Is Suns’ wait to re-sign Miles Bridges more for them or him?

The Phoenix Suns offseason produced one bit of preordained contract news in the new three-year extension for Dillon Brooks, but the other expected bit has not come and perhaps will not until later in the season.

New addition Miles Bridges, who was acquired from the Charlotte Hornets in exchange for Grayson Allen, Royce O’Neale and a 2033 unprotected first-round pick, has not signed a contract extension yet as a potential unrestricted free agent next summer. The decision is reportedly to hold off on that for the time being.

ESPN’s Brian Windhorst said on The Hoop Collective Podcast that his understanding is Bridges will wait until later for an extension that can be signed at any point in the season.

“You may see him come in and really have a sizable role,” Windhorst said. “I think they have an intent to not only pay him but really an intent to give him a big role. So we’ll see how that goes.”

There is a lot to read into what was ultimately two quick sentences from the ultra-reliable Windhorst while discussing how many games he thinks the Suns will win this year, so with that disclaimer aside, it’s an interesting turn for the start of this relationship between Phoenix and Bridges to take.

And it begs the question: Who wants to wait more? Bridges to prove he’s worth more money than his current market value? Or the Suns to make sure he’s worth it?

For what it’s worth, the way to interpret Windhorst’s reporting is that this is what Bridges would prefer.

The delay, combined with the emphasis on Bridges’ role expanding when he’s averaged 15.7 shots per game the last four seasons, is concerning on a scoring-heavy roster that needs him to focus on everything else. Perhaps it’s not as thin as a guy in his contract year trying to get paid, entrenched in that late 20s stage of his career when this could be the last huge deal to come across Bridges’ desk. But it’s hard to at least deny getting that notion.

Regardless, both sides will be able to see out however much of the season they want to before coming to an agreement. There is no deadline before the season starts to get worried about, like players getting an extension off their rookie deals, a deadline Phoenix let pass with Mark Williams last October.

A recent example to give you a baseline understanding of how this could go is when Allen re-signed with Phoenix during the 2023-24 season. He played an entire regular season as a pending UFA before agreeing to a four-year extension in mid-April, right on the heels of when the Suns would take on the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round of the playoffs.

Phoenix benefits from this delay, so if this is indeed Bridges doing more than its own, that is a fortunate wrinkle of fate.

To speak from the Suns’ perspective, if Bridges is awesome and indeed was the missing piece that warranted a major trade package, fantastic. That will then make it a whole lot easier to commit major funds to him, presumably at or above the $25 million a year Bridges is currently signed to. That’s a whole lot of cash for a guy that even in a breakout year would be a borderline All-Star at best, but Jalen Green in the 2027-28 season is on an expiring $36 million that would open up the room for that type of beefy contract a year later.

If Bridges doesn’t fit long term with the Suns in the ways that I believe he won’t, then they’ve at least got some sort of leverage to hold him to a more affordable contract. Certainly not anything at his previous price threshold.

This is sort of how the Williams saga went. While he was productive and healthy to some extent in a prove-it year, the consistency of those two factors was not high enough to warrant a sizable payday, so he instead got three years for a reasonable $38 million.

The difference is Bridges can hold over unrestricted free agency in negotiations. Williams was restricted. And while free agency has been more of a snooze the last couple offseasons, with marquee players rarely entertaining it these days and teams rarely holding cap space to sign any, ESPN’s Bobby Marks notes nearly a third of the league could have cap space next summer.

The follow-up question is that even though this passes the smell test of Bridges seeking out a contract year for the ages, would a negative outcome affect the way the Suns think about his future?

Any possibility that Bridges spends a season or less (he will now remain tradeable as well) in Phoenix is handcuffed to the high price of that pick, which led many to presume Bridges was going to get re-signed this summer. At the same time, overpaying him and then getting stuck with his contract would arguably be the worst-case outcome, because mistakes like that would affect Phoenix more than almost any other team.

The Suns do not get to operate over the next four seasons with the salary cap freedom most organizations get for two reasons. It requires them to have to think differently than everyone else.

One, they are paying Devin Booker a quarter-billion dollars over that time.

At a price point of over $60 million a year, when you tie together the cap space math and the basics of roster-building, franchises should only be paying superstars that money. We can all agree Booker is not one, and there is even a case that a certified top-15 player is not worth that, a pedigree Booker no longer holds. It has put several teams in a bind when these supermaxes become available, ultimately forcing them to do the right thing (like the Suns did) and re-sign their franchise cornerstone even though it is an overpay.

Two, there will still be $22 million in dead money on the Suns’ books through 2030.

Let’s say the tax line for the 2027-28 season sticks at its projected $210 million. That would mean that Booker and the dead money make up 40% of that. That’s before Green’s $36 million expiring, Brooks’ $22.5 million of his new deal or the potential for a new Bridges contract. If Bridges even gets back to just $25 million on a new deal, those four contracts together plus the dead money would account for 80% of the money before the tax line.

Point being, the Suns have to be incredibly sure of whomever they commit money to over the next couple of years. Brooks, Collin Gillespie and Jordan Goodwin make up a trio they were correct to feel safe with. I’m not there on the Williams deal, and adding one more unstable contract like Bridges is asking for an inescapable situation to materialize.

The Suns better be sure when they re-sign Bridges, whether it’s in October or April.

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