Rookie extensions are basically teams betting on what a player is going to become, not only paying for what he already is, and that's why some of these deals can look completely different two or three years later.
A young player shows enough flashes, the team doesn't want to risk restricted free agency, and suddenly $20 million or $30 million per season feels reasonable because the expectation is that the production will eventually catch up to the salary.
Sometimes it works perfectly, but the six contracts here went the other way for very different reasons. Some players couldn't stay healthy, some never made the jump their teams expected, and one was literally traded before his extension even started. That doesn't mean every player on this list is bad, because Zion Williamson is still an All-Star-level scorer when healthy and De'Andre Hunter has had some very good stretches, but the return compared with the original expectations simply hasn't been there.
So, looking only at extensions signed over the last six years, these are the six that disappointed me the most.
The Hawks extended De'Andre Hunter in October 2022 for four years and up to $95 million, with $90 million in base salary and another $5 million available through incentives. The idea was easy to understand because Hunter was a 6-foot-7 former No. 4 pick who had just averaged 13.4 points while shooting 37.9% from three, and Atlanta clearly believed he could become the big two-way wing every contender wants next to a high-usage guard like Trae Young .
The problem is that the jump never really came in a consistent way. Hunter averaged 15.6 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 1.5 assists in the first season of the extension, then finally had his breakout stretch in 2024-25, putting up 19.0 points on 46.1% from the field and 39.3% from three in 37 games for the Hawks. That version absolutely looked worth the contract, but instead of becoming a permanent part of the core, Hunter was traded to the Cavaliers for Caris LeVert , Georges Niang , three second-round picks, and two swaps.
Things got worse again in 2025-26, when Hunter averaged 13.7 points and 4.1 rebounds across 45 games while shooting only 41.5% from the field and 30.5% from three, finishing with an 11.4 PER before season-ending eye surgery. He has now moved at the deadline in the Dennis Schroder-plus-Keon Ellis trade and is with the Kings, so the player Atlanta once paid as part of its long-term core is already on his third team since the deal started.
This isn't an awful contract in the same way some others on this list were, because Hunter actually had stretches where he played above the salary, especially during that 2024-25 run. That's why he's only sixth, but for a deal that was supposed to lock in Atlanta's long-term starting wing, ending with a trade halfway through the contract and no real leap into star territory still makes it disappointing.
The Pelicans didn't really have a choice with Zion Williamson in 2022. He had already shown superstar-level production, averaging 25.7 points on 60.4% from the field through his first three seasons, so New Orleans gave him a five-year, $193 million designated rookie max that could climb as high as $231 million through incentives. The scary part was obvious even then, because Zion had played only 85 games in those first three years and missed the entire 2021-22 season with a foot injury.
The extension started in 2023-24, and Zion finally gave the Pelicans a full season, playing 70 games while averaging 22.9 points, 5.8 rebounds, and 5.0 assists, but that durability didn't last. He dropped to only 30 games in 2024-25, then recovered enough to play 62 last season, averaging 21.0 points, 5.7 rebounds, and 3.2 assists while shooting a ridiculous 60.0% from the field. The talent is obviously still there, but the numbers aren't what anybody expected.
Through the first three seasons covered by the extension, Zion has played 162 of a possible 246 regular-season games, only 65.9%, and the bigger number is zero playoff games. The Pelicans reached the 2024 playoffs, but Williamson was injured after scoring 40 points in the Play-In and missed the entire first-round series, so one of the most expensive franchise players still hasn't logged a single postseason minute.
If you're paying somebody max money, the expectation isn't just 25 points whenever he's available, it's building a contender around him and having him available when the season actually matters. Zion has been efficient to justify the money on a per-game basis, but availability has stopped the contract from ever delivering what New Orleans expected, and 21 PPG is far away from what he should be doing.
Markelle Fultz looked like he had finally reset his career before signing a three-year, $50 million extension with the Magic in December 2020. He had played 72 games in 2019-20, averaged 12.1 points, 5.1 assists, and 1.3 steals, and after everything that happened with the 76ers , Orlando had turned him into a good starting point guard at only 22 years old.
The extension barely got started before another major injury changed everything. Fultz tore his ACL eight games into 2020-21, then played only 18 games during the first season covered by the new deal, so Orlando got almost nothing from him during the opening year of a contract that was supposed to reward his comeback.
He did eventually have one genuinely strong season in 2022-23, averaging 14.0 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 5.7 assists while shooting 51.4% from the field in 60 games. The jumper never came with it, though, as he hit only 31.0% from three that year, then his role completely collapsed in 2023-24 when he dropped to 7.8 points and 2.8 assists while shooting 22.2% from deep. Across the three seasons of the extension, Fultz appeared in only 121 of a possible 246 games, just 49.2%.
What happened after the contract says even more. Fast forward a little bit, and you see that Fultz played only 21 games for the Kings in 2024-25 after becoming a free agent, and five for the Raptors last season, averaging 0.8 points in 7.2 minutes in those five appearances. He is still only 27 years old, but he's already gone from a $50 million starting point guard to fighting for NBA minutes, which makes that Orlando extension look much worse in hindsight.
Jordan Poole's extension might have the craziest timeline on this entire list. The Warriors gave him a four-year deal worth $123 million guaranteed and up to $140 million with incentives in October 2022, only months after he averaged 17.0 points during their championship run and looked like the young scorer who could eventually help carry the team after Stephen Curry .
Golden State didn't even wait for the extension to begin. Poole struggled during the 2023 playoffs, the relationship with Draymond Green had obviously become complicated after their preseason altercation, and the Warriors traded him to the Wizards in June 2023, meaning the team that handed him more than $120 million guaranteed got rid of him before paying a single dollar of the extension.
His first year under the new contract showed why. Poole averaged 17.4 points in 2023-24 but shot only 41.3% from the field and 32.6% from three in his first Washington season, with a 49.1% effective field-goal percentage, and even lost his starting spot for part of the season. He bounced back in 2024-25 with 20.5 points and 37.8% from three, which kept the deal from looking completely hopeless, but last season brought another huge drop after he was traded to the Pelicans for CJ McCollum (later used to trade for Trae Young).
Poole averaged only 13.4 points, 2.0 rebounds, and 3.1 assists in 39 games for the Pelicans while shooting 37.2% from the field and 33.3% from three, finishing with an 11.5 PER and only 0.2 win shares. The guy Golden State once saw as an important part of its post-Curry future started only eight games last season at age 26.
That's what makes this extension so disappointing to me. Poole wasn't just paid for production, he was paid because the Warriors believed they'd found their next major offensive piece, and less than one year later they were attaching him to a Chris Paul trade to get off the contract .
The Magic knew exactly how much risk they were taking with Jonathan Isaac. He had torn his ACL in August 2020, but before the injury he looked like one of the most special young defenders in basketball, averaging 11.9 points, 6.8 rebounds, 1.6 steals, and 2.3 blocks in only 28.8 minutes. Orlando still gave him a four-year extension worth up to $80 million, with $69.6 million guaranteed and another $10.4 million in incentives protected around his injury situation.
Then Isaac didn't play a single game during the first season of the extension. He returned in 2022-23 but lasted only 11 games, meaning Orlando received 11 total appearances across the first two years of a four-year deal.
His 2023-24 comeback was actually impressive, because Isaac played 58 games, averaged 6.8 points in only 15.8 minutes, and posted a 19.2 PER with .188 win shares per 48, while his defense remained ridiculous on a per-minute basis. He followed that with 71 games in 2024-25, but his offensive efficiency dropped to 41.4% from the field and 25.8% from three, and his defensive role never became anything close to what Orlando originally projected.
Across the four original extension seasons, Isaac played 140 of a possible 328 games, only 42.7%, and never averaged even seven points in any of them. The Magic re-signed him in July 2026 after waiving him days before, but that doesn't change what happened with the original rookie extension. Orlando paid for the possibility of a future All-Defensive starter and got mostly rehab seasons plus limited bench minutes.
Patrick Williams is my No. 1 because there isn't one giant injury or one crazy event that explains everything, the development… just never happened. The Bulls gave Williams five years and $90 million in 2024 after he averaged 10.0 points and 3.9 rebounds while shooting 39.9% from three, basically betting that a 22-year-old former No. 4 pick with size, defense, and shooting would finally become more aggressive once the roster started changing around him.
Instead, his production went backward immediately. Williams averaged 9.0 points and 3.8 rebounds in the first season of the deal while shooting just 39.7% from the field, then somehow regressed even further in 2025-26, averaging 7.0 points, 3.0 rebounds, and 1.5 assists in 72 games. He shot 37.2% from the field, 34.7% from three and started only six games.
The advanced numbers are brutal too. Williams produced minus-0.1 win shares last season and only .031 win shares per 48, while his effective field-goal percentage fell to 47.2%. His usage rate actually climbed to 17.1%, so this wasn't just a case of him barely touching the ball, he was getting a little more offensive responsibility and producing less efficiently with it.
That's what makes the contract such a problem, since Chicago wasn't really bidding against other teams to justify such a big deal. The Bulls are paying Williams $18.0 million per year for the possibility that a young 3-and-D forward would eventually grow into something closer to a high-level starter. Six NBA seasons in, his career scoring average is still only 9.0 points, his career PER is 10.2, and he's never averaged more than 10.2 points in any season.
Williams is still only 25, so there is technically time for the story to change, but two years into a five-year contract, the Bulls are getting less production, and he's looking like a huge trade candidate . For me, that's the clearest definition of a disappointing young-player deal, because Chicago bet on future growth and has watched the player move in the opposite direction.
What makes Williams stand out from the rest is that there isn't really one big excuse to point at. Hunter at least had stretches where the contract looked fine, Zion has still played like a star whenever his body lets him, and Isaac was mostly crushed by injuries, but Williams just never became much more than the same low-usage forward he already was before getting paid. That's why his deal feels different, because Chicago basically bet on a jump that still hasn't come.
