Report: Kevin Durant contract extension with Suns won’t be signed this offseason

Fourteen-time All-Star Kevin Durant and the Phoenix Suns will not reach a contract extension this offseason and rather look toward an opportunity to ink a longer extension next summer, ESPN’s Shams Charania reported Friday.

Arizona Sports‘ John Gambadoro believed in August that the discussions between Durant and the Suns were leaning more toward a two-year deal signed next summer.

Durant is signed through 2025-26, but Monday is a deadline for Durant to sign a one-year, $59.7 million deal that would take his contract through the 2026-27 season.

However, next summer he can sign a two-year extension worth approximately $120 million that would keep him under contract through 2027-28.

“I’m told there will not be an extension there for Kevin Durant,” Charania said of the Monday deadline.

“That’s really where (Durant’s) and the Suns’ focus has been. They’ve both been focused on getting a deal done in a two-year range, not that one-year extension. Kevin Durant has expressed publicly and privately how much he loves Phoenix. The Suns obviously want this iteration of this team to work and they’re all-in on this season.”

The one-year extension before the 2024-25 season began was the maximum length the Suns could’ve offered the 36-year-old because of the Over-38 rule.

Durant and forward T.J. Warren were acquired by the Suns in a February 2023 blockbuster trade with the Brooklyn Nets. The exchange included Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson, Jae Crowder, four unprotected future first-round picks (2023, 2025, 2027, 2029) and a 2028 first-round pick swap.

In the proceeding regular season, Durant played in eight games for the Suns where he averaged 26 points, 4.5 rebounds, 5.5 assists per game while shooting 57% from the field. The Suns finished with a fourth-place 45-37 record in the Western Conference.

Durant averaged 29.0 points, 8.7 rebounds, 5.5 assists and shot 47.8% in 11 playoff games. Phoenix lost in six games in the second round to the eventual NBA champion Denver Nuggets.

This past season, Durant started all 75 games he played in. He averaged 27.1 points, 6.6 rebounds, 5.0 assists and shot 52.3% per game.

He averaged 26.8 points, 6.5 rebounds and 3.3 assists while shooting 55.2% in a disappointing four-game sweep against the Minnesota Timberwolves in the opening round of the playoffs.

Kevin Durant’s NBA career before landing with the Suns

In 17 seasons, Durant has averaged 27.3 points while shooting 38.7% from three-point range and 50.1% overall. He has also posted seven rebounds and 4.4 assists per game.

Durant was drafted second overall in the 2007 NBA Draft by the then-Seattle Supersonics, who would relocate to Oklahoma City the following year to become the Thunder.

He spent nine seasons with the franchise (2007-16), where he would win the 2014 NBA MVP award and lead the Thunder to the 2012 NBA Finals which went to the Miami Heat in five games.

Durant left the Thunder after the 2016 NBA season and joined the Golden State Warriors. He played three seasons with Golden State and won two championships (2017, 2018) in three trips to the NBA Finals. The forward also took home Finals MVP honors each of those championship-winning years.

After suffering a torn Achilles in the 2019 Finals, Durant missed the entirety of the 2019-20 season. He then signed as a free agent with the Nets during the 2019 offseason, joining forces with Kyrie Irving.

Durant made his debut with the Nets the following season, in which the team would finish with a 48-24 record in the regular season, the second-best record in the Eastern Conference. Brooklyn entered the playoffs with championship aspirations, especially after the team acquired former MVP and Durant’s teammate with the Thunder, James Harden.

The Nets would lose in the second round of the playoffs to the eventual NBA Champion Milwaukee Bucks in seven games.

The following season, the Nets would finish with a 44-38 regular season, seventh in the Eastern Conference. They would lose in the first round of the playoffs to the eventual-conference champion Boston Celtics in a four-game sweep.

Durant has also won a record four Olympic gold medals for the United States national basketball team (2012, 2016, 2020, 2024), most recently in Paris alongside Suns teammate Devin Booker.

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