Bradley Beal is set to become a restricted free agent this summer, and he’d prefer to stay in Washington. His expectation, however, is that the Wizards give him a max contract – or else he’ll find it somewhere else.
“I want to be valued the right way,” Beal told Jorge Castillo of the Washington Post. “I feel like I’m a max player and that’s what I’m looking for. If Washington can’t meet that requirement then I may be thinking elsewhere. I’m pretty sure that they probably won’t [let me go]. At the end of the day, that’s where I want to be. I think a deal will probably get done but you just never know.”
The Wizards can give Beal a fifth year and go over their cap to sign him, which other teams cannot do, so his best chance for the big payday he wants is with Washington. That said, he’s coming off an injury-plagued season, and he’s already turned down an extension that wasn’t the max. There are also whispers that the Wizards aren’t sold on Beal as a max player, which could create a rather intriguing offseason stalemate between the two sides if true.
