Mike D'Antoni has just one year left on his contract as head coach of the Houston Rockets, and judging by the way extension talks have gone, it's going to stay that way going into next season.
Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta and general manager Daryl Morey had indicated that Houston offered D'Antoni at least $5 million for the 2020-21 campaign, but D'Antoni's agent, Warren LeGarie, says that is not completely true:
“I’d like clear up some inaccuracies that were stated about the offer made to Mike,” LeGarie said, according to Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle. “The reported $5 million is really $2.5 million because it comes with contingencies. One, it’s only $5 million if he makes the playoffs and two, if he is coaching the team at the end of the year.”
To be fair, the Rockets should be a playoff team next season, but in the competitive Western Conference and with rumors abounding that Houston might try to blow the team up this summer, it's not a guarantee, which LeGarie pointed out:
“If they decide to fire Mike in the proverbial change of direction he gets $2.5 million,” he said. “If there is an injury or a change in the roster construction, of which Mike has no control, he nonetheless would become a victim of it.”
There's more:
LeGarie also said the $1 million bonus for each round of the playoffs the Rockets reached in that season would begin with the second round.
D'Antoni took over as head coach of the Rockets in 2016. In three years at the helm, he has led Houston to a 173-73 record, including a 65-win season during the 2017-18 campaign.
However, the Rockets have only made it past the second round of the playoffs once under D'Antoni, advancing to the Western Conference Finals last year before losing in seven games to the Golden State Warriors.
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