I think it's a little more complicated than that
yeah, there's always the chance of a career-ending injury. But how many career ending injuries are there, really? Now, cumulative injuries can certainly have an impact on a player's earning potential. But Camara hasn't been injury prone. He's played 70 & 78 games in his two seasons. But that 70 game mark is deceptive because the Blazers shut Camara down for 9 games to complete their tank. Otherwise, he would have played 79 and 78 games. He also played 32-25-34-34 games in college. So, he's been pretty durable
there's also some fallacy involved in this: that being that he'd get more money if he waited a year for his extension. The false assumption in this is that he'd play that 5th season with an extension next year and that = more money. But, he'd play that 5th season anyway with an extension this summer. It would just be year 1 of his third contract. And by then he would have hit the 7th season threshold for veterans
now, if you assume 22.3M a year for his extension this summer, then a 10% increase is likely for an extension next summer. So his annual salary would be 2.2M higher. Project that over 5 seasons and he's make 11M more waiting till next summer for an extension
but here's the thing, if he signs an extension this summer, then his 2.4M option in 2026-27 is discarded and his new contract would start with close to a 21M salary instead of 2.4M. Waiting a season for the extension means he has to play for that 2.4M in 2026-27. And that 19M bonus for signing this summer beats the hell out of his 10% base salary bump with a later extension. Of course, that doesn't account for step raises, so it levels out some more
but still, the biggest differential is what happens in 2026-27
