LAS VEGAS — When the Milwaukee Bucks clinched their spot in the NBA Cup championship game, plenty of the team’s younger and lesser-paid players were exuberant in the locker room.
Yes, they have a chance at a trophy. Those are nice.
They’ll also have a chance at their biggest payday of their careers. The NBA Cup final — the Bucks vs. the Oklahoma City Thunder — is Tuesday in Las Vegas, with an additional $308,983 in prize money going to each of the players on the winning team.
For the league’s superstars, that amount might represent a game’s pay — or maybe even a half-game’s pay. For much of the league, it’s still a colossal sum.
“I try not to think about the money,” said Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo, who is making about $48.8 million this season. “No, it’s not accurate what I’m saying. I think about the money — but I think about the money when we talk about the young guys.”
Winning players Tuesday will receive $514,971 from the league’s Cup prize pool if they’re on standard NBA contracts. The players on the losing team Tuesday will get $205,988 apiece; players on two-way deals will get half of those figures.
At his current salary of $578,577, Thunder two-way player Ajay Mitchell would be making about $7,056 per game. He’s going to do a lot better than that on Tuesday, win or lose.
“Obviously, there’s a lot of money on the line,” Mitchell said. “But my main focus is just on the win. It’s exciting to know that there’s money on the line, but the main focus is just winning another basketball game.”
The NBA Cup has a prize pool to incentivize players. The teams that lost in the semifinals — Atlanta and Houston — saw their players collect $102,994 each; the teams that bowed out in the quarterfinals — New York, Orlando, Golden State and Dallas — saw their players collect $51,497 apiece.
“I might get a new watch,” Knicks forward Josh Hart, who was asked what he’d do with his bonus, said in a response that went viral — and it should be noted he wasn’t being entirely serious. “I don’t really care about the young guys getting money. I only care about me, what I’m going to spend.”
For six of the players on the Bucks and Thunder rosters — Antetokounmpo and Milwaukee teammates Damian Lillard, Khris Middleton and Brook Lopez, along with Oklahoma City’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Isaiah Hartenstein — the difference between winning and losing Tuesday isn’t even an average day at the office. Those six guys, on average, are making about $443,300 per game.
For everyone else, the trip to Vegas will be a nice bump — some nicer than others.
“Not everybody gets the same paycheck in the NBA,” said Thunder forward Jalen Williams, who is making about $4.8 million this season. “We have guys that are on two-way contracts and some guys that are fighting to stay in the league. So, obviously, that money is a bigger deal for some people than others — so we definitely play for that.”
Bucks reserve A.J. Green makes about $2.1 million this season. The idea of adding $500,000 to that for winning one game blew his mind.
“It is crazy,” Green said. “But that shouldn’t make you play any harder. It really shouldn’t.”
Nothing makes Bucks forward Bobby Portis play harder; he’s one of the guys in the league who seems to treat every game with the same all-out vigor. He’s from Little Rock, Arkansas, where the median household income is about $60,000 and it’s estimated that 1 in 6 people in that city of about 200,000 are living in poverty.
It’s not lost on Portis — who’s making about $12.6 million this season — how lucky he is.
“It’ll take guys a lifetime to make $500,000 where I’m from,” Portis said. “So, I don’t take any dollar amount lightly.”
Green said he would give some of that bonus to his church, some of it to the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and save the rest. Mitchell plans on saving just about all of whatever comes his way from his NBA Cup experience.
Antetokounmpo’s NBA contracts — past and future — add up to about $460 million, and that’s just the total of his on-court deals. He fulfilled his life dream of being able to provide for his family long ago; he’s built wealth that will last for generations. That said, he still says Tuesday should be significant to everyone.
“It’s life-changing money,” Antetokounmpo said. “Obviously, $500,000, you can put a down payment on a house. You can put the down payment on two houses. … It’s an ongoing joke we have in our locker room. We say we play for the young guys because this money will mean a lot to them. But it really means a lot to everybody — because it’s a lot of money.”
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