this: Even at his erratic best, Ross does what not very many players in the NBA can do — drain threes at high volume and high efficiency. As a bonus he has the physical ability — and occasionally displays the acumen — to guard really athletic wing players, because he himself is really athletic.
As I wrote earlier: Over the past two years Ross has shot 38.3 per cent from three and made an average of 153 triples each season. Only eight players topped those thresholds last season and they are some of the most lethal perimeter weapons in the NBA.
According to Basketball-Reference.com the list starts with Steph Curry and ends with Kyrie Irving. Wesley Matthews is on it and he signed a four-year deal worth $70 million with the Dallas Mavericks this past summer while he was out with a torn Achilles tendon. Danny Green of the San Antonio Spurs is on it and he got a four-year deal worth $40 million this past summer, one that many thought had a heavy hometown discount. The Los Angeles Clippers have J.J. Reddick under contract at four years and $27 million.
As well, having had Ross for three seasons the Raptors feel confident in him from a character perspective. They appreciated him playing all 82 games while suffering with bone spurs in his ankle last year and were impressed with how hard he worked in the off-season to recover from surgery. Ross may come across as a kid at times, but he’s by no stretch the kind of person who creates problems for you and his determination to get better as a player has been improving.
So there’s that.
Another consideration is that while $10.5 million is a stack of cash, these things are relative. It represents just 11.6 per cent of a $90-million salary cap forecast for the 2016-17 season and 9.7 per cent of the $108-million the cap is expected to jump to in 2017-18. If you think Ross’s deal is proof the NBA has gone crazy, just wait for the real craziness to kick in over the next couple of years.
In comparison, when DeMar DeRozan signed his four-year, $38-million extension that has seemed like a good bargain for the Raptors, his deal started out at 16.2 per cent of a $58.7-million cap in 2013-14. Many thought it was an overpay, and it wasn’t.
In that context, Ross’s deal isn’t a cap crippler, and its term is certainly team friendly and should provide some motivation for Ross to position himself for another rich deal while still in his prime.
The deal also provides some insurance for the Raptors.
Consider the best-case scenario: The Raptors have a big year, Ross thrives off the bench, DeRozan is an all-star again and Toronto makes a strong run to the second round of the playoffs.
As a free agent next summer DeRozan would likely be looking for and may well get a maximum contract starting at $23-million annually. Would the Raptors want to match that?
It’s debatable, and having Ross at a manageable contract (in context) gives Ujiri some confidence that he can figure out something if DeRozan gets a max deal from the Lakers (as an example) and decides home is where the wallet is.
The other scenario: The Raptors struggle and are one round and out again (or worse) and Ujiri determines it’s time to retool, that this group has reached its ceiling.
To be able to make trades (keeping in mind the Raptors have four first-round picks coming to them in the next two years that are the grease that get so many deals done) you need to have players under contract at reasonably robust numbers to put a good package together. Ross’s relatively short term and dollar figure and forever tantalizing potential could make him useful in that regard as well.
Is Terrence Ross worth $10.5 million a year? In the NBA, he just might be.