With Jalen Brunson’s team-friendly four-year, $156.5 million extension signed, sealed and delivered, the focus at Madison Square Garden now shifts to another extension-eligible star in position to ink to a long-term deal in New York.
Next up is Julius Randle, the three-time All-Star and two-time All-NBA forward entering the third season of his four-year, $117 million contract.
Randle can decline the player option on the final year of his deal to hit free agency early in the summer of 2025, and beginning the first week of August, on the three-year anniversary of his first extension in 2021, the Knicks can lock him into a second contract extension.
Randle was one of just five players to average 24 points, nine rebounds and five assists last season prior to his season-ending dislocated right shoulder in late January. The other players to average that stat line over the past two seasons have either already won an NBA Most Valuable Player of the Year award — Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo, Denver’s Nikola Jokic and Philadelphia’s Joel Embiid — or project to win one soon: Dallas’ Luka Doncic.
The Knicks have made the playoffs three times since Randle left the New Orleans Pelicans for New York in 2019, and the combination of both team and individual success puts the star forward in line for a pay raise.
He has a base salary of $27.5 million for the upcoming 2024-25 season, a likely All-Star roster incentive worth $1.38 million, and another incentive worth $13.8 million if he appears in 65 games and the Knicks make the playoffs.
If they so choose, the Knicks can offer Randle a maximum of a 40% raise on his salary, or a four-year, $181.5 million extension with potential payout structure featuring $40.5 million in Year 1, $43.8 million in Year 2, $47 million in Year 3, then a possible $50.2 million player option in Year 4.
Again, that’s if the extension is available and if Randle chooses to accept it.
Randle is in a similar position to Brunson, who eschewed an additional $113 million and instead signed an extension this summer to help give the Knicks cap flexibility to avoid the restrictions imposed on teams with payrolls exceeding the second apron.
Brunson could have gone this summer without an extension, played the entire 2024-25 season, then sought a maximum contract offer of five years, $269.1 million next summer.
Randle’s numbers differ slightly.
If an extension were not agreed upon this summer, Randle, who will have 11 years of NBA experience, will be eligible for the 10-year-player maximum salary exception of 35% of the projected $155.1 million salary cap, or a $54.25 million Year 1 salary in a five-year, $314.65 million deal.
The deal would immediately make him the highest-paid player in NBA history compared to players who’ve signed a contract as of this summer.
It would also vault the Knicks right up against the second apron, which lingers at $189 million this season and will increase in conjunction with the salary cap, which is projected to spike the maximum of 10% following the NBA’s renegotiated broadcast right’s deal.
That’s about $208 million, a figure the Knicks must avoid to chase a championship now without facing roster-building ramifications later.
As a reminder: Brunson signed at four years, $156.5 million. OG Anunoby stayed in New York on a five-year, $212.5 million deal. Mikal Bridges becomes extension-eligible in October but will make $23.3 million this season and $24.9 million in 2025. Josh Hart, Donte DiVincenzo and Mitchell Robinson are three more eight-figure players. The rookies Pacome Dadiet and Tyler Kolek have cap hits, too.
The Knicks are already projecting at a roughly $160 million payroll if they use their taxpayer mid-level exception to sign a free agent (like a backup center to help Robinson and Jericho Sims) to a two-year deal. Bringing Randle back at his team-friendly max would vault the payroll north of $200 million, with the second apron projected at $208 million.
And if he were to wait until next season to command his 10-year max, the Knicks’ payroll would rocket north of the second apron.
There’s also one more angle to consider: Randle is perpetually included in trade rumors for a Knicks team in the market for the piece capable of lifting the franchise to championship heights. If Randle were to sign a team-friendly deal, he could then be valued higher by rival executives given the looming salary cap spike over the coming seasons.
All factors are in play for a Knicks front office that’s already locked in its star guard, and now has the ability to secure his supporting cast.