Like a storm cloud approaching, you will see the Oklahoma City Thunder quickly ascend in the payroll rankings. It will almost happen as fast as when they went from a rebuild to an NBA champion.

The Thunder had one of the greatest seasons ever. They finished with a historic 68-14 record and won two Game 7s on their way to the Larry O’Brien trophy. They broke several NBA and OKC records. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had one of the most complete individual seasons ever with an MVP and a ring.

Now, the price for all that will be paid soon. The Thunder brought back mostly the same roster, which is a luxury most reigning NBA champions aren’t afforded. But as soon as this upcoming offseason, expect roster changes to happen.

The Thunder signed Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren to contract extensions this past offseason worth over $800 million in total. That means OKC’s title window will remain open through the rest of the decade at a minimum. It’s a good problem, but still a problem.

Thunder general manager Sam Presti explained why the worries that three players will consume over 80% of their payroll are overestimated. In his 2025-26 preseason press conference, his best answer detailed the nuances involved and how OKC plans to navigate through an expensive roster

Here are the six ways Presti said the Thunder can prepare for their upcoming expensive rosters as they hope to win more NBA championships:

Building around 3 players isn’t a novel idea

“Yeah, you know, a couple things on this. If you look at — the way to look at this, I think, initially relative to those three players you talked about is the aggregate percentage of the cap that they’re assuming, so this season it would be in the bottom 10 in the league in terms of if you took three players from each team and you see the percentage of the cap.

“Next season, roughly, we’ll be up in the top 10, but we’re not going to be anywhere near the top 5; know what I mean?

“Teams pay three players pretty regularly, but the most highly compensated players on each team are not necessarily making the same amount of money. Just start there. We’re not in some realm where committing dollars to those three guys is taking you outside any type of norm. You’re going to end up toward the high end, but you’re not in some type of outlier territory.”

Second Apron doesn’t equal roster destruction

“I think you used the right word, ‘expensive.’ I think the issue for us coming is — people talk about the CBA and the second apron has become so engrained in our NBA vocabulary so quickly. But there’s nothing relative to the second apron that would prohibit us from keeping anyone on our team.

“The rules themselves are not prohibitive to our ability to maintain the team. The challenge is obviously for every team that has a sufficient collection of talent is the finances that come with that.”

Taking advantage of the cheap years

“Now, as I said, I think, last year, we don’t get into and we’ve had three years, if you count the play-in year, I’d say where we were a good team, two years where we were a contending team, we have not been a taxpayer. We’re positioned this year to be a non-taxpayer.

“Assuming we’re a contending team this year, that would be three years as a non-taxpayer as a contender. People talk all the time about the fact that these — the windows are shorter and they’re saying there’s three years with each team more or less with the new rules. We just had three, or we’ve had two, we’re going on three.

“We don’t know how this year is going to go, what chapter 18 will be, but we certainly can say with confidence that we are a contending team but we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Other means of money can help pay repeater tax

“From there, things will get more expensive because of those changes in those three guys’ contracts. But we won’t hit any type of repeater penalties until we’re in another CBA. We’ll be in a new arena by the time we’re hitting any repeater tax penalties, as long as we stay under this year.

“Simultaneously, we are at a point where there will be some significant financial benefits for our team going forward as a result of things happening kind of outside of the team itself. You have a brand new television contract that was just signed, which is a remarkable achievement and sign of the strength of the product. That benefits all teams.

“You have a new arena opening, which will be a significant driver in revenue for our organization. You have potential expansion down the line, both in Europe and potentially domestically. Obviously that’s a decision that Adam and the Board of Governors are reviewing presently.

“So we’re positioned well to have a significant influx of capital going forward, during a period of time where for sure our team is going to get more expensive.

“It’s rare that you have a team like ours bring back every player more or less, right? So over the course of time, whether or not you have aprons, taxes or what have you, teams change”

Roster change is part of NBA

“We have a very unique situation because everybody is back to a team that had tremendous success. But going forward, that’s just natural, that there will be some changes. Part of it is players. Players have options. So when they become free agents, they have choices.

“We might want to keep specific players. They may have better opportunities other places.

“All that to say, we understand what’s coming, but it would be really fruitless for us to predict what’s going to happen because we’d be missing the most important information, which is this season. What happens this season, what happens next season.”

OKC ownership group willing to spend

“But our ownership group is fiercely committed to supporting the team, as we talked about, the mutual commitment component to a small market franchise. I think it’s extremely important that everyone is mutually committed and everybody understands this is coming.

“We knew five years ago when we repositioned and replenished that team that if we were to ever get back to the postseason or exceed past being just an average playoff team, we would need the resources to support that. We saw that during the first mountain.

“So this isn’t our first look at this. There’s been ample time for us to plan for this, and then we have the benefits of some outside resources that should aid us.

“But we’re still going to have to be strategic and make smart decisions when we have all the information.”