Booker is eligible for early renewal of Sun this summer, and the Sun is expected to reach an agreement with Booker soon

is here, Booker's super maximum salary is about to be achieved.

According to senior journalist Mare Stein today, Booker is eligible for a two-year, $149.8 million early contract renewal this summer, and the Sun is expected to reach an agreement with Booker soon.

2, 149.8 million, or $75 million in annual salary. This wave is really scary. Although the NBA has frequently issued large contracts in recent years, there have never been more than 70 million cases in annual salary calculations. Booker directly set a new record for the highest annual salary in a single season.

As early as 2022, Booker and Suns completed a four-year, $224 million contract renewal. Currently, the contract has three years left. The total contract in the next three years will be $174 million. With 149.8 million in the past two years, the total contract will reach 325 million in five years, surpassing Tatum’s 5-year 315 million in five years, also ranked first in history.

If players like Tatum, Jokic, Edwards, and Antetokounmpo get super top salaries, everyone will only lament the inflation in the United States, but it is really a big question for Booker to get such a contract.

So is such a Booker worth such an annual salary of 75 million?

Look first, I took a look at Booker this season. He played in a total of 75 games, averaged 37.3 minutes per game, second in the league, handed in 25.6 points, 4.1 rebounds, 7.1 assists and 2.9 turnovers, with a shooting percentage of 46.1% + 33.2%, and a real shooting percentage of 58.9%.

As a comparison, Booker's data in the past two years are as follows...

-22-23 season, 27.8 points, 4.5 rebounds, 5.5 assists,

-23-24 season, 27.1 points, 4.5 rebounds, 6.9 assists,

, and his average assists reached a new high in the entire career, and the assist-turnover ratio also reached 2.5, but this season his three-point shooting percentage hit a new low in the past seven years. As the team's tactical core, he plays the organizational core under Budenholzer's leadership, which has led to a decline in efficiency to a certain extent.

But Booker did not have an All-Star this season. Because the team missed the playoffs, they were not selected for the Best Team in the end. Last season, Booker was the third team of the year, and he also missed the Best Team in the previous year. Therefore, Booker is only at the All-Star level.

Entered the league's ten years, even at its peak, Booker only had one annual match, no scoring champion, no MVP, and no top five candidates for MVP. All of these three top personal honors are far apart.

Overall, Booker has never been a super player from the beginning to end, even in his peak period, and now with Edwards' rise, even the title of the league's first point guard has long been replaced.

So in the face of Booker such a year, the annual salary of 75 million is obviously expensive. The league today should not exceed five people worth this price. Booker is obviously not at this level.

It is also foreseeable that if Booker continues to be the cornerstone of the team building, the upper limit of the Suns will not be too high.

First of all, Booker's player level is here. He is neither a big core type with his own system, such as Harden and Doncic. As a super scorer, he does not have enough static talent + athletic ability.

Secondly, the current competitive landscape of the West is epic. After already matching Booker with two All-Stars, Durant and Bill, the Suns still miss the play-off this season, so if Durant is replaced with a bunch of high-quality character puzzles, the team's competitiveness will inevitably continue to decline.

From the perspective of Suns management, Booker is the cornerstone of their team building that they have trained for many years. He is only 28 years old now, so it is difficult to truly make up for the decision to start over.

I guess the Suns management's idea is like this: first send Durant away for restructuring chips, then use up Bill's garbage contract, wait for two years to free up a lot of salary space.

But the reality is here. Instead of spending money and time in the future, it is better to completely push it back and start over. Just send away all valuable chips like Durant and Booker, and start the reconstruction as soon as possible.