Stephen Curry just agreed to a two-year extension worth $116 million when he could have demanded $136 million. That's a $20 million discount. For context, that's more money than the average retail trader will lose on meme stocks over their entire lifetime, and Curry gave it away before signing the paperwork.
The Warriors are thrilled. They get to keep their franchise player while saving enough cash to sign two mediocre role players who will brick open threes in the playoffs. Brilliant financial stewardship. This is the same organization that convinced investors their dynasty would last forever, right before they missed the playoffs twice in three years.
Curry is worth $160 million according to most analysts. He settled for $116 million. That's a 27.5% haircut. The last time someone took a voluntary pay cut that steep, they were a middle manager at a startup who believed in the mission and got laid off six months later with no severance.
Here's what $20 million buys: eight Tesla Cybertrucks that don't work, a beach house in Malibu that will be underwater in fifteen years, or 400,000 shares of whatever dogsh*t penny stock is trending on Reddit this week. Curry looked at those options and said no thanks, I'd rather help Bob Myers sign another aging veteran to a minimum contract.
The discount is being called team-friendly. That's corporate speak for "we convinced our employee to make less money so our billionaire owner can increase his profit margin." Lacob must have sent Curry a PowerPoint about cap flexibility and competitive windows. Those presentations have never been wrong.
Somewhere right now a day trader with $847 in his Robinhood account is reading this headline and thinking he could have negotiated better.
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