The fabled Contract Year. The season when a player, previously unaware of his own earning potential, decides to lock in and play better than ever before all in pursuit of that next big payday. The thinking goes that a player one year out from free agency will do anything to show that they’ve found a new level that leads to a massive raise.

Now, does the Contract Year exist? Technically, yes. Is there significant evidence to suggest that players perform better in their contract years? Not really, no. Money is a great motivator, and if you feel like using a contract year scenario as a tiebreaker when picking between two similar players, then go for it, but we wouldn’t be adjusting rankings simply because one player is on the eve of free agency. Some players will undoubtedly raise their game with a new contract waiting on the horizon, but there’s no real rhyme or reason as to who it will be. All we can do is take a look at who is entering a contract season and go from there.

In this article we’re going to check out the players who are headed for unrestricted free agency, but before we do, we need a quick little primer on Bird Rights.

Bird Rights, named after Larry Bird, allow teams to go over the salary cap to re-sign their own free agents. Those rights are gained when a player plays three seasons for one team. A player’s Bird Rights are lost when a player changes teams via free agency, is waived and unclaimed (aside from the rare situation in which he re-signs with the team that waived him and plays three seasons) or has his rights renounced by his team. That means that Bird Rights are retained even if a player is traded. A player with Bird Rights can sign a five-year deal up to the max with his current squad, regardless of what the team’s salary cap situation is.

Early Bird Rights are a lot like regular Bird Rights, only the time frame is condensed to two seasons instead of three. Pretty much all of the same rules apply, with the main difference being the type of contract that Early Bird players can get for their next deal (a two-year minimum with a four-year max, and a maxed out at 175% of a player’s previous salary or 105% of the league average salary, whichever is greater). Luckily there are no Early Bird Rights players who were lining themselves up for a max contract.

Check out our look at impending RFAs and players with player/team options here.

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