Otto Porter’s maximum contract offer matched by Wizards

A merger of factors made Otto Porter rich.

There is his personal work that turned him into one of the league’s most efficient offensive players and a hand-in-glove fit for this Washington Wizards roster.

There were the bungled signings of last offseason that constricted Washington’s salary cap space this season, next and possibly beyond.

There is the lack of development by what could have been Porter’s cheap replacement, Kelly Oubre Jr.

And, of course, the mangled pursuit of Kevin Durant.

Those were the driving forces prompting the Wizards to unsurprisingly match the Brooklyn Nets maximum offer sheet to Porter.

Washington had 48 hours to retain Porter after the Nets made him their offer Thursday night. The Wizards did so Saturday night, a source confirmed. The deal is expected to be announced in the middle of the week once Porter is done with a physical and Washington is done temporarily holding Brooklyn’s salary cap space hostage.

Porter was not a shiny pick when selected third overall by Washington in 2013. He wasn’t even a marquee recruit out of the one-stoplight map dot of Sisketon, Missouri. Georgetown signed him as a four-star recruit. He turned that chance into a high draft status. After two seasons as a starter, he leveraged last season’s shooting into roughly $106 million the next four years.

Last season, Porter shot 43.4 percent from behind the 3-point line. His offensive rating was a staggering 129. He averaged a career high in points, rebounds, shooting percentage, free throw percentage, blocks and steals. He turned 24 years old in June following his second full season as a starter.

For now, Porter is the highest-paid player on the team. Washington reportedly has a “supermax” offer out to All-Star point guard John Wall who is two years from becoming an unrestricted free agent. Should Wall sign the offer, Washington will have three players under maximum contracts: Wall, Bradley Beal and Porter. The Wizards say they would like Wall to end his career in Washington. Wall said he’ll consider his options this summer.

Signing Porter to a maximum deal is yet another ripple from the Wizards’ failed recruitment of Durant, which became a dual influence in this specific case. They cleared cap space two years ago — costing Wall, Beal and Porter a playoff appearance in the process — to sign Durant, who shrugged and walked by when the Wizards called out to him. That forced team president Ernie Grunfeld to fill out the roster with high-cost big men Andrew Nicholson, Jason Smith and Ian Mahinmi. That money had to be spent somewhere. They received it. It slammed the Wizards up against the salary cap.

This is relevant to Porter because Durant would have replaced him. The subsequent expenditures also put Washington in a position where it could only lavishly pay Porter since it retained his Bird Rights. It was not a choice between Porter and an high-end free agent. The Wizards had to pay Porter or he would depart, creating a large gap at small forward and leaving Washington near the salary cap this season and next while Porter played for someone else. The money could not be spent elsewhere.

Oubre could have resolved this. Instead, Washington’s lone first-round pick of the last four years has remained an erratic player during his first two seasons. He is labeled as a defender, but his defensive rating last season was 110 (Porter, often criticized for being an average defender, was 108). Oubre was 57th out of 70 small forwards in real plus-minus (Porter was 6th). Had he qualified to be among the ranked players in 3-point shooting last season, Oubre would have been 168th in the league, just ahead of Boston non-shooter Marcus Smart (Porter was 4th). Again, there was no choice.

So, next week, the Wizards will sit down at a table with the polite but media reticent Porter and explain how much they wanted to keep him. It makes sense in context of their team. Porter does not need the ball, shoots a top-5 percentage from behind the 3-point line, hustles, cuts, gets along and has twice shown to be an effective player in the postseason. He is more valuable in Washington than elsewhere because of how the team is constructed. That goes for on the floor and on the books.