Two years after signing with the Milwaukee Bucks on a veteran’s minimal contract, Gary Trent Jr. is now drawing important consideration. When he formally signed his four-year, $64 million contract on July 16, the NBA confirmed it was reviewing the deal. The timeline of occasions has raised critical questions across the league, and the solutions may get ugly for everybody concerned.
Backdrop To Trent’s New Contract
There have been rumblings of Trent touchdown a deal within the four-year max vary ($68 million) earlier than free company even opened. That alone drew important behind-the-scenes scrutiny across the league, with loads of individuals questioning if such a head-scratching contract was even actual. However the actual concern was larger: had somebody been quietly working across the wage cap for years? Quick ahead to July 16, and the NBA is trying into the matter.
Understanding why this contract has raised suspicion across the NBA requires trying past the ultimate quantity. To know how this contract raised suspicion, the timeline begins in Toronto.
Timeline To $68 Million Contract
On June 20, 2023, Trent exercised his close to $18.6 million participant choice with the Raptors. His representatives, Wealthy Paul and Lucas Newton, rapidly indicated their need for a long-term extension, nevertheless it by no means materialized. By spring 2024, Michael Grange of Sportsnet reported that Toronto had withdrawn their supply, which was regarded as round $15 million per yr. Trent was aiming for about $25 million yearly, however free company did not unfold as his workforce had hoped.
Finally, Trent had restricted choices getting into free company, because the market was already feeling the stress of the Second Apron, which restricted what groups may realistically supply him. He signed at an under-market price, on the veteran’s minimal, with Milwaukee.
Affect of Second Apron
At the moment, the Bucks have been deep sufficient into luxurious tax territory to set off Second Apron restrictions, a league penalty that limits groups to providing solely minimum-salary contracts to free brokers. Trent rejoined former Portland Path Blazers teammate Damian Lillard, was personally recruited by Doc Rivers, and Milwaukee confirmed it stays devoted to its championship ambitions with Giannis Antetokounmpo by including a shooter. The next summer season, Milwaukee re-signed Trent with a two-year, $7.5 million deal utilizing the Non-Chicken exception, giving him a 20% wage improve, however the actual good thing about staying in Milwaukee was Trent continued to construct towards Early Chicken rights. It is a rule that lets the Bucks supply him an even bigger contract down the highway, though they’re already over the wage cap.
Trent’s Incomes Energy
Ordinarily, a participant builds incomes energy by bettering his manufacturing. Trent’s went the opposite method. Final season, he averaged 8.1 factors, 1.0 rebound, and 1.2 assists over 65 video games, with 38.7% capturing from the sphere and 36.0% from three. His function diminished, and he acquired a number of DNPs, making it his least productive season since getting into the league.
He entered free company with the place to safe his largest assured contract so far. Previous to the beginning of free company, Dallas Hoops Journal famous that negotiations have been gaining momentum for a brand new Milwaukee deal, which might leverage Trent’s preserved Early Chicken rights. Marc Stein later reported the Bucks had floated a smaller extension earlier than elevating their supply. By July 11, ESPN’s Shams Charania had the ultimate quantity: 4 years, $64 million, absolutely assured. ESPN’s Bobby Marks reported the contract begins at roughly $15.2 million in yr one, just under the utmost Milwaukee may supply utilizing Trent’s Early Chicken exception.
The Gary Trent Jr. timeline of becoming a member of the Milwaukee Bucks on a minimal and two years later getting a four-year, $64M absolutely assured deal is extremely suspicious to say the least.
Here’s a timeline of occasions from Trent Jr. choosing up his participant choice with Toronto in 2023.… pic.twitter.com/6uYGTPfo2i
— Grant Afseth (@GrantAfseth) July 13, 2026
Curious Timeline To Trent’s Payday
The problem is not that Milwaukee is paying Trent $16 million a yr, excess of his manufacturing warrants. What stands out is the development of every step within the timeline to bypass the wage cap for 2 years. Trent signed for the minimal when that is all of the Bucks may supply. He took one other below-market deal that occurred to protect his Chicken rights. As soon as his rights matured, he opted out and signed a totally assured contract that almost reached the utmost allowed beneath the Early Chicken exception.
The complete assure has solely raised suspicion across the NBA. Underneath the league’s present labor settlement, entrance places of work managing the second apron usually want partial ensures, workforce choices, and shorter contracts to take care of flexibility. The present market resembles extra the NFL’s than the absolutely assured NBA market of some years in the past.
„Handshake“ Settlement?
Milwaukee’s contract supply didn’t match present market tendencies by guaranteeing 4 full seasons to a 27-year-old function participant coming off his worst statistical yr. The deal’s construction feels extra like one from two or three offseasons again than one signed in July 2026, which might solely add to suspicions of a previous handshake settlement.
Charania additionally reported that „at the least one workforce“ had thought of a sign-and-trade for Trent at an analogous wage, although no workforce has been publicly recognized, which solely provides to the suspicion. In a league the place suitors are leaked continuously, it is naturally suspicious {that a} rival workforce was actually . It raises a good query whether or not a rival government was taking part as a favor, which in flip raises one other query: will this workforce obtain a future favor if this did certainly occur?
Bucks‘ Present Rebuild Raises Eyebrows on Deal
Milwaukee’s pivot to a rebuild has solely elevated skepticism, particularly given the logjam at Trent’s place group. Simply earlier than the 2026 draft, the Bucks traded Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis to Miami for Tyler Herro, Kel’el Ware, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Kasparas Jakucionis, and a bundle of future picks. Groups in that place normally keep versatile and construct belongings as a substitute of committing 4 assured years to a declining 27-year-old function participant. For league executives, this choice is tied to the 2 years prior.
There are better potential implications at play on this scenario. The NBA’s anti-circumvention guidelines are designed to stop groups and gamers from getting into into agreements outdoors the written contract, equivalent to promising future funds in trade for a right away low cost. If widespread, it may weaken the wage cap and second-apron restrictions, letting groups preserve expertise through off-the-books funds as a substitute of official collective bargaining mechanisms. This prohibition is embedded within the contractual documentation required for each NBA settlement.
Paragraph 20 of the Uniform Participant Contract states there are not any aspect preparations „regarding any future Renegotiation, Extension, or different modification of this Contract.“ Each negotiated deal contains an Agent Certification by which the agent swears, beneath penalty of perjury and earlier than a notary, that the phrases in Paragraph 20 are correct. Furthermore, the CBA specifies in Article XV that the workforce official who indicators the contract, the participant, and the agent should every submit a separate sworn certification relating to the identical particulars for each contract, renegotiation, or extension in the course of the deal’s period. If any of those certifications are discovered to be false, prison perjury expenses might be introduced in opposition to all three events. The participant, the agent, and the signing workforce official are every named individually.
We will additionally add to the record that Shams Charania reported „at the least one workforce“ was „poking round a possible sign-and-trade“ for Gary Trent Jr. „at across the similar sort of quantity.“
Why is that this essential? Having documented curiosity, whether or not actually legit or not, is advantageous… https://t.co/Zu5wDBrRoh
— Grant Afseth (@GrantAfseth) July 16, 2026
What’s Subsequent?
If the league’s evaluate turns up proof that Trent and the Bucks had an understanding about this summer season’s contract again when he signed these below-market offers, it would not simply be a cap violation. This means that the certifications linked to these earlier contracts—signed beneath oath by Trent, his agent, and whoever finalized the deal for Milwaukee—have been fraudulent, and the Collective Bargaining Settlement (CBA) already features a course of to implement such violations.
Groups across the NBA are monitoring how strictly the league workplace enforces the cap system, which has develop into way more restrictive beneath the present CBA.
This case truly has precedent, courting again to 2000. On the time, the league found the Minnesota Timberwolves had a secret settlement with free agent Joe Smith, below-market contracts adopted by a future payday as soon as his Chicken rights have been triggered. The NBA voided Smith’s deal, fined the Timberwolves, and stripped Minnesota of a number of first-round picks. The precedent is why the league treats circumstances like this one significantly. Simply because the Bucks are now not contending for titles as initially meant with Trent as a key piece subsequent to Antetokounmpo and Lillard would not take away from the method in place.
That is a part of why Trent’s contract is a sizzling matter: a participant with a dropping market worth accepted two below-market offers from a limited-spending workforce, which allowed Milwaukee to pay him extra after his efficiency declined. The Bucks additionally absolutely assured all 4 years, at a time when the remainder of the league favored extra cautious contracts.
The NBA is at present investigating potential wage cap circumvention by the Los Angeles Clippers and Kawhi Leonard, holding up his commerce to the Raptors.
Trent’s contract scenario clearly is one which we and different media retailers will monitor.
