Bonus in Harkless' Contract Creates Unusual Situation

In July of 2016, restricted free agent Maurice Harkless of the NBA chose to re-sign with the Portland Blazers. Harkless is set to receive roughly $40 million over the course of the four-year deal - in addition, there are multiple bonuses that Harkless is eligible to receive.

One of those bonuses that Harkless and his agent worked into his contract - a $500,000 bonus if he shoots 35% or more from the three point line in any given season.

Heading into the final month or so of this past regular season, Harkless was looking to be in good shape to collect the bonus, as he was shooting a little over 36% from beyond the arc.

According to Harkless, this was the point at which he started actually thinking about the bonus. In what is probably not a coincidence, his three point attempts dropped dramatically over the past month or so of the season - instead of attempting roughly 3 three-pointers per game, which had been his average up until that point, Harkless' attempts dropped to less than 1.5 per game. In an unfortunate streak of shooting, Harkless dropped to less than 35% from beyond the arc.

After going 3-5 from three point land against the Minnesota Timberwolves on April 3rd, Harkless was suddenly above the important 35% mark once again. At this point, Harkless essentially stopped taking three pointers.

Over his last five games of the season (which included one game where he had the night off), Harkless' three pointer attempts looked like this:

0-1
0-0
0-0
0-0
0-0

So, over the Blazers' last five games of the season, Harkless took just one three pointer.

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By the time that the regular season had drawn to a close, Harkless finished with a three point percentage of 35.1%, which means that the Portland Blazers will have to cut him a check for $500,000.

The Portland Blazers are now playing in the playoffs, which means that Harkless can start firing at will again.

Filed under: General Knowledge