{"id":345685,"date":"2025-12-15T00:19:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T00:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/345685\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T00:19:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T00:19:07","slug":"for-players-like-knicks-guard-tyler-kolek-the-nba-cup-brings-a-significant-payday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/345685\/","title":{"rendered":"For players like Knicks guard Tyler Kolek, the NBA Cup brings a significant payday"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

New York Knicks guard Tyler Kolek (13) surveys the Orlando Magic’s defence during the NBA Cup semi-final on Saturday.Ronda Churchill\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

The New York Knicks might get a trophy. Tyler Kolek\u2019s dad might get a car.<\/p>\n

The NBA Cup final will have San Antonio against the Knicks on Tuesday night in Las Vegas. The game won\u2019t count in the standings, and the stats won\u2019t be added to any official totals. But there is a trophy, bragging rights and money at stake.<\/p>\n

By making it to the final, the Knicks and Spurs already have secured US$212,373 per player from the NBA Cup prize money pool. The losing team on Tuesday gets nothing extra. Players on the winning team get an additional US$308,560 \u2013 pushing their Cup winnings to US$530,933 each. Two-way players get half of what players on standard contracts get.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means a lot to some,\u201d Kolek said. \u201cMaybe not as much to others, obviously.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s in the \u201csome\u201d group.<\/p>\n

Kolek, a backup guard for the Knicks, is making US$2.2-million this season. In the real world, that\u2019s a lot of money. In the NBA world, not so much. Take a look at some other Knicks players\u2019 salaries: Karl-Anthony Towns is making US$53.1-million this season, OG Anunoby is making US$39.6-million, Jalen Brunson is making US$34.9-million, Mikal Bridges is making just under US$25-million and Josh Hart around US$19.5-million.<\/p>\n

Those guys \u2013 and plenty of the Spurs players, too \u2013 are used to seeing cheques exceeding US$500,000. Kolek surely isn\u2019t. But he\u2019s earned his shot to win big in Vegas, by being a big reason why the Knicks got to the final.<\/p>\n

New York outscored Orlando by 18 points in Kolek\u2019s 16 minutes in Saturday\u2019s semi-finals. When Kolek wasn\u2019t on the floor, the Magic outscored the Knicks by six. He finished with four points and four assists; the stats might not seem impressive, but his energy was a huge plus for New York.<\/p>\n

\u201cTyler did a fantastic job today, our young fella, of impacting winning,\u201d Towns said after the game. \u201cAnd he did that on a big stage. … One of his finest games as an NBA player was tonight, and it may not show up on the stats sheet, but everybody in our locker room knows how important he was to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Kolek drives to the basket past Orlando Magic forward Paolo Banchero (right) during Saturday’s NBA Cup semi-final on Saturday in Las Vegas.Kirby Lee\/Reuters<\/p>\n

Kolek took his NBA Cup quarter-final bonus from last season, a little over US$50,000, and bought his mother a car. This year, he has said it could be his father\u2019s turn for a new vehicle. The question is, will the bigger bonus this year lead to a better car for his dad?<\/p>\n

Knicks coach Mike Brown \u2013 who raves about Kolek\u2019s competitive juices and has rewarded him with a bigger role in recent weeks \u2013 can\u2019t wait to find out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want to know if his dad\u2019s going to get a better car than his mom or vice versa, because we\u2019ll find out soon which parent he likes more,\u201d Brown said, laughing. \u201cBetter be his mom. … Hey, I\u2019m not causing trouble. I\u2019ve just got two eyes open. Wait to see what he\u2019s going to do. Just take care of your mom. Just remember that. Take care of your mom.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a nice problem to have, for sure.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a big amount of money for a guy like myself,\u201d Kolek said. \u201cIt\u2019s not only about the money. We want to win this to hold up the trophy and for the fans.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: New York Knicks guard Tyler Kolek (13) surveys the Orlando Magic’s defence during…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":345686,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,459,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,82,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-345685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-nba","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=345685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/345686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=345685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=345685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=345685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}