Basketball CSKA signed a contract with NBA veteran Will Barton

The leader of the regular championship of the VTB United League, CSKA, signed one of the most notable contracts for Russian basketball in recent years. The army team was strengthened by Will Barton, who has 11 years of experience in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The agreement is valid until the end of the current season. Such a short contract period is most likely due to the fact that the 33-year-old American still hopes to return to the strongest league in the world, where he enjoyed a reputation as a strong player. For the army team, his appearance in any case is an important strengthening in the fight to regain the title, which they have not won for two years.

The most famous and titled Russian basketball club CSKA announced on Monday the signing of a contract with American shooting guard Will Barton. The agreement, as they say on official website club, is calculated until the end of the current season and will come into force after the 33-year-old athlete undergoes a medical examination. “Will is a renowned player with extensive NBA experience. It will take him a little time to adapt to European basketball. We hope he will help us achieve our goals this season,” said CSKA head coach Emil Rajkovic.

The appearance of a player with NBA experience in the VTB United League is not a sensation. There have been quite a few of them on the league’s teams throughout its history, and they still exist now, but in much smaller numbers. After February 2022, many basketball players chose to leave Russia, and, say, in the current CSKA squad before Barton’s arrival there was only one basketball player who could be called an “NBA player,” and even then with a stretch (in 2014, Casper Ware flashed in Philadelphia , but failed to gain a foothold in the team).

But the appearance of a basketball player, who has 11 seasons in the strongest league in the world, and even spent far from being the last, is at least a noticeable event. And Barton’s track record is impressive.

He was selected 40th overall in the 2012 NBA Draft and spent 11 seasons in the league, playing in 679 games (in the 2012-13 season, Barton played for the G League club from Idaho). During his career, Barton played for the Portland Trail Blazers, Denver Nuggets, Washington Wizards, and Toronto Raptors. He spent his most productive years (2015–2022) in Denver, where he earned a reputation as a sniper. At the time of leaving the team, Barton was the best in its history in the number of three-point hits, converting more than 36% of attempts – 804 out of 2220 (the status of the club record holder was taken away from him last season by Jamal Murray).

All this could not but affect the basketball player’s income: in his last years in the NBA, he earned approximately $15 million per season, and during his career he managed to receive more than $81 million. However, after Denver traded Barton to Washington in 2022 “Things went wrong for him. He failed to gain a foothold in the capital team, followed by a move to Toronto (for his sake, Barton even bought out his contract from Washington), and at the end of last season, Barton was left without a contract. It seemed that this would not last long – he was consistently included in the top 5 most sought-after free agents in the league. However, Barton failed to sign a new contract with the NBA club.

Be that as it may, the appearance in the lineup of such an experienced performer as Barton is a serious trump card for the army team in the fight to regain champion status (the last time the army team, with ten titles to their name, became the strongest back in 2021).

Obviously, they took the American with an eye on the playoffs. Note that CSKA deliberately kept the quota for foreigners in the squad unfilled, looking for a player who could really strengthen the squad.

True, one cannot help but notice that even without Barton, CSKA is doing well in the championship. The team secured first place ahead of schedule based on the results of the first stage of the regular season, which means it guaranteed a ticket to the play-offs. In addition to the army team, UNICS, Lokomotiv-Kuban, Zenit, Yenisei and Parma also booked places in the top 6 at the first stage, giving automatic entry into the play-offs. At the second stage, which will take place from February 9 to April 14 (all results at the first stage will be taken into account), teams from the top 6 will play each other in two rounds for higher places in the final classification, and therefore for home-court advantage in the playoffs. Teams that take places from 7th to 14th will also compete for two more tickets to the play-offs in the two-round tournament. However, we should not forget that in the last season and the season before last, CSKA had no equal in the regular season. But despite this, in 2022 the army team lost in the final to Zenit, and in 2023 you were out of the fight for the title already in the semi-finals, losing to Lokomotiv-Kuban.

Alexander Petrov