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Tobias Harris' $38 million cost has more value to Pistons than any other NBA team originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The Detroit Pistons aren't going to have a ton of flexibility this offseason as far as salary is concerned.
That makes Tobias Harris even more important as he heads toward free agency than he would be in other circumstances.
Simply put, the Pistons can pay more to retain Harris than they could pay someone else in free agency. That means he specifically is quite valuable to the outcome of Detroit's offseason.
ESPN's Bobby Marks projects that the Pistons will pay Harris $38 million over a two-year contract.
"Detroit would need to pay more than the $15 million non-tax midlevel exception that teams could offer," Marks writes. "Considering that the Pistons are already over the cap because of the Jalen Duren hold, retaining Harris should be a priority."
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Harris closed the playoffs a bit cold, but he had a really strong postseason overall which should only affirm to Detroit that he's still a good player to have around.
"Harris, the top stretch forward in this free agent class, increased his scoring in the regular season from 13.2 points to 18.1 in the playoffs," Marks writes. "He had eight games of at least 20 points, including a 30-point performance in the Game 7 win against Orlando. But in the last four games against Cleveland, Harris scored fewer than 20 points, including single-digit performances in Game 6 and 7 as the Pistons were eliminated. Defensively, Harris held opposing players to a 41.3% shooting as the closest defender during the regular season, ranking third among 187 players to defend at least 500 attempts, per GeniusIQ."
In Marks' article, he also wonders about the Pistons potentially pursuing a guard like Coby White or Ayo Dosunmu -- so he doesn't expect Detroit just to stop at retaining its own players.
But as far as Harris is concerned, it would make a lot of sense for Detroit to keep him. The Pistons very much know what they're getting with Harris.
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