Joel Embiid is easily one of the best defensive players in the NBA. He has been playing for the 6ers for a while now though, so will he be a free agent soon?
Joel Embiid is not a free agent. He is signed to a 5-year $148 million contract with the Philadelphia 76ers. He signed the contract in 2017 for the 2108-2019 season and will become eligible for free agent status in 2023.
You can read more below about how free agent status works in the NBA and the five-year contract Joel Embiid signed.
What It Means to Be an NBA Free Agent
When it comes to free agency in the NBA, there are two types. Someone can be a restricted free agent or an unrestricted free agent. Here’s how the two work.
A restricted free agent is the one where the free agent’s original team has the “right of first refusal.” This means that the free agent can accept offers from another team but their original team has the right to make the same offer so that they can retain the free agent.
According to the NBA, a restricted free agency can happen in only a few circumstances. A player can enter restricted free agency in the fourth year of a rookie -scale contract, veteran free agents who have been in the NBA for three seasons or less, or a player who is coming off a two-way contract.
An unrestricted free agent (UFA) is very simple. They have the option to sign with whatever team they want to if they get an offer. Some people who enter an unrestricted free agency do have options on their contracts with their original team.
In the NBA, they do have a period known as the Free Agency Moratorium. It is a period from July 1 to July 6 every year where no team is allowed to sign a free agent.
This is because starting at 6:01 pm on Jun 30th free agents become available for contract negotiation but no one can sign them until July 6th.
When it comes to free agency there are also a lot of options that players can negotiate within their contracts, like early termination and contract extension.
These are all options that Joel Embiid could negotiate when he becomes a free agent in 2023.
Watch the below ESPN video to see how Joel Embiid has proved he’s worth a big contract with the 76ers.
Joel Embiid’s Contract With the 76ers
Even if he isn’t a free agent right now, Joel Embiid did manage to land a pretty great contract with the Philadelphia 76ers. It has landed him a lot of cash.
As mentioned above, in 2023 Joel Embiid will become a free agent but it’s not the first time the Cameroonian player has hit free agent status. In 2018, he would have entered into restricted free agent status when he hit his fourth year of rookie-scale contract with the 76ers.
He was their first-round draft pick in the 2014 NBA draft and the third pick overall in the entire league. Like we said above, when a player hits the fourth year of his rookie-scale contract and was a first-round draft pick, they enter into restricted free agent status.
However, in 2017 before Embiid was a restricted free agent, the 76ers negotiated a contract extension with him. In the end, they negotiated what is called “The Super Max” which is the term for a designated contract that is the maximum extension of a rookie-scale contract.
The contract allows Embiid to earn more from the salary cap and there is the possibility for him to make even more money if he achieves certain distinctions laid out by the team.
Those distinctions include winning MVP, winning Defensive Player of the Year, and making the NBA All-Star teams.
The base amount that Joel Embiid earned from the contract is $148 million, however, he could earn up to $178 million if he achieves those goals above. When the contract expires in 2023, Joel Embiid will become an unrestricted free agent and have the option to sign with any team if he chooses to.
Whether or not he will sign with someone other than the Philadelphia 76ers is to be seen. Embiid’s all-time favorite NBA player is the Nigerian player Hakeem Olajuwon. Olajuwon played for the Houston Rockets and then briefly for the Toronto Raptors.
Maybe we could see him playing for either of these teams in the future, but for now, only time will tell.
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