The Golden State Warriors are currently focused on winning their second title in three seasons, but once their offseason begins, they'll have another challenge to deal with -- figuring out the roster situation with Kevin Durant, Andre Iguodala, and Shaun Livingston all set to be free agents.
Durant noted recently that he wants to stick around, and the latest news is that Iguodala is expected to stay as well. Via RealGM:
An NBA source said the only real open question for Iguodala to re-sign is the number of seasons on the deal with the Warriors.
Unfortunately, the Warriors' cap situation leaves them with more work to do than simply convincing that trio to return. Tim Kawakami of The Mercury News lays things out well here:
The key mathematical part of this for the Warriors is Durant, who could seek the max of about $36 million for 2017-18. But the Warriors don't have his Bird Rights, so they would have to shed a lot of money to create the cap space to fit such a salary, and that would include the renouncing of Iguodala and Shaun Livingston.
But if Durant is willing to take strictly a 20 percent raise from this season's salary of $26.5 million up to $31.8 million, the Warriors would not have to fit him into cap space and then could use Bird Rights to re-sign Iguodala and Livingston above and beyond the cap.
Players obviously aren't keen to leave money on the table, but with Durant already making $25M-plus, he could be willing to make that sacrifice in order to help keep the Warriors' core in tact, and give himself a better chance to win a championship. It'll be interesting to see this all play out in the summer.
