There's a long way to go before we'll have the final verdict on whether the teams who signed players to contracts of three years or longer this offseason made mistakes. Nonetheless, with the 2012 part of the 2012/13 season behind us, we have a clear picture of who might have some early pangs of buyer's remorse. Deron Williams has taken plenty of flak of late for his less-than-stellar play after having re-signed with the Nets to a maximum deal in the summer, but there are a few others whose long-term contracts look like even more burdensome albatrosses for their clubs. Here they are, listed in descending order based on the value of their deals.
- Roy Hibbert, Pacers (four years, $58.366MM): He's had his moments this season, but Saturday's scoreless effort against the Hawks seems about as low as it can go for someone who just signed a max contract. Hibbert's production in other categories has been fine, but he's averaging single digits in points, something he hasn't done since his rookie year.
- Ersan Ilyasova, Bucks (five years, $40MM): The 6'9" power forward set career highs in rebounding (8.8) and three-point percentage (45.5%) last season, but this year's numbers are more in line with his career marks of 5.5 RPG and 37.9% from behind the arc. Milwaukee may have gotten caught up in a natural regression to the mean for Ilyasova.
- Jeff Green, Celtics (four years, $36MM): His return from heart surgery was a feel-good story as the season began, and his numbers this season are eerily similar to those from his half-season with the Celtics in 2011. Still, $9MM a year to someone producing 9.8 PPG and 3.2 RPG in 23.7 MPG, particularly for a sub-.500 team, does not sound appealing.
- Courtney Lee, Celtics (four years, $21.35MM): He was supposed to have made up for the absence of Ray Allen's long-distance shooting after knocking in better than 40% of his treys in three of his first four seasons in the league. He's shooting a career-low 30.6% from behind the arc this season as he's been in and out of the starting lineup.
- Landry Fields, Raptors (three years, $18.725MM): It may be a bit premature to include him on this list, since he's only played seven games so far since returning from injury, but he's been ghastly in his limited playing time, averaging just 2.9 points on 31% shooting in 21 minutes per contest. He's registered a 4.3 PER this season. His deal didn't look too promising for the Raptors when he signed it, and it doesn't look any better now.