Keith Bogans: Brooklyn Nets Contract Breakdown

The Numbers:
2012-13: $1,229,255

Contract: Keith Bogans signed a contract with the then-New Jersey Nets for the veteran’s minimum in 2011, before the team waived him five games later due to injury. The now-Brooklyn Nets re-signed him before the 2012 season to another one-year deal worth the veteran’s minimum. He is now an unrestricted free agent.

Bogans, one of Deron Williams’s closest friends on the team, hung out with the Nets on their bench in New Jersey even after being waived by the team. He felt comfortable with the roster and the people in the organization and wanted to return, even at a minimum contract.

Rights: Even though the Nets waived Keith Bogans prior to the end of his last contract, since he’s been with the Nets for two consecutive seasons, the team owns his “Early Bird” rights. That means the Nets can technically sign Bogans for up to 104.5% of the league average salary last season, at a contract for a minimum of two years.

We won’t know what that number is exactly until the league audit in July, but it’s estimated at $5.51 million, which at a minimum would be a two-year contract worth a little over $11.4 million with standard raises. Bogans is the only player on the Nets eligible for the “Early Bird” exception, and it’s more than they can offer any of their own or other free agents this season.

As much as I espouse about Bogans’s value, he just won’t earn that on the market. But while there’s no chance that the team will offer him that much money, the Nets still may use the exception to re-sign him. The Nets can also choose to renounce Bogans’s “Early Bird” rights and sign him with the non-Bird exception, or 120% of the minimum salary for one to four years (most likely one year).