Playing in the NBA is a dream for every basketball player. When it comes to veterans these are the players that have notable experience playing in the league. Of course, they also have different salaries than rookie players.
What is the NBA Veteran Minimum Salary? The NBA veteran minimum salary changes year after year but generally it is in the range of $2-2.5 million – depending on the number of years played Some veterans get more than $2 million, but their status in the teams is different too.
Sometimes it is confusing to understand who is considered a veteran by NBA’s standards. This is a question that bewilders a lot of people. In this article, we will explore these details comprehensively and talk more about salaries and their essence.
Who is considered an NBA Veteran?
An NBA veteran is a player who has signed one contract (at least) with an NBA team. Technically, it means that even a 23-year-old player could be considered a veteran if his rookie deal is finished. Generally, 2 or 3 years are enough to classify a player as a veteran.
If we will talk purely from experience and the number of years a player has been in the NBA, there is no single standard. Most likely a veteran is a player who has been playing for 10 years and more, acquiring significant experience in the league.
Why Signing Veterans is Beneficial for NBA teams?
Every team in the NBA has its own salary cap, meaning that it is impossible to exceed the limit. Teams sign veterans and assign them minimum salaries to have space for other players. Also, such contracts are not long-term and rarely veterans stay more than a year in any team. At the same time, they can provide a great contribution to any team.
How Average Salary is Calculated?
Average salary is calculated by adding the salaries of all NBA players in a given season and dividing that number by the total number of contract players. This does not necessarily reflect the amount that NBA players are most likely to earn, as actual player salaries span a wide range.
In addition to providing information on how well NBA basketball players are paid compared to previous years, and with other professional players in the sport, the NBA’s average salary is also used as a guideline in the collective bargaining agreement between the NBA and the National Basketball Association, for the average exclusion clause level.
History of the Veteran Contract
In the first year of the NBA’s salary cap, 1984-85, the average salary in the league was $330,000. It stayed under $1 million for another six years, until the 1991-92 season, when the average salary was $1.1 million. It took just four years to cross the $2 million threshold, where it remained unchanged for three seasons, before breaking the $3 million in 1998-1999. The upward trend continued as average salaries topped $4 million just two seasons later, before slowing growth as it would not exceed $5 million until 2005-06. Season 2004-05 was the only one with an average salary lower than the previous season.
The Salary Cap and Veterans
Player salaries are directly related to the league’s financial health. The salary cap is based on the league’s revenue forecast for the upcoming season – 50% of the income goes into the pocket of the club owners, and 50% is spent on basketball salaries. So the more the league earns, the more the athletes get, this is a direct proportion.
All salaries are formed according to certain rules. The minimum salary in the NBA is 1.5-2.5 million per season, depending on the length of service (815 thousand – for beginners). Usually, they earn much more.
The player spends his first few seasons in the NBA on a fixed rookie salary before getting real money – so the majority of rookies are very far from the leaders in terms of earnings.
The term of the contract can be from one season to five years, and during this period the salaries are not revised. The player cannot demand an increase in the middle of the contract, but his salary cannot be lower either.
Players are paid only for the regular season. There is a small bonus fund from the NBA in the playoffs, but this is not very big money by the standards of athletes.
Despite common misconceptions, neither the NBA nor the players’ union discloses the exact salaries of the players. All numbers are collected by insiders, who not only have wide connections in the world of players, managers and NBA agents but also can skillfully calculate most salaries based on knowledge of the NBA Collective Agreement.
About 500 people play in the NBA every season, including those waived during the season, The league’s revenues have increased significantly in recent years, and salaries have risen with them. At the present moment there are a lot of veterans in the NBA if we look at purely from the technical point of view. We have noted that a veteran is a player who has signed at least one contract with an NBA team. LeBron James is also considered a veteran as he is already 36 but is the highest-paid player. Even though most veterans prefer to play on the minimum salary considering their decreased role in the roster, there are some who can play better considering their skills and receive more than their counterparts.
Although veterans are paid relatively well compared to the lowers paid player in the NBA. You can see who the lowest paid player in the NBA is by clicking here.
What is considered a Veteran in the NBA?
The term veteran can often be quite subjective in terms of how NBA players are described. The CBA is the collective bargaining agreement, an agreement between the players and the NBA that determines things like revenue share and salaries. They determine a veteran player as an player who has signed at least one contract with an NBA team. The CBA needs to organise whether a player is a veteran or not because it affect their free agent rights. This would earn that an NBA veteran is anyone who is not a rookie. NBA players also look at it this way.
They see that any NBA player who has played at least one year in the NBA is a veteran. Quite often NBA fans will also look at it this way, with players considering themselves veterans or “vets” if they are anything more than a rookie. Sometimes this view is not always taken by fans. Often veterans will be looked at as the older players in the league. Current NBA players like Dwight Howard, Russell Westbrook and Lebron James would be looked at as veterans. This is because of their age which is over 30, and having played in the NBA for over 10 years. The term veteran is really therefore subjective.
What is the minimum wage in the NBA?
Overall, the lowest possible salary for an NBA player is $925,258. This is the very lowest salary that can be given to an NBA player, and it only applies to certain players. NBA players without any previous experience in the NBA are the only ones that are eligible for this contract. The minimum contract that is allowed to be given to each player increases if they have more experience. For example, an NBA player with 1 year of experience can be paid a minimum of $1.49m, a huge increase compared to the minimum from the first year.
This continues to increase as players gain more and more experience in the NBA. This means that, the minimum contract for an NBA player with 10 or more years of experience is $2.64m. The NBA does not want teams to continually offer contracts to younger players over more experienced veterans, so it means that while veterans could earn $2.64m, this will only cost $1.67m on the teams salary cap. This rule was implemented so veterans are not discriminated against because they have higher minimum contracts.
How much do rookies make in the NBA?
The beginning of the new season in the NBA is getting closer, and like the previous seasons, we will have the opportunity to see an enviable number of newcomers in the strongest basketball league in the world. When it comes to the earnings of these players, it ranges from just over $900,000 to 7-8 million dollars per season. If we look at this year’s draft, the first pick from the draft, Cade Cunningham, is guaranteed $17.2 million for the first two seasons, and the total salary for the four-year contract is $38 million. When it comes to the mentioned draft, the players will earn a certain amount of money depending on which position they have taken in the draft.
Jalen Green’s second pick in the first two seasons will earn about $ 2 million less than the aforementioned Cunningham. The last pick from the first round of Santi Aidama will earn “only” 3.4 million dollars for two guaranteed seasons. Players who debut in the NBA without being drafted generally sign contracts with a minimum wage that will amount to about $925,000 next season.
What is the average salary for a rookie NBA player?
Rookie salaries heavily depend upon a number of factors and the answer is changing every season. This past year, the average salary for a rookie player in the NBA was $2,737,600 per year! Diving a little bit deeper into this subject, players receive larger paychecks when they are drafted higher up in the first round. For example, Anthony Edwards was the number one overall pick for the Minnesota Timberwolves a few years ago, he received a rookie salary of $9,757,440.
James Wiseman was drafted number two overall and got a contract of $8,730,240 and LaMelo Ball rounded out the top three with a salary of $7,839,960. As I previously mentioned, these average rookie contracts are expected to rise even more in the next couple of years. The salary cap for NBA franchises has been growing almost every season and with that comes more money to spend on their players, newly drafted or not. These rookies also have a ton of other factors included in their salary that could allow them to jump above what these expectations show, or could end up dropping below it. Still, it’s crazy to think about how much money these guys are making after just being drafted!