The Clippers and Ivica Zubac have agreed to a contract extension that will cover the next three years and will be worth $33M, agents Jeff Schwartz and Mike Lindeman tell Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.
The Clippers held a team option on Zubac for the 2022-23 season worth $7,518,518, but will decline that option as part of the extension agreement, Wojnarowski reports.
The new deal, which will run through the 2024-25 season, won’t include any options, according to Andrew Greif of the Los Angeles Times.
Zubac, 25, was the Clippers’ starting center in 2021-22, appearing in a career-high 76 games and starting all of them. He also established new career highs in points (10.3), rebounds (8.5), assists (1.6) and blocks (1.0) in 24.4 minutes per contest.
Zubac will be the second Clippers player to receive an extension between the end of the regular season and the start of the NBA’s 2022-23 league year, joining Robert Covington.
Los Angeles now has more than $171M in guaranteed money on its books for next season without accounting for its reported agreement with John Wall — rumored to be worth the taxpayer mid-level exception — or possible new deals for free agents like Nicolas Batum, Isaiah Hartenstein and Amir Coffey. The team’s tax bill projects to be worth at least $80M, assuming a taxpayer MLE contract for Wall, per Yossi Gozlan of HoopsHype, and that number could continue to grow.
Hartenstein won’t be eligible to be traded for six months once he officially signs the extension, since it exceeds the extend-and-trade limits.
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