Jonathan Kuminga and the Golden State Warriors are locked in a stalemate and barreling toward an October deadline to agree to a new contract. One expert's prediction should be music to Kuminga's ears: he says the Warriors are going to blink first.
The basics of the Kuminga standoff are simple, even if there are plenty of complicated tendrils spinning off. Jonathan Kuminga is a restricted free agent, which means the Warriors can match any contract he signs with another team. There is only one team left with the cap space to sign a market deal, the Brooklyn Nets, and they don't appear to be interested.
Kuminga is an extremely talented player capable of big-time scoring, as he showed in the playoffs last year once Stephen Curry went down. On the other hand, the Warriors also lost all four games in which Kuminga played a prominent role. He doesn't consistently do the "little things" that winning teams rely on, and his lack of a dangerous jumper makes him a poor fit on a roster with Draymond Green and Jimmy Butler.
The Warriors have offered Kuminga a two-year contract worth $45 million with a team option on the second season and are demanding that he waive his right to block any trades next season. His only recourse to signing the deal is to sign the qualifying offer instead, a one-year, $8 million deal that would see him hit unrestricted free agency next summer.
If Kuminga signs the qualifying offer it would be a disaster for the Warriors, as he would retain that no-trade clause and automatically lose his Bird Rights in a trade; the offers coming back would be peanuts. Yet fail to trade him, and he almost certainly walks in free agency for nothing next summer, when significantly more teams will have access to cap space.
Yet Kuminga signing the qualifying offer also means he makes $8 million next season instead of $22 million, with no guarantee of what his next contract will look like. It's a massive risk for him, which is why he hasn't done it yet. He's trying to use that threat as leverage -- but it's not clear who will cave and make a concession first.
According to Dan Favale, a longtime NBA analyst who writes for both Fansided and Bleacher Report, it will be the Warriors caving.
The Warriors will give in to Kuminga
There is a massive unknown waiting for Kuminga after this season. Can he prove himself enough to sign a large long-term deal? Will he be squeezed into a prove-it contract? Whether he makes $22 or $8 million this season, future years are an unknown either way. His decision largely comes down to trading $14 million for control over his future; he doesn't want to make that move, but he likely is willing to at some point.
That's why the Warriors have to blink first. If he truly does sign the qualifying offer it would be a death sentence for the franchise moving forward. They would have a player on the roster who doesn't want to be there, whose value is too complicated to trade for anything significant, and who wil leave for nothing next summer.
Favale predicts that the Warriors will cave in some form. They can't increase the salary of the offer and still sign Al Horford to the Taxpayer MLE, so it's more likely that they give up some of the concessions they demanded. Specifically, he predicts that Kuminga gets a player option instead of a team option and signs on a "1+1" contract for $45 million altogether.
It's not an ideal resolution for Golden State, nor Kuminga, but it may be enough of a compromise on both sides to get done. Given the leverage all around, it would not be a surprise to see Favale proven correct and the Warriors budging on their stance. Their offer is currently painful and perhaps insulting; taking a step off the ledge gives Kuminga incentive to sign and still maintains the asset.
No outcome is going to be perfect for the Warriors, but this one seems the least of multiple evils.