Victor Wembanyama just signed a five-year, $252 million extension with the San Antonio Spurs. In any other world, that number is jaw-dropping. But here’s the thing: it could have been a lot more. Wembanyama took a 25 percent max deal instead of the 30 percent supermax he qualified for based on performance escalators. The difference? Roughly $50 million over the life of the contract. He did it on purpose, too — to give the Spurs breathing room under the league’s brutal second apron rules.
And the NBA Players Association is not happy about it.
Jared Weiss of The Athletic reported that NBPA executive director David Kelly held his introductory press conference just minutes before Wembanyama’s news broke. Kelly made it clear the union is gearing up for a fight under new leadership. The target? The very system that makes a star player feel like he has to take less money to keep his team competitive.
“The CBA should not put a player in a position where he has to carry the burden in order to keep a team together,” Kelly said, per Weiss. “A system that does that, we have a problem.”
This isn’t an isolated move either. Jalen Brunson did something similar with the Knicks, taking a below-max deal that helped New York stay flexible. The Knicks just beat the Spurs in the NBA Finals, and Brunson’s sacrifice was a big part of why they could surround him with enough talent to get there. Wembanyama is following the same playbook.
The Spurs have some expensive pieces coming. De’Aaron Fox is already on a max contract. Young guards Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper both had monster postseasons this year, and their paydays are coming soon. If Fox weren’t on the books for that much, the Spurs would have more flexibility and Wembanyama’s sacrifice might not have been necessary. But he’s there. And so the franchise centerpiece took a haircut to keep the machine running.
It’s a noble move from a guy who has always been about winning over everything else. But it also lays bare a tension the league has been wrestling with for years. The second apron was designed to punish overspending and create parity. Instead, it’s pushing superstars to choose between their own max earnings and keeping a contender together. The NBPA sees that as a structural flaw. They’re right to be worried.
Kelly’s message was clear: the union is going to push back hard. Whether that leads to meaningful changes in the next CBA negotiation — or just a lot of posturing — remains to be seen. For now, Wembanyama is a Spur for the long haul, and he left tens of millions on the table to make it work. The league’s system made him feel like that was the only way.
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