The Lakers’ quest to become the first two-time NBA Cup champion in league history is set to begin on Wednesday against San Antonio. If they beat the Spurs, they’ll face the winner of the Phoenix Suns and
Oklahoma City Thunder’s quarterfinal matchup with a trip to the Cup final on the line.
If the Lakers wind up winning their second Cup title, they’ll stamp their names in the league’s history books forever. They’ll also earn a sweet cash prize as a nice bonus.
Since the Lakers already made it to the knockout round, each player is guaranteed to walk away with at least $53,000. They stand to roughly double that payout with each round that they advance from there.
That’s the rate for every player on a standard contract. While an extra $530,000 might not mean much to LeBron James, Luka Dončić or the soon-to-cash-in Austin Reaves, that’s potentially life-changing money for some of their lowest-paid players. Adou Thiero is earning only $1.3 million this season, which is the absolute minimum that a rookie can be paid. The cash prize he’d receive if the Lakers win the Cup championship is more than 40% of his annual salary.
Head coach JJ Redick believes that prize money will fire his guys up.
“Didn’t get an opportunity to compete for the Cup last year,” Redick told reporters after the Lakers clinched their spot in the knockout round. “So we’re excited. I mean, $53,000 is a lot of money. It just is. So, I’m sure there’s some extra motivation.”
The Lakers’ two-way players also stand to cash in, albeit not to the same extent. If they’re on the active or inactive roster for any of the knockout-round games, they get half of the prize money awarded to players on a standard contract. In other words, they’d get roughly $26,500 if the Lakers lose in the quarterfinals, $53,000 if they lose in the semifinals, etc.
That timing couldn’t work out much better for Drew Timme, whom the Lakers signed to a two-way deal in late November, and it couldn’t work out much worse for Christian Koloko, whom the Lakers waived to make room for Timme. Koloko will not receive any prize money from the NBA Cup, while Timme will make at least $26,500 if he’s on the Lakers’ active or inactive roster for the quarterfinal matchup against the Spurs.
Two years ago, many of the Lakers weren’t shy about admitting that the prize money added some fuel to their fire for the NBA Cup. While the prize money is effectively a rounding error for their max-contract stars, it’s a big deal for guys like Timme and Thiero.
After the Milwaukee Bucks won the NBA Cup last year, Giannis Antetokounmpo told reporters that he didn’t care about the money for himself, but he was fired up because of what it meant for some of his teammates.
“We have this joke within the team about our two-way guy Liam,” Antetokounmpo said. “I promised him from the first Cup game, I said, ‘We’re going to go all the way and you’re going to get your house in Iowa.’ So after every game I was like, ‘One step closer to your house in Iowa!’
“After the game, we went to the locker room and I saw smiles on their face.”
Will the Lakers be the ones hoisting the Cup—and the $530,000 in prize money—this year? We’ll find out soon enough.
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