...also worth noting - it appears most GMs aren't handing out incentive laden deals anymore because they don't offer any value to the teams. In the new CBA those incentives count towards a team's cap space regardless of whether the player meets the incentives or not - that means even if in this hypothetical $100mil Tari deal - Tari was offered $15mil in incentives over x years, those $15mil in incentives would still count against the team's cap sheet and prevent Houston from making further roster moves even if they were unrealistic targets like Tari winning an MVP. I think incentives were a tool used to mitigate risk for young players with developmental concerns or injury histories - Tari fits into both camps. Now Tari is sitting on the qualifying offer like other young players with similar concerns. This isn't a Tari/Houston problem so much as a problem with the new CBA eliminating risk mitigation for players who fall into that camp. All he can do is ball out this year(last night was NOT a good start for him) and try to find a handful of teams willing to compete for his services this offseason...but the reality is there aren't a lot of teams with budget to do that so his options are likely limited.
I think Tari played one of the worst games of basketball I've ever seen yesterday. Truly. Couldn't believe it.
This seems like a fabrication. No way Stone offered 100 mill in any capacity. Would've been 4/100 or 5/100 and youre not giving 5/100 to an injury prone player. 2+1 team option at 55 mill seemed abt right to me.
We have the KPJ extension as a clear model of how just reporting a $100M total contract value without revealing the guarantees is pretty much useless. KPJ signed a 4-year, $82.5M deal, but only received $15.6M of it due to the guarantee structure. That was definitely an extreme case, but I would suspect that one sticking point for Tari was going to be how much the Rockets pushed for Exhibit 3 prior injury exclusion protection on his leg. If he's definitely going to have to manage chronic soreness for the rest of his career, you absolutely would refuse to sign a deal where the team is going to be incentivized to trump up the severity of an injury so they can cut you with no financial commitment. If he's on a fully guaranteed deal, the team is going to be strongly incentivized to keep any injury under wraps as best they can, work with you to rehab, and possibly find a future trade suitor who is more permissible on the medicals. If Tari eventually got cut with an injury designation, he'd be hit by the double whammy of getting waived with no guaranteed money, and also carrying that tag while looking for a new spot. He'd likely never be able to sign another deal with significant guaranteed money, and would likely be bouncing from team to team on short term deals. This seems pretty bush league for the Rockets to leak this offer, as they know how it will be picked up by content aggregators, and how misleading it is without further details. Really poisons the well and hurts the relationship with the player, and I just don't see any upside in it for the team in future negotiations.
It was like he got his talent stolen like in that movie Space Jam, but instead of the monstars stealing his talent, Cam Whitmore jumped inside Tari's body so he could still be a Rocket but actually play in a game alongside KD.
Why do you automatically blame the Rockets for leaking this offer when Windhorst doesn't say who his source is and whether he knows any other details? Tari's camp could have leaked the offer and Windhorst just left out the details because the Twitter audience doesn't care about that stuff. Windhorst might clarify in the future that the offer was incredibly team friendly. Even the example you referenced earlier with KPJ's extension demonstrates this. Woj listed $82.5M in his tweet. The source wasn't the Rockets, it was KPJ's agent and Woj left out all the details about the partial guarantee structure.
Because if Tari's side leaked the offer, then it would be all about how the Rockets were lowballing with bad guarantees, so public opinion would be resting on Tari's side. Those details would be in the headline of the post. Instead, the way that the leak was structured is intentionally designed to make it so Tari looks greedy for turning down a big deal, and the Rockets look reasonable, with a small footnote on saying it's "not fully guaranteed." The tweet you're referencing from KPJ's agent is specifically written that way to make the agency look as good as possible, so that they can claim they secured a huge extension, when in reality, they basically got a souped up qualifying offer with multiple outs. It's no different than FVV's first deal getting announced without mention of a year 3 player option, or DFS's 2-year guaranteed deal being announced as a 4-year deal initially. This is sports journalism in 2025. No reporting is given away for free without some underlying motive unless you're Pablo Torre, apparently. Or Tari is REALLY delusional about his own role, health, and the economic risks he's taking, and somehow thought that people would see him turning down $100M and be on his side. To be fair, I suppose that is still a possibility, but it seems a lot less likely to me.
Remember this news? Oladipo hadn't had a healthy season in three years by that point. I don't know who leaked it, but it made both sides look bad. Dipo for turning it down and Stone for offering it in the first place. So unless Woj made it all up there's a recent example of a player being delusional about his own role, health, and the economic risks right there. I'm NOT saying Tari's side leaked this extension news. I just don't see the benefit from the Rockets' side either. Like you said, it sours the relationship with Tari and makes future negotiations harder. He's still on the team. They need him to play well. Whether they plan to keep him or trade him they are better off being on good terms with him. Why would they risk that just to make Tari look bad? No offense to Tari, I love him as a player, but most NBA fans wouldn't even know who he is. Did they really need to win a PR battle against him?
I 100% believe in Windhorst.. I don't ever recall him just making up bullshit and this is Tari Eason we're talking about, not some big named FA. Why would he just suddenly make up a rumor about him? Makes zero sense, especially, since he's been making us look good all pre-season by picking us as one of his favorite teams in the west. Tari on the other hand, Mr. Giver, not Taker. Better start showing he belongs on the team because I can give him a pass for having a fluke game but the way he played last night was completely selfish and detrimental to the team. Refusing to pass when he's being walled and taking ill-advised shots. Not even trying on defense, even when Sengun was directing him in traffic. Like what the **** was going on? It felt like watching T-Mac/Vince Carter pouty attitude on the court live, in a huge season opener where we needed him. Also, let's get to the contract, 100M for 4 years or 5 years. I'm going to say it was for 5 because if it was for 4 we'd be going to the 2nd apron just for Tari Eason and that'd be idiotic because he's not good enough to warrant the team being shackled. Even for 5 years 20M, that may be a fair deal but it'd still put us over the 1st apron next off-season. Ya'll gotta remember, we need to make all the moves possible to fix our team before we extend Amen, since we'll be at the 2nd apron afterwards, if we limit ourselves before that because Tari is crying that we owe him more than he's worth, then we're walking down the path of failure once all is said and done. I still have fresh memory of us being stuck on the Anderson contract, even in our CP3 year where we desperately could have used that money on an actual player in the playoffs and don't get me wrong, I love Ryan Anderson but he didn't deserve that contract. We probably win game7 if we had another elite role player instead of Ryan Anderson being on the bench. Smart decisions with money and being healthy wins championships. With Tari Eason, that's ignoring both if we pay him what he wants.
Tari is the most expendable of the young core considering Amen, Jabari, and even DFS all can do what Tari does. He’s also the last remaining low-iq player, after getting rid of Jalen, Cam, and Dillon. I’m perfectly fine with trading him to find a starting point guard.
I agree with this. When we were building from the draft I really wanted to keep these guys together, except Jalen, but as we watch them progress you can really tell who has got it together and who doesnt. It's too early with just 1 bad game but Tari seems like he is still doing the same stuff he was 4 years ago without much progress. If it boils down to a core of Sengun, Jabari, Amen and Sheppard (Still needs another year or two of developing ) I'm fine with that.
