Harden may get extension after all

The deadline to reach contract extensions for the 2009 draft class is now less than a week away. Teams have until the end of the month to either reach a new contract with their players or allow them to become restricted free agents next summer. One of the biggest names involved in these disputes is Oklahoma City Thunder guard James Harden. Harden is an interesting case because the Thunder have made it very clear that they want to keep him around, but offering him a max deal would put them over the salary cap, something OKC is trying to avoid. The Thunder may have found a loophole though. They could give Harden an incentivized contract that would reward him for his play, getting him near the same amount of money as a max deal without being penalized by the salary cap. They just have to make sure Harden’s incentives are challenging enough. The NBA counts ‘easy to achieve’ incentives against the cap, however, incentives that are deemed hard to achieve, like making the Conferen...