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Teams around the NBA have been deathly afraid of the second apron tax penalty, and for good reason. Over the years, we have seen numerous franchises torn apart by the financial restrictions placed upon them by the league's new CBA. Many are pointing to the Oklahoma City Thunder, who just won the 2025 NBA Finals, as the eventual next casualty of these apron rules, but Sam Presti has other ideas.
If you rewind to 2012, after the Thunder lost in the NBA Finals to the Miami Heat, you may recall Presti facing tough tax and financial decisions regarding James Harden. As a result of already paying Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, Oklahoma City was forced to part ways with Harden, who went on to become an MVP with the Houston Rockets.
History always tends to repeat itself, but that won't be the case here with the Thunder.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is coming off one of the greatest seasons in recent memory. Aside from leading the league in scoring, the 26-year-old guard won the regular-season MVP award, the Finals MVP award, and he delivered the Thunder their first championship in team history.
Only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1971), Michael Jordan (four times), and Shaquille O'Neal (2000) had ever achieved this trifecta before Gilgeous-Alexander did so this past year.
As a result, Presti and the Thunder rewarded their superstar with a four-year, $285 million contract extension that keeps him with the team through the 2030-31 season. He isn't going anywhere anytime soon, and Gilgeous-Alexander's new extension marks the highest single-season average salary in NBA history with an average annual value of around $70 million per year.
After the team announced that Gilgeous-Alexander had signed his enormous extension on Tuesday, Oklahoma City went to Chet Holmgren and secured his future. Holmgren and the Thunder agreed to a five-year max rookie extension that could reach $250 million in value. This deal keeps the Thunder big man under contract through the 2030-31 season.
The final major order of business for the Thunder was the new contract extension with Jalen Williams, who emerged as a first-time All-Star this past season and has cemented himself as the perfect second option next to Gilgeous-Alexander in Oklahoma City. Williams has agreed on a five-year max extension worth up to $287 million, according to ESPN's Shams Charania.
With these three deals, it means Presti and the Thunder will have committed a max amount of $822 million in new contract extensions to Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren, and Williams. These three are the core of Oklahoma City's championship DNA, and the team expects to contend for multiple titles with them in the years to come.
Although there are obvious concerns about how the Thunder will sustain success and construct a roster around these young stars given the implications of the league's apron penalties, Presti has prepared for this. In fact, the Thunder executive has been making exceptional moves over the last several years to prevent any second-apron problems.
Sam Presti's plan has been in motion for years
Before all the championship celebrations and Gilgeous-Alexander's rise to becoming the MVP of the league, Presti and his staff were working hard behind the scenes to create a roster that could be self-sustainable.
This was mainly achieved through the NBA Draft, as the Thunder accumulated a ton of first-round picks through the years by leveraging big names like Russell Westbrook, Paul George, Chris Paul, Steven Adams, and Al Horford. In doing so, Oklahoma City began to form the backbone of its roster around Gilgeous-Alexander.
More importantly, Presti had a vision to create flexibility for when the Thunder's championship moment came. Now that it's here, this plan has been set into motion.
As great as Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren, and Williams are, the identity of Oklahoma City's title run was their depth.
Luguentz Dort, Isaiah Hartenstein, Alex Caruso, Isaiah Joe, Aaron Wiggins, and Cason Wallace all held essential roles on this roster during the 2024-25 season, and Presti utilized the cap space his team had as a result of players being on rookie contracts to strengthen said depth.
The main reason why Hartenstein ended up with the Thunder in free agency is that only Shai was making more than $30 million per season. While many may not consider Hartenstein a top-tier center who should be making $30 million or more, Presti gave him this contract to win now and create flexibility for when SGA, Holmgren, and Williams were ultimately given extensions.
Hartenstein signed a three-year, $87 million contract with the Thunder before the 2024-25 season. The final year of his contract has a $28.5 million team option that Presti can and will likely utilize.
Another key piece of the Thunder's success is Dort, who is the defensive menace in the starting lineup. From being undrafted and not respected as a perimeter threat to becoming one of the league's best 3-and-D players on the wing, Dort's journey has been incredible.
After his original contract expired, Presti and the Thunder negotiated a five-year, $82 million contract with Dort, which has suddenly become one of the best deals in the entire league, given his two-way capabilities. Dort has an $18.2 million team option in the final year of his contract — the 2026-27 season.
Like Dort, Caruso's contract is also extremely team-friendly, as he signed a four-year, $81 million extension with the Thunder in December. This deal doesn't break the bank, and Presti can continue to lean on the veteran as the ultimate glue guy to bridge the first and second units.
Then there is Wiggins, who signed a five-year, $45 million contract that was front-loaded, meaning this contract decreases in monetary value as the years go on. Wiggins made $10.9 million this past season in the first year of this contract, and he will make $8.3 million in the final year, the 2028-29 season, when the Thunder own a team option on his deal.
Even before the 2024-25 season, a year that ended in a championship and the start of something special in Oklahoma City, Presti and the Thunder were working hard to set the stage for what's to come.
Unlike other franchises, which throw around money to try and contend every year and continuously run into financial hardships with bad contracts, the Thunder have flexibility. There are no bad contracts on this roster, and Presti can continue filling gaps and creating avenues to development behind the scenes through the draft.
The Presti plan is in full effect, and it's about to result in the Thunder navigating their way to success while also avoiding the second apron.
How Thunder can dodge second apron moving forward
With all these contract extensions being agreed upon, many NBA fans are already calling this the start of the end for Oklahoma City because of second-apron restrictions that high-salary teams are dealing with. Just this offseason, the Boston Celtics had to rip apart their championship team because of the apron penalties and Jayson Tatum's Achilles injury.
Many NBA teams are operating on a two- or three-year window now because of the tax aprons. However, that is not the case for the Thunder.
Over the next two to three years, Presti's team will not only contend for championships, but it will continue building the way that it has over the last decade. Nothing is going to change in terms of the organization's philosophy.
How could this be, especially when the Thunder are going to be committing over $800 million to Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren, and Williams?
Already, the Thunder are locked into their roster for the 2025-26 season, where they will look to become the first back-to-back champion since the Golden State Warriors in 2017 and 2018. All 15 roster spots are filled, and the Thunder will operate as an above-the-cap team. Even so, they are still roughly $8.5 million below the first apron.
Looking ahead to the 2026-27 season, that is the year many are questioning how Presti will be able to work his magic with the extensions of Holmgren and Williams kicking in. Between the three core members of the roster, Oklahoma City will be paying somewhere between $120 million and $125 million in total.
Based on the cap projections and estimates for the 2026-27 season, plus factoring in their current contracts, that automatically puts the Thunder roughly $17 million below the second apron. This doesn't include Williams' extension, which obviously temporarily takes Oklahoma City into the second apron.
However, as a result of the way Presti negotiated some of his players' contracts, the Thunder will have over $50 million in team options for Hartenstein, Dort, and Kenrich Williams that can be utilized to move under the second apron altogether. Hartenstein's deal, when he initially signed last offseason, was viewed as a short-term move for Oklahoma City.
He is the most likely player to depart the Thunder, especially with Holmgren being a complete player by then and Jaylin Williams' extension kicking in. Plus, this team just drafted Thomas Sorber, a defensive-minded big man with a lot of two-way potential, and he will be in the rotation by the 2026-27 season as well.
By moving on from Hartenstein and restructuring Kenrich Williams' deal, the Thunder can easily move below the second apron.
When you look ahead even further to the 2027-28 season, the same flexibility that Presti created exists. This would be the season in which Gilgeous-Alexander's mega-deal kicks in, and he is projected to make around $60 million that year. When you combine his salary with Holmgren and Williams' extensions, that is about $150 million in salary between three players.
The Thunder are undoubtedly going to be a high tax-paying and apron team, right?
Wrong.
By this point, Isaiah Joe now has an $11.3 million team option that the Thunder can utilize for cap relief, and the same can be said about Jaylin Williams with his $7.7 million team option. The only questions surrounding this roster would revolve around Dort and Wallace, two players who would be free agents, assuming they don't negotiate new deals before then.
With plenty of draft picks to continue filling gaps behind the scenes, Presti can retain talent and keep this team's championship status intact.
This doesn't necessarily mean that the Thunder won't lose players over the next several years, because they will, but the vast majority of this roster and core will remain in Oklahoma City because of the flexibility that is present via team options and non-guaranteed contracts Presti negotiated.
Oklahoma City has an excellent front office spearheaded by Presti, and he is already ahead of the game when it comes to thinking about where his team will be three, four, or even five years from now.
“Well, I think the number one thing on this question is we're in the very early stages of the CBA, and I think I've been around for four CBAs, maybe five, I can't remember,” Presti said at his end-of-year press conference. “And what's clear is the way people respond and react in the first few years is not the way that the team or teams ultimately end up engaging with the CBA or the rules as it unfolds.”
One of the big questions is whether the Thunder would have to deal with the repeater tax, which comes into effect for teams who are consistently above the league's luxury tax threshold over multiple seasons.
While this is obviously a concern for high-salary teams, which the Thunder will ultimately be with their three new extensions, Presti isn't concerned whatsoever.
“Now, for us specifically, the taxes and things, those things have always been in place for years. The repeater tax was conveniently introduced in 2012, as was the Rose rule and a lot of different things,” Presti continued. “But as constituted right now, we wouldn't face the repeater penalties until the next CBA. So we're far from that.”
Even when the Thunder ultimately see a higher tax bill and are forced to go into the second apron, they will already be well into their championship journey. This isn't going to happen for at least four years, and by then, Oklahoma City could have multiple championships with its core of Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren, and Williams.
It is too hard to say what will happen then since it's so far in the future, but the one thing that is certain about the Thunder is that they can sustain success now and for many years to come while remaining below the dreaded second apron.
With plenty of young talents developing behind the scenes and the ability to continue drafting high-level talents, the Thunder aren't going anywhere anytime soon.
