After Kevin Durant's departure, the future seemed bleak for the Thunder. Russell Westbrook was set to become a free agent in 2017, so Oklahoma City was looking at the very real possibility of losing two of the game's best 10 players in back-to-back offseasons.
Luckily for them, Westbrook agreed to restructure his contract and sign an extension that will keep him with the franchise that drafted him until at least the 2017-18 season. His decision has many ramifications, but the most important one is that it bought the front office some time to put together a contender around their start point guard.
Obviously, it's extremely hard to replace a player of Durant's caliber, but the Thunder should have the future cap space to at least try. Even with Westbrook on the books, they will have only about $63 million in committed salary to seven players next summer, according to Spotrac.com.
Those players are Westbrook, Enes Kanter, Alex Abrines, Kyle Singler, Mitch McGary, Cameron Payne and Josh Huestis. (Domantas Sabonis, a 2016 first-round pick, will add a couple million more to that total once he officially signs his rookie contract).
If Oklahoma City were to renounce all of its free agents in the summer of 2017, it could create close to $40 million in cap space, according to the latest projections that put the salary cap at $102 million. That would be enough to offer a maximum contract while still leaving enough room to add another good piece.
Carving out as much cap room as possible, however, would mean losing Steven Adams, Andre Roberson and Victor Oladipo, which is highly unlikely. Still, the Thunder can create significant cap space and keep them by keeping the relatively small cap holds those three have on the books, which add up to just over $26 million, according to Basketball Insiders' Eric Pincus. Combined with the guaranteed salary on their cap sheet, that puts the Thunder at around $90 million, just $12 million below the projected cap.
That's not enough to offer a full max contract starting at around $34 million, but the Thunder can get there by finding trade partners for Enes Kanter and Kyle Singler, whose combined salaries amount to around $23 million, and not picking up McGary's and Huestis' options. That would give Oklahoma City all the space it needs, and it should be doable. Kanter has value as a player and is on a decent contract while Singler is on a very affordable deal.
If the Thunder go after Blake Griffin, as it's been reported, they won't even need to have that much room to make an offer. Maximum contracts vary in value depending on the years of experience a player has. Anyone who has been in the league for 10 years or more can get a max contract worth roughly 35 percent of the salary cap. Griffin will have been in the league for only seven years when he very likely opts out of his contract after this season. That means his maximum contract, under the current cap projection and CBA, would be for roughly 30 percent of the cap, coming in at around $29 million.
Even if Griffin decides against returning home to Oklahoma, other top free agents such as Paul Millsap and Gordon Hayward should be available. Solid players like Danilo Gallinari, Nikola Mirotic and J.J. Redick, to name a few, should be on the market as well. The Thunder will have several potential targets.
Banking on free agency to upgrade a roster is always risky and the Thunder could emerge from next summer empty handed. They've yet to sign even a decent unrestricted free agent since moving to Oklahoma City, and that was with Durant. Yet, they've also rarely had cap space to actually pursue a big name, so perhaps that history is unimportant. The possibility to play next to an elite player like Westbrook and one of the league's best centers in Adams should be appealing to many, especially if Oklahoma City has a good 2016-17 season.
Had Westbrook not committed to the franchise by signing that extension, the Thunder would have been looking at a rebuilding process that could have taken years with no guarantee of a payoff. Instead, they should be back in the playoffs next season, and with a little luck could be back to contention in 2016-17 after adding a quality free agent.
That's how meaningful August 4 was for the organization and why Westbrook is now, more than ever, celebrated as a hero by the Thunder's faithful.
* * *