Oklahoma City Thunder Lock Up Serge Ibaka With Four-Year Extension And What It Might Mean For James Harden

According to Yahoo! Sports, among other sources, the Oklahoma City Thunder have locked up the third member of the team's four-headed monster of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, Serge Ibaka, and James Harden when the team agreed to a four-year, $48 million deal with Ibaka to remain with the Thunder.

Ibaka's new extension leaves Harden as the only member of the Thunder's core group that isn't locked in for the foreseeable future with Oklahoma City.

With Harden emerging last season as the best bench player in the NBA, averaging 16.8 points per game en route to earning NBA Sixth Man of the Year honors, most people thought Thunder GM Sam Presti would have a deal worked out with Harden before moving on to Ibaka's.

However, for reasons that remain unknown at this time, Presti decided to lock in Ibaka first, who is one of the league's best defensive players and only beginning to scratch the surface of his potential ceiling.

At 6'10", and with freakishly long arms, Ibaka has led the league in total blocks in each of the past two seasons, averaging a whopping 3.7 blocks per game while playing and starting all 66 games this past season for OKC.

Ibaka also led the league in total postseason blocks in each of the past two seasons, including a 2.68 average this past postseason to go along with his 9.5 points and 6.5 rebounds per game as he helped lead the Thunder to the 2012 NBA Finals.

He was also named to the All-NBA first Defensive Team this past season, and finished second to Tyson Chandler of the New York Knicks in voting for Defensive Player of the Year.

You can't really make an argument that efficiency played much of a role in the team opting to deal with Ibaka's extension before Harden's considering they had very similar PERs this past season, with Harden narrowly edging Ibaka 21.1 to 19.0 in that category.

Both players have had extremely good luck staying healthy and on the court during their first three seasons in the league, as Harden has only missed 10 out of 230 regular season games, while Ibaka has missed only 9 out of 230 games (all nine of his missed games came during his rookie season).

It wasn't because Harden was busy with the Olympics, playing alongside Durant and Westbrook for Team USA on their way to a gold medal because Ibaka played just as deep in the tournament with Spain, settling with a silver medal after Team USA's 107-100 victory over the Spanish team.

Harden was reportedly being shopped around the league at the time of the 2012 NBA Draft, with the Charlotte Bobcats being one team reportedly very interested in making a move for him (they supposedly considered sending their number two overall pick to OKC in exchange for Harden.

I can't say with any certainty that Presti hasn't shopped Ibaka at some point over the past three seasons, although I'd venture to say it's likely Presti has shopped everyone on the roster except for KD at some point just to gauge interest in his players from around the league.

The reason Presti decided to lock up Ibaka for the next four years before dealing with Harden's extension could be as simple as he realized just how bad the Thunder will need Ibaka when they inevitably get matched up against the Los Angeles Lakers and their newest incarnation of twin towers, Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol, in the postseason.

For instance, remove Ibaka from the Thunder's squad and replace him with Dante Cunningham of the Minnesota Timberwolves, who had a PER of 14.94 last season (15.0 is the standardized league average and Cunningham was closet to the mark at the power forward position last season).

I don't think Oklahoma City would win more than two games against the 2012-13 Lakers in a seven game series with that swap, and that's assuming Durant AND Westbrook each have at least one out of this world performance during that series.

Now, let's remove Harden from the equation and replace him with Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors, who posted a 14.97 PER during the 2011-12 season (again, the closest player at shooting guard to a 15.0 PER).

I still don't think the Thunder would be able to pull out four wins against that same Lakers squad (maybe once in every five seven game series between the two), but I do know that it would be a much, much closer fight with Ibaka and Kendrick Perkins down low battling Howard and Gasol with Durant and Westbrook still handling their business.

Basically, what this proves is that Oklahoma City will need all four pieces of their four-headed monster if they want to get past a Lakers squad being led by an insanely determined Kobe Bryant (Do you honestly think the Black Mamba is going to show any sign of mercy or focus on anything beyond the hardwood in his pursuit of his Jordan-tying sixth ring?) and an almost equally determined Steve Nash (still chasing his first ring while holding the fairly embarrassing title of having played more playoff games than anyone in NBA history without even reaching the NBA Finals at an astounding total of 118 games.. and counting).

While the Thunder NEED that four-headed monster intact to secure their best odds at a title, it's a different story entirely whether or not they can actually make it happen.

Assuming Ibaka will be earning about $12 million a season under his new extension, Oklahoma City would have around $47 million committed to Durant, Westbrook, and Ibaka alone starting with the 2013-14 season.

Tack on another $15 million (approximately) for Kendrick Perkins, Thabo Sefolosha and Nick Collison, and those six players alone eating up about $63 million in cap space in 2013-14.

While Harden's qualifying offer is only $7.64 million, it's almost a certainty he will be offered somewhere between $12 million per season and a maximum contract by a team that's chasing him next summer as a restricted free agent.

Even if he draws the short straw out of those numbers, still $12 million per year, that means the Thunder would be committed to $75 million in salary in 2013-14 for Durant, Westbrook, Harden, Ibaka, Perkins, Collison, and Sefolosha if they matched his offer sheet.

With the salary cap expected to be somewhere in the range of $58 million and the tax threshold at around $70 million (and reportedly getting more punitive in 2013-14, hitting teams harder that are over the line), that puts the Thunder almost $17 million over the cap and paying at least $10 million in luxury taxes with a minimum of six more spots to fill on their roster.

While Clay Bennett, owner of the Thunder, has never been one to shy away from spending, I'm not sure he is going to want to spend that kind of money when it can't even guarantee a championship with the Miami Heat and Los Angeles Lakers on equal or higher ground than the Thunder.

In the end, although it may be tough for Bennett to swallow financially, I don't think he has a choice but to pay James Harden whatever he commands as they easily have the youngest core of the three super teams right now (Thunder, Heat, Lakers. Sorry everyone else, they're just on a separate level at this point) and would almost certainly win at least one championship over the next four or five seasons.

If for some reason Oklahoma City decides they can't afford to keep Harden around and they allow him to leave town, they may be regretting it over the next decade if they fail to win multiple titles without him, because as long as OKC has their four-headed monster of Durant, Westbrook, Ibaka, and Harden in tact, they will remain a threat to win the Larry O'Brien championship trophy almost every season for the next five to ten years.