NBA Champion, All-Star, one of the most successful undrafted players of all time, undrafted free agent, Fred VanVleet.
The Raptors are at some sort of crossroads. Caused by the slow, trickling loss of talent from a championship team, the fruitless attempts to replenish it; and finally, the clashing of different egos and personalities. The championship head coach, Nick Nurse, is gone. Four players from the championship remain on the team — Pascal Siakam, VanVleet, O.G. Anunoby (didn’t play), Chris Boucher (played 4 minutes across 24 games) — and the championship identity isn’t something they can coast on any longer.
The championship will mean something to everyone who was involved: players, coaches, front office members, fans. However, that’s now personal, not organizational.
With the line of demarcation drawn, both the franchise and VanVleet have to decide whether they want to renew their partnership. Is VanVleet the last of the championship trickle, leaving the organization with nothing coming back? Probably not. Do the Raptors have different designs on the backcourt for the future? Probably, but they’ll want to get maximum return for VanVleet to help usher in the new era. The Raptors likely won’t have a first round pick next season, have very limited depth at the guard position, and want VanVleet to recoup some of his value around the league. A full year of Jakob Poeltl as a pick n’ roll partner and his shooting returning to career averages? That would do it.
What option does that most obviously point to? Re-sign VanVleet at an agreeable number, and eventually make the trade down the line.
Now, let’s see what a good number for VanVleet is as a free agent in 2023.
For reference, in the 2022-23 season, VanVleet was the 21st highest paid point guard per AAV (Average Annual Value), and 36th highest paid guard overall.
Tre and I did a mock negotiation of VanVleet’s contract, wherein I represented the Raptors & Tre represented VanVleet’s team: we arrived at 2 years 54M. If contracts were stagnant (they’re actually rising, of course) that would see VanVleet as the 29th highest paid guard in the league on AAV for the 23-24 season, and the 17th highest paid point guard. Wondering about consensus? I took note of the commentary around our mock negotiation. The YouTube comment section hated it, and on average wanted VanVleet to walk for nothing, I believe the same came from the RR comment section. Twitter, for the most part, seemed to think that 27M was a realistic AAV for VanVleet, but that he’d get longer than a two year deal. I guess we’ll see.
He is sharing the free agent class with the likes of James Harden, Kyrie Irving, and D’Angelo Russell – if expected opt-outs occur. VanVleet himself is an expected opt-out. They won’t set the market for VanVleet, though. It’s possible he and Russell garner a similar level of interest, but the contracts that have already been signed are what will determine VanVleet’s contract.
VanVleet & his team consider him in the All-Star class of guard, they’ll want him paid similar to his perceived contemporaries. The lowest pay for guards who meet that criteria? Donovan Mitchell (incredibly team friendly contract), De’Aaron Fox (incredibly team friendly contract) and Jrue Holiday – these guys are hanging out around 32-34M a year.
However, there are 16 guards currently sitting between 36M and 24M per year, Harden & Irving would make it 18, but they’re on the brink of out-earning that group. Six of those guards have been All-Stars, but that list includes Kyle Lowry, Ben Simmons, Chris Paul and none of those players are ever sniffing that status again. 25-percent of the 16 is made up of the recently extended combo guards – Jordan Poole (32M), Tyler Herro (30M), RJ Barrett (26M), Anfernee Simons (25M). There’s expected development curves with those players, of course, but with players like CJ McCollum (32M) and Terry Rozier (24M) in that same 16 guard grouping, how could VanVleet expect anything less?
If you want to sign a good, starting guard in the NBA? You can start low, but you’re probably ending up closer to 30M than you are 25M per year. The cap is high now, rising next year, rising the year after – these guys are getting paid. Raptors fans are well aware of VanVleet’s warts — fanbases are always acutely aware of their players’ shortcomings — but his standing in the league is still quite good. This will also likely be the biggest payday of his career.
I’ll posit a guess at what VanVleet’s contract ends up being. This isn’t what I would want to pay him, but this is my best guess: 3 yrs/90M or 4 yrs/108M. I guess we’ll see!
Have a blessed day.
