NBA free agency 2025: The 7 worst contracts of the summer, including a costly Bucks blunder

An important reminder: There are no bad contracts in the NBA. The players earned their money. They receive 50% of the league’s basketball-related income, and they probably deserve an even greater share.

There are, however, misallocated funds from a team-building perspective, and that is where we find ourselves here, determining the seven most bewildering contracts of the 2025 offseason (so far).

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NBA executives are making fewer big mistakes than ever, and part of that is because they have very little money to spend. Only one team, the Brooklyn Nets, entered this summer with sizable salary cap space, and they did not seem all that interested in spending it. Most teams had only their mid-level exception to offer free agents, and a few of them managed to screw that up. Imagine if they had unlimited resources.

One team even took drastic measures to create cap space, and see how that turned out for them …

THE 2025 OFFSEASON’S 7 WORST CONTRACTS

1. Myles Turner, Milwaukee Bucks ($27.2M AAV)

• Contract: 4 years, $108.9 million (player option in 2028-29)

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 16.37%

• 2024-25 (72 games): 15.6 PTS (48/40/77), 6.5 REB, 1.5 AST

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On its own, the contract for Turner is not a bad one. The average annual value of $27.2 million is probably pretty close to an average salary for a starting center. And Turner is probably pretty close to an average starting center, even after he helped the Indiana Pacers to the 2025 NBA Finals last month.

For that he earned this contract. Stealing him from the Pacers also makes worse a rival, though Tyrese Haliburton’s injury sets a sub-championship ceiling on Indiana, and the addition of Turner alone does not make Milwaukee a serious contender, either. Turner does make the Bucks a more competitive team than they were with a 37-year-old Brook Lopez manning the middle, and maybe that is enough to convince Giannis Antetokounmpo to stay in Milwaukee. And maybe that makes Turner’s contract worth the price.

But not if it limits the Bucks’ ability to contend, and it does do that. Because, in order to sign Turner into salary cap space, Milwaukee had to waive and stretch the $113 million left on Damian Lillard’s contract. As a result, the Bucks will pay Lillard $22.5 million annually over the next five seasons not to play for them. That dead money is wider than the salary divide between Rudy Gobert ($36.5 million) and Nikola Jokić ($55.2 million).

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Instead of paying an average of $27.2 million over the next four years to retain Turner, Milwaukee will be paying an average of $49.7 million — or more than 30% of the cap. You cannot win a title paying the equivalent of superstar money to Turner, and sooner or later Antetokounmpo will realize that.

2. Duncan Robinson, Detroit Pistons ($16M AAV)

• Contract: 3 years, $48 million ($18.8 million guaranteed)

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 10.89%

• 2024-25 (74 games): 11 PTS (44/39/89), 2.3 REB, 2.4 AST

Who else, exactly, were the Pistons competing with to sign Duncan Robinson for $48 million? He made a similar salary the last four seasons, and we did not just decide that was a negative contract, the league did. There was no real market for Robinson’s services, not even as an expiring salary this past season.

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This is surely why Detroit built in a way to get out of this contract as soon as next season.

Do not get me wrong. Robinson is an elite shooter, and he is a safeguard against the Pistons losing Malik Beasley, who is currently embroiled in an alleged gambling scandal. But he is a replacement-level player, even though he just shot better than 39% from long distance for the fourth time in his past six seasons.

The Miami Heat’s offense was better when Robinson was on the court, and their defense was worse, and that is how it has been for the 31-year-old, who did contribute to a pair of runs to the NBA Finals. In the end, though, his defense made him a detriment on the game’s biggest stage. That is unlikely to change.

It will be interesting to see how much more the Pistons can squeeze from Robinson than they did Simone Fontecchio, the player who they dealt for Robinson in a sign-and-trade with Miami. Fontecchio, who shot 40% from 3 for the 2023-24 season, was making half Robinson’s salary, and even that was a little steep.

3. Dennis Schröder, Sacramento Kings ($14.8M AAV)

• Contract: 3 years, $44.4 million ($33.3 million guaranteed)

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 9.12%

• 2024-25 (75 games): 13.1 PTS (48/40/77), 2.6 REB, 5.4 AST

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Dennis Schröder will play for his ninth team in five seasons. He is perennially available, as he was traded three times on his last contract, a two-year, $25 million deal with the Toronto Raptors. He represented little to no value each time he was dealt, and that was on a cheaper contract than the one he just signed.

Granted, the Kings needed a true point guard. Rookie Devin Carter was the only one on the roster. But to bend over backwards — to the point where they reportedly considered signing-and-trading Malik Monk to facilitate the acquisition of Schröder — for this particular point guard seems like a strange priority.

After all, what does Schröder do for a team that features Domantas Sabonis, Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan as its three best players? Maybe they hunt for a play-in tournament bid in a crowded Western Conference. But not with that defense, probably. More likely the Kings are bound for the lottery again.

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If Sacramento was so keen on signing someone who is better off being a backup, why pay $44.4 million over three years to Schröder when, say, the Orlando Magic paid Tyus Jones $7 million for a single year?

4. Clint Capela, Houston Rockets ($7M AAV)

• Contract: 3 years, $21.1 million

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 4.33%

• 2024-25 (55 games): 8.9 PTS (56/0/54), 8.5 REB, 1.1 AST

An average annual value of $7 million for Clint Capela is not so bad, considering he made three times that as a member of the Atlanta Hawks last season. He is a decent rim-running and rim-protecting big man, though the Hawks produced a whole lot of mediocrity (or worse) with him on both ends of the floor.

Atlanta shopped Capela for what seemed like the entirety of his last contract, and there were no takers. He made more money then, and his contract now was probably net neutral value as soon as he signed it.

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What I do not get is why the Rockets felt compelled to pay their third-string center $21 million. They have already committed close to $50 million over the next three years to Alperen Şengün and Steven Adams, and that does not account for any small-ball lineups that head coach Ime Udoka might want to roll out. It is unclear how much playing time Capela will even receive, though he does provide some injury insurance.

5. Luke Kornet, San Antonio Spurs ($10.2M AAV)

• Contract: 4 years, $40.7 million ($24 million guaranteed)

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 7.11%

• 2024-25 (73 games): 6 PTS (67/0/69), 5.3 REB, 1.6 AST

I like Luke Kornet. I feel like I need to say that about all of these guys. They are worthwhile NBA players.

But the 30-year-old has not averaged more than six points since his early 20s, when he was toiling for terrible New York Knicks teams. He built his value over time on the Boston Celtics, turning himself into a fringe contributor on a championship team, all while playing on a series of veteran minimum contracts.

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Now, Kornet will make almost as much money in his first season with the Spurs as he has for the entirety of his career — all to be Victor Wembanyama’s sometimes sidekick in San Antonio’s frontcourt. It is quite the added responsibility from what he was in Boston, where he served as a third- or fourth-string center.

It sure seems like he is being paid commensurate with the best he has ever been (those seven blocks against the Knicks were something, weren’t they?) than by what he actually is, which is a career backup who has only excelled in an ideal situation. This is a $24 million bet (the deal is only fully guaranteed for the first two seasons) that Kornet’s production per 36 minutes will translate in increased playing time, and that is a bigger bet than most others in this market.

6. Jake LaRavia, Los Angeles Lakers ($6M AAV)

• Contract: 2 years, $12 million

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 3.88%

• 2024-25 (66 games): 6.9 PTS (48/42/68), 3.9 REB, 2.4 AST

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Jake LaRavia is fine. He was thrown in as salary filler at the deadline to a three-team trade involving the Memphis Grizzlies, Sacramento Kings and Washington Wizards, and none of those teams — all of which could have used a value added — preferred to keep him. That should tell us something right off the bat.

It did not tell the Lakers anything, though, as they made LaRavia their first priority, agreeing to terms with him in the moments after the free-agency window opened. They wanted his shooting, ignoring the fact they need to build a defense around Luka Dončić, 40-year-old LeBron James and Austin Reaves.

LaRavia is making short money, and for that his cannot be a terrible contract. But it can be a questionable one. You are telling me the Los Angeles Lakers — the league’s premier franchise — could not convince anyone else to accept a $6 million salary from them? How much more valuable is LaRavia than, say, Tim Hardaway Jr., who took a veteran’s minimum contract to play for the Denver Nuggets?

7. D’Angelo Russell, Dallas Mavericks ($5.8M AAV)

• Contract: 2 years, $11.7 million (player option in 2026-27)

• Percentage of the 2025-26 salary cap: 3.68%

• 2024-25 (58 games): 12.6 PTS (39/31/83), 2.8 REB, 5.1 AST

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I cannot in good conscience tell you that anything more than a veteran’s minimum contract is good value for D’Angelo Russell. Granted, he is a one-time All-Star who averaged 18 points for the Lakers two years ago, but tell me what team he has made better since he made that All-Star roster for the 42-win Brooklyn Nets in 2018-19. He has proven to be a high-usage, low-efficiency player over the course of his career.

And the Mavs have made him their starting point guard in the absence of an injured Kyrie Irving. Is that really the environment in which they want Cooper Flagg to learn how to be an additive superstar? Dallas wants Flagg to play winning basketball, and it has been some time since Russell has contributed to that.