The San Antonio Spurs historically have always been ahead of the competition, whether it's through coaching, front-office moves or drafting. They've been to the playoffs 22 straight years, and every year when they look to be on the brink of ending their streak, Gregg Popovich and the Spurs prove everyone wrong.

They're not a prime free agency market, and ever since the Kawhi Leonard debacle they've fallen from an elite championship contender to just a middling Western Conference team. The Spurs pushed the Denver Nuggets to seven games in the first round last season, largely because of the performance of LaMarcus Aldridge. He nearly averaged a double-double, putting up 20 points and 9.6 rebounds a game. Entering his 14th season in the league, Aldridge is still as effective as ever, and San Antonio rewarded that steady consistency from arguably its best player by guaranteeing the remaining $24 million on his contract.

As reported by Marc Stein of The New York Times, Aldridge's final year of his contract -- which is the 2020-21 season -- was only partially guaranteed for $7 million. The Spurs had until June 29, 2020 to fully guarantee his final year, as originally reported by Adrian Wojnarowki of ESPN. Aldridge signed a 3-year, $72 million extension with San Antonio in 2017 which kicked in last season.

By guaranteeing the remainder of Aldridge's contract, he's now off the board for the summer of 2020 free agency, pushing it down the road another year. It's not clear yet why the Spurs pushed to guarantee the rest of Aldridge's contract as they could've waited for this season to play out to see if they still wanted to commit themselves to the rest of his deal. 

Aldridge and DeMar DeRozan are the two highest-paid players on the team, and had a successful first year together as a tandem in the 2018-19 season. Guaranteeing the remainder of Aldridge's contract matches up the two All-Stars' timeline, with DeRozan having a player option in 2020 worth $22.7 million which he'll likely opt into. In 2021, the Spurs will have both contracts off their books and can decide how they want to retool their team to get back to contending rather than just being a tough first-round matchup for the top teams in the west.