Spurs' October Team Options and Twitter Question about Jeremy Sochan

With October approaching soon, the San Antonio Spurs have some upcoming decisions to make regarding four players with team options. I also answered a Twitter question about Jeremy Sochan.

Back on July 18, when free agency started to slow down, I looked at upcoming dates for the rest of the Spurs’ offseason. While most of the dates from that piece have passed, one key date is approaching next month, and that date is October 31.

Here’s what I wrote back on July 18 about team option decisions on October 31:

Finally, the Spurs will have until October 31 to exercise team options for the following players for the 2025-2026 season. These are usually more of a formality, and unless a team really doesn’t see a player as part of their future going into next season, then they wouldn’t exercise the team option.

• Victor Wembanyama - $13.4 million team option

• Jeremy Sochan - $7.1 million team option

• Malaki Branham - $5 million team option

• Blake Wesley - $4.7 million team option

Looking back at press releases from the Spurs over the last three years, the team usually announces the team option decisions in mid October. The precise dates were October 18, 2021, October 10, 2022, and October 23, 2023.

So regarding these decisions, they usually come out around mid-October. When looking at the four players above, it’s a foregone conclusion the Spurs will exercise the team options for both Wembanyama and Sochan.

The key decisions to watch then will be for both Branham and Wesley, who like Sochan, will be entering their third seasons in the NBA. Unlike Sochan though, Branham and Wesley may not be locks to have roles in the initial 10-player rotation to begin the season.

With the additions of Chris Paul, Harrison Barnes, and Stephon Castle over the offseason, the backup perimeter minutes may not be guaranteed like they were last season for Branham and Wesley. With Paul likely to start, that means Tre Jones will now become the backup point guard. If Castle doesn’t start, he’s likely to get backup perimeter minutes very early in his rookie season. Another starter from last season - Julian Champagnie, might also be battling for minutes on the perimeter.

This circles back to the question of what the future holds for Branham and Wesley going into their third seasons with the team. The Spurs have to make one of two decisions before October 31.

• Exercise the team options - By exercising the team options for both players, both players would be under guaranteed contract going into next season, and then the Spurs could make each player a restricted free agent in the summer of 2026.

• Decline the team options - If the Spurs were to decline the team options for both players, then this would be the final season under a guaranteed contract for each player, and next summer, each player would become an unrestricted free agent.

Since this decision doesn’t have to be made until at latest, October 31, the Spurs can use the upcoming training camp and preseason as one final evaluation point before having to decide on whether to exercise or decline the team options for both players.

This could be a crucial October for both Branham and Wesley going into training camp in two weeks.

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Jeremy Sochan Twitter Question

As I mentioned in the most recent episode of the Spot Up Pod, I’ve been answering Twitter questions sent in from fans recently. While most of the questions have been answered on the podcast, I saved this specific question as a written answer.

Here was the question: