The Spurs have wasted no time with the negotiation period for their own free agents. After agreeing to new three-year deal with Julian Champagnie, ESPN’s Shams Charania is reporting that Harrison Barnes will return to the Spurs on a one-year, $8 million deal. He reports that the Spurs valued “his leadership and production” when negotiating the new deal.
The move will ensure Barnes returns to the Spurs for a third season. He was acquired via trade in 2024 as part of a three-way trade that sent DeMar DeRozan from the Bulls to the Kings. He started in all 82 games in the 2024-25 season to continue a streak of three straight iron man seasons. He started this season as their starting power forward and looked on track to continue that trend. He was red hot from three through the first third of the regular season, living up to his nickname of “Mr. 100%” before his shooting fell off, and he was eventually benched in favor of Champagnie as the Spurs looked for answers during a tough January stretch, and Barnes would eventually miss five games with an ankle injury to end his streak of 82-game seasons.
He eventually fell out of the main rotation all together as Mitch Johnson seemed to value Carter Bryant getting more developmental time, even in the playoffs. As a result, it wouldn’t have been a surprise to see Barnes test the free agency market, but it’s quite possible that at 34 years old, there may not have been a huge market out there, and he very well may value the Spurs as much as they do him.
With these two moves, it’s quite possible the Spurs are aware that the power forward market is a bit dry or outside of their price range. While this doesn’t mean they won’t make any major moves in free agency, the fact that they’re bringing back last season’s rotation shows that they’re prepared to run it back as a worst-case scenario, and provided Bryant continues to improve, bringing back a rotation that went to the finals and was a few blown leads from winning it all isn’t a bad thing.
Welcome back to San Antonio, Harrison!
