7 Players Who Are Going to Get Massively Overpaid in 2026 NBA Free Agency

NBA teams are getting smarter and growing more cautious in free agency, developments that combine with a dearth of cap space around the league to potentially drive down spending this summer.

Don't worry, recklessness is still alive and well.

The second apron has a chilling effect on big contracts, but it won't completely freeze cash flow. All it takes is one owner who decides it's time to fast-track a rebuild or one general manager whose job may depend on year-over-year improvement for an overpay to happen.

Ahead of 2026 free agency, let's take a look at the players primed to benefit most. These are the top candidates to be overpaid this summer.

Austin Reaves (Player Option)

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Austin Reaves put up 23.3 points and 5.5 assists on a 64.1 true shooting percentage in 2025-26, his best career season. That's a well-timed breakout with free agency ahead, assuming the 27-year-old guard declines his $14.9 million player option to hit the market this summer.

Potential suitors will include the Brooklyn Nets, Chicago Bulls and Reaves' own Los Angeles Lakers. All three should be wary of viewing this year's 51-game sample as a production baseline going forward.

Reaves performed like a superstar through the end of November, thriving in an upsized role while Luka Dončić and LeBron James missed time with injury. After that, his numbers were much more in line with what he did in 2024-25, when he posted 20.2 points and 5.8 assists on a 61.6 true shooting percentage. Those are still stellar stats, but it's hard to argue they're worth a potential five-year max with the Lakers, which would check in at a total of $241 million.

On his Buha's Block livestream, Lakers beat reporter Jovan Buha predicted Reaves would collect $210 million over five years from the Lakers.

No other team can offer more than four years and $179 million, which is exactly where Los Angeles should set its ceiling. A dollar above that for a player who's battled injuries in several seasons, ran hot for six weeks this year and projects as a somewhat duplicative second option next to Dončić would be a mistake.

Trae Young (Player Option)

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All indications are that Trae Young will sign a three-year extension with the Washington Wizards this summer after he declines his $49 million player option, no surprise considering Young specified the Wizards as his preferred landing spot when he was on the trade block.

That kind of steering typically means a handshake agreement on a new deal is in place.

Washington needs to drive a hard bargain, emphasizing the minimal, draft-free package it gave up to get Young, along with the league-wide stylistic changes that continue to devalue small, offense-only guards.

The sheer size of that $49 million player option suggests the Wizards will have to pony up significant cash to make declining it a sensible call for Young. That's concerning for Washington, a team intent on moving away from tanking but one that cannot count on Young to do more than lift it into the league's soft middle.

Atlanta won between 36 and 43 games during Young's peak years, escaping the first round of the playoffs just once.

Washington is likely to pay Young as if he's capable of leading a team to meaningful success. The truth is, beyond one outlier run to the Conference Finals in 2021, Young has never been that player.

Tari Eason (Restricted)

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Tari Eason is a useful rotation forward who can be disruptive defensively, crash the glass and knock down threes at a slightly below-league-average clip on decent volume. He's not a star. He may not be a starter on a good team, as he has not proven he's durable enough to warrant a major investment.

A player with that profile should have accepted the five-year, $100 million deal the Houston Rockets reportedly offered last offseason—even if it included non-guaranteed money tied to his availability.

That Eason declined the extension suggests he believes he's in line for more. This past season didn't exactly juice the 24-year-old's value, as Eason again missed significant time and couldn't sustain his hot shooting start. This was the second season overall, and first since he was a rookie in 2022-23, in which Eason posted a negative Box Plus/Minus.

The Rockets didn't trade him at the deadline, which would have been the move if they wanted to avoid paying him.

Restricted free agency gives Houston leverage via matching rights, so it may not be the team to overpay him. But it's not hard to imagine the rebuilding Bulls or Nets dipping into their cap space to hand Eason $20-25 million per year over four seasons.

Jalen Duren (Restricted)

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After the Detroit Pistons decided he wasn't worth his asking price of $30 million per year during preseason extension talks, Jalen Duren hulked out. The 22-year-old center boosted his scoring average from 11.8 to 19.5 points per game, made his first All-Star team and set the brutally physical defensive tone that kept the Pistons atop the East all season.

He might even land on an All-NBA team, which would make him eligible for a salary worth up to 30.0 percent of the cap. In that scenario, Detroit could offer up to $287 million over five years. Expect Duren to start negotiations there.

The Pistons could talk him down to five years and $239 million, which is the 25-percent max. Another team could top out at four years and $185 million.

Duren is one of the top centers in the league, but he's not a superstar or a franchise pillar worthy of the full max. With the Nets, Bulls and Lakers all toting enough space to pay him at that level, and with Detroit perhaps looking to make up for slighting him over the summer, he's going to come close—or even get it.

There are worse things than paying very good players as if they're great. But Duren is set up to be overcompensated nonetheless.

James Harden (Player Option)

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It certainly helps that the market this summer will be unfriendly toward James Harden. The younger cap-space teams like the Bulls and Nets won't be interested. The more established operation in Los Angeles already has Luka Dončić running the show.

At the same time, the Cleveland Cavaliers dealt away Darius Garland to acquire Harden. Barring a total demolition in the wake of playoff disappointment (very possible!), headlined by a Donovan Mitchell trade, we should assume that Harden green-lit the deal to the Cavs with a very good idea of what his next contract was going to be.

Using Bird rights, Cleveland can offer a two-year deal worth up to $97 million. Given his history of engineering exits from situations he doesn't like, Harden should be expected to make things uncomfortable if he doesn't get most or all of what the Cavaliers can offer.

Though still a stellar offensive player who helped the Cavs finish 16-6 down the stretch, Harden is entering his age-37 season and simply cannot be counted on to stay committed unless things are going absolutely perfectly. Those factors should diminish his earning potential, but they won't.

Mark Williams (Restricted)

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Mark Williams might have been drafted a little too high at No. 15 in 2022 and was grossly overvalued by the Los Angeles Lakers when they gave up an unprotected 2031 first-round pick and a 2030 swap to get him from the Charlotte Hornets. When that trade was rescinded due to Williams' failed physical, Los Angeles dodged a major bullet.

It's not so hard to understand why multiple franchises chose to believe in him. The Duke product is massive at 7'0" with a shocking 9'9" standing reach. His career numbers—12.0 points and 8.5 rebounds with a 62.9 field-goal percentage—suggest he's exactly what you'd want in a starting center.

So when someone (probably his incumbent team, the Phoenix Suns) overpays him this summer, you'll know why.

For all of his impressive measurables and surface-level stats, Williams remains a mostly unhelpful player. The Suns outscored opponents by 5.3 points per 100 possessions with Oso Ighodaro in the middle this season, far better than they fared when Williams was in the game. This was also the fourth straight year in which opponents shot the ball more efficiently at the rim with Williams on the floor.

To put a finer point on it, Williams allowed shooters to convert 64.4 percent of their shots inside six feet, the best they fared against any center who defended at least 350 attempts.

Despite all those numbers and the fact that Williams has missed roughly half of his career games, some team is going to give him $15-20 million per season.

Kristaps Porzingis, Unrestricted

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The first factor weighing in favor of Kristaps Porzingis being overpaid is his clear value to his most recent team at its best. Though only viewed in brief glimpses, his floor-stretching shooting, shot-blocking and mismatch-smashing post-up play were beyond tantalizing to a Golden State Warriors squad that benefits so much from those skills.

He makes perfect sense next to Draymond Green. His ability to shoot right over the top of smaller players can prevent switches in screening action with Stephen Curry. In short, Porzingis is the exact kind of 5 the Dubs have wanted for over a decade.

As the sole return for Jonathan Kuminga, Porzingis is also a retention priority for face-saving reasons.

Secondly, teams tend to pay players as if they're going to be healthy. For Porzingis, that's not a safe assumption. He's played more than 60 games in a season just twice, appeared in only 32 contests this year and is entering his age-31 campaign in 2026-27. Fifty games played would be an optimistic estimate.

The market may be afraid of his availability issues, as suitors will be scarce. More likely, the Warriors and/or some other team will be understandably drawn in by KP's intriguing skill set and assume he can shake the health bug that has plagued him for most of his career.

Stats courtesy of NBA.com, Basketball Reference and Cleaning the Glass. Salary info via Spotrac.

Grant Hughes covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Bluesky and subscribe to the Hardwood Knocks podcast, where he appears with Bleacher Report's Dan Favale.