Tristan Thompson Is Reportedly Willing To Take Less Than The Max From The Cavaliers

Tristan Thompson has already balked at a contract from the Cleveland Cavaliers worth $80 million over five years. Might he be willing to end this ongoing stalemate if his team sweetens the pot a bit? One report indicates as much.

According Chris Broussard of ESPN, Thompson would accept a three-year deal if Cleveland ups his yearly salary incrementally.

Those terms would afford Thompson an average salary of $17.7 million, one nearly two million dollars more than the offer that Cleveland made him this summer – and presumably still stands.

Broussard originally reported that agent Rich Paul – who’s close friends with LeBron James, remember – would have his client sign the three-year, $53 million that the Cavaliers put on the table. But that intel was immediately refuted by the Akron Beacon Journal’s Jason Lloyd and later corrected by Broussard, both of whom say that Cleveland is currently unwilling to cede to Thompson’s new demands.

It bears reminding that Thompson’s camp holds all power in these negotiations.

The Cavaliers will be cash-strapped next summer despite the salary cap’s imminent rise to approximately $90 million. Due to the fact his team will be close to the cap or even above it when free agency begins in July, general manager David Griffin won’t have simple means to finding a replacement for Thompson should Cleveland ultimately fail to come to terms with the Canadian big man.

Teams overpay to retain their own players, the saying goes, and that’s especially true of squads that are up against or have completely surpassed the salary cap threshold. Why shouldn’t Thompson force the Cavaliers’ hand by giving him an outsized contract? Taking less would have no tangible benefit to him personally, instead simply lessening the luxury tax penalty billionaire owner Dan Gilbert will be forced to pay the league one way or another.

LeBron James, Tristan Thompson
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That reality, combined with the free agency of breakout center Timofey Mozgov, puts Thompson in a position of strength Cleveland can’t come close to matching. And if reports are true that three teams already have eyes of paying him the max-level deal he desires, the 24-year-old has literally nothing to lose by playing this season on a one-year deal – barring the unlikelihood of catastrophic injury, of course.

Thompson originally wanted $96 million over five years, and probably still does. But he wants to play basketball, too, and the specter of the Cavaliers beginning their quest for a championship while he sits at home is surely weighing on the fifth-year power forward. $17.7 million a year is too much for a player of his caliber in a vacuum, but teams can’t afford to see through that pristine lens. Context matters, and agents have become smarter than ever at exploiting it.

This development seems like the first major step in contract negotiations that have proven unsurprisingly arduous. Thompson conceded, basically, if ever so slightly; will Cleveland follow suit? Stay tuned.

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