Report: Jamal Murray agrees to five-year, $170 million extension with Nuggets
In the middle of a frenetic free agency, Jamal Murray received his payday after helping lead the Denver Nuggets to the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference.
The Nuggets have agreed to a five-year, $170 million deal with Murray, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic.
Denver Nuggets rising star Jamal Murray has agreed to a five-year, $170M maximum contract extension, agent Mike George of OneLegacy tells @TheAthleticNBA @Stadium.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) July 1, 2019
Murray just finished up a season in which he led the 54-28 Nuggets in minutes per game while averaging 18.2 points and 4.8 assists per game.
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Selected seventh overall in the 2016 NBA draft, Murray has steadily progressed throughout his three-year career.
As much as Murray produced last season, handing the 22-year-old a max contract is a bet on him continuing to develop into one of the NBA’s top guards. A similar bet worked out well enough last offseason when Nikola Jokic, fresh off a five-year, $147 million deal, delivered a first-team All-NBA campaign.
With Jokic and Murray now on board for the next four seasons and taking up a significant chunk of their cap space, the Nuggets are likely hoping they’ve found the two-man core to build around. As the West opens up more than it has at any point in the last half-decade, we’ll see if they were correct.
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