The Spurs hear echoes

Good morning. De'Aaron Fox signed a max extension with San Antonio, setting up a run with Victor Wembanyama as Dylan Harper develops. This is an interesting paradigm. Let's basketball.

On Monday, news broke that the Spurs and De'Aaron Fox reached a 4-year, $229 million extension. With no player options on the deal, Fox is locked into San Antonio through 2029-30. So, in the course of a year, Fox went from a short-term contract in a co-starring role with Domantas Sabonis for a team with one playoff berth in nearly two decades to a max deal over five years next to a player who would have been All-NBA at age 21 if not for an untimely blood clot on a franchise with five championships in the past 25 years or so. It's quite a pivot.

What strikes me as so interesting about the Spurs' decision-making to land Fox and now extend him despite lucking into Dylan Harper with the No. 2 pick is that San Antonio knows what it has right now and isn't content to wait for a "natural" evolution of the team around him to contend for championships. If Harper takes 2-3 seasons to materialize as a top-notch NBA player, the Spurs are betting that it will benefit him to have cut his teeth in meaningful games while Fox, Wembanyama and the rest of the supporting cast glide up the West standings. If Harper doesn't develop, well then you haven't wasted the end of Wembanyama's rookie contract and start of his second deal.

This is not a unique situation. The last wunderkind who came in and made it clear he was a future MVP as a teenage rookie was Luka Doncic. Do you recall what Dallas did in Luka's rookie season?