Spend 822 million US dollars! Thunder renews its three core contracts: Why are they not afraid of the second rich line?

Jaylen Williams renewed his contract with a maximum of 287 million in five years, plus Alexander's 4-year 285 million in four years, and Homgren's 5-year 250 million in five years, and the total salary of the three's new contract will reach a maximum of 822 million US dollars. This number is really crazy! We have witnessed some teams falling apart due to the huge impact of the second rich line. Many people believe that the Thunder, who just won the 2025 championship, will become the next victim. Is this really the case?

Go back to 2012, after the Thunder lost to the Heat in the Finals, you may still remember Presti's difficult choice on Harden's contract. The Thunder were forced to part ways with Harden, who later became the MVP for the Rockets. History always tends to repeat itself, but this time Thunder will not repeat the same mistakes.

Presti and the Thunder rewarded their superstar Alexander with a four-year, $285 million contract extension that will keep him on the team until the 2030-31 season. The Thunder and Homgren finalized a five-year contract of up to 250 million, and the period also lasted until the 2030-31 season. In the end, Jaylen Williams also consolidated his position as the second in command with a new contract of up to 287 million in five years.

Although there are obvious concerns about how the Thunder will maintain success and build a roster around these young stars, the savvy Presti is already ready for it. In fact, the Thunder executive has been taking great steps over the past few years to avoid any issues related to the second tyrant line.

Presti's plan has been implemented for many years

Before the Thunder won the championship and Alexander grew into the league MVP, Presti and his team worked behind the scenes to build a self-sustaining lineup.

This is mainly achieved through the NBA draft. Over the years, the Thunder have accumulated a large number of first-round draft picks by trading Westbrook, George, Paul, Adams and other players. In this way, the Thunder began to build the core framework of the lineup around Alexander.

More importantly, Presti has a clear vision to create salary flexibility for the Thunder’s championship moments. Now that the championship moment has arrived, the plan has begun to take action.

Alexander, Homegren and Williams are excellent, the key to the Thunder's winning is their roster depth.

Dolt, Haltenstein, Caruso, Isaiah Joe, Wiggins and Carson Wallace all played a major role in the 2024-25 season, and Presti strengthened this depth by leveraging the team's cap space as the players are in their rookie contract.

Haltenstein signed a three-year, $87 million contract with the Thunder before the 2024-25 season. There is a $28.5 million team option in the final year of the contract. Another key figure in the success of the Thunder is Dort, the defensive vanguard in the starting lineup. From being unpicked and not seen as an outside threat to becoming one of the league's best wing 3D players, Dort's growth is amazing.

After his original contract expired, Presti negotiated a five-year, $82 million contract with Dort. Considering his ability to both offense and defense, the contract suddenly became one of the most cost-effective contracts in the league. Dort had a $18.2 million team option in the final year of his contract, the 2026-27 season.

Like Dort, Caruso's contract is also very team-friendly, signing a four-year, $81 million contract extension with the Thunder in December. The contract won't cost the team too much, and Presti can continue to rely on the veteran as a key adhesive connecting the starting and the backup lineup.

and then Wiggins, who signed a five-year, $45 million contract, a structure with a higher salary in the early stage, meaning that the contract amount will gradually decrease over time. Wiggins made $10.9 million in the first year of this contract, the just-passed season, and by the last year of the 2028-29 contract, he would make $8.3 million, when the Thunder have team options for his contract.

Unlike other teams who spend money at will to compete for the championship every year but are constantly in financial trouble due to bad contracts, the Thunder have flexibility. There are no bad contracts in their roster, and Presti can continue to fill the gaps through the draft and create development paths for the team behind the scenes.

Presti's plan is being fully implemented, which will allow the Thunder to avoid the second rich line while achieving success.

How the Thunder will avoid the second rich line in the future

With all these contract extensions reached, many NBA fans have already believed that this is the beginning of the Thunder's end due to the restrictions on the second rich line faced by high-paying teams. In this offseason, the Celtics had to break up their championship lineup because they were afraid of the second-large tyrant line and Tatum's Achilles tendon injury.

Due to the existence of the second rich line, many NBA teams have only two to three years of championship competition. But the Thunder is not the case.

In the next two to three years, Presti's team will not only continue to compete for the championship, but will also continue the team-building method of the past decade. The team's philosophy will not change.

Especially when the Thunder are paying more than $800 million for Alexander, Homegren and Williams, how could they do this?

Thunders have confirmed the roster for the 2025-26 season, and they hope to be the first team to achieve two consecutive championships since the Golden State Warriors in 2017 and 2018. The 15 roster quotas have been filled, and the Thunder will operate at a state that exceeds the salary cap. Even so, they are still about $8.5 million lower than the No. 1 Rich Line.

Looking ahead to the 2026-27 season, it was a year when many people questioned how Presty would use his magic as the extension of Homegren and Williams will take effect this year. The three core members of the Thunder will have the Thunder pay a total of about $120 million to $125 million.

Based on the salary cap forecast and estimates for the 2026-27 season, if all their existing contracts are added, the Thunder is expected to surpass the second rich line. However, as the Thunder have more than $50 million in team options to exercise on Haltenstein, Dort and Kenridge Williams to completely control salary below the second luxury tax line. When Haltenstein signed last offseason, his contract was seen as a short-term move for Oklahoma City.

He is the most likely player to leave the Thunder, especially by then Homgren had become a full-time player, and Jaylen Williams' contract extension was in effect. In addition, the team has just selected Thomas Sauber, a defensive big man with strong offensive and defensive potential, and he should also be able to enter the rotation lineup by the 2026-27 season.

By giving up Haltenstein and reorganizing Kenridge Williams' contract, the Thunder can easily control their salary below the second rich line.

Looking further away, the flexibility that Presti created still exists. It will be the season when Alexander's huge contract comes into effect, with his salary expected to be about $60 million that year. Adding his salary to the renewal of Homegren and Williams, the three players combined for about $150 million.

There is no doubt that the Thunder will become a team that pays high luxury taxes and exceeds the second rich line, right?

is wrong.

By then, Isaiah Joe will have a $11.3 million team option that the Thunder can exercise to get a salary relief, as does Jarin Williams' $7.7 million team option. The only question about the roster will revolve around Dort and Wallace, assuming they have no new contracts before this, both players will become free agents by then.

With a large number of draft picks continuing to fill the gaps behind the scenes, Presti was able to retain core talents and maintain the team's championship status.

This does not necessarily mean that the Thunder will not lose players in the next few years, as they will certainly lose some, but due to the flexibility brought by Presti’s negotiations to the team options and the flexibility that the team has to offer, the vast majority of the team’s roster and core members will remain in Oklahoma City.

The Thunder have a good management team led by Presti, and he is already at the forefront when considering the team's situation in the next three, four or even five years.

"Well, on this issue, I think the most important thing is that we are in a very early stage of the labor agreement, and I think I have gone through four or five labor agreements and can't remember exactly," Presti said at the year-end press conference. "It's obvious that the way people deal with it in the first few years is different from how the team ended up participating in the process of gradual advancement of labor agreements or rules."

"In our case, things like luxury tax have been around for years. The duplicate luxury tax was introduced in 2012, and the Ross clause and many other different clauses were also in that year," Presty continued. "But as it stands, we won't face a duplicate luxury tax penalty until the next labor agreement period. So we're still far from that."

Even if the Thunder ended up paying higher luxury taxes and were forced to surpass the second-large line, they've already gone a long way to the championship, which won't happen for at least four years, by then, Oklahoma City may have won multiple championships on the core lineup of Alexander, Homegren and Williams.

It is hard to say what will happen then now, because the future is too far away, but it is certain that Thunder will be able to keep their salary below the daunting second rich line while maintaining success for many years to come. With the numerous young talented players growing behind the scenes and the ability to continue to select high-level rookies, the Thunder will not decline in the short term.