About $28.4M of Paul George's salary last season paid for games he missed
Paul George scored 38 points in his first game for Boston on Tuesday, making 12 of 21 shots and 7 of 12 threes in 31 minutes, and the Celtics still lost 121-113 in Detroit. According to AP, it was the most points by a Celtic in his debut and the fifth-most by any player in his first game with an NBA franchise.
The shape of the loss matters as much as the box score. George hit three 3-pointers in under a minute early in the third quarter to put Boston ahead 72-50, AP reported, and the Pistons came all the way back for what AP called the biggest comeback win in a league opener since 1997.
"I'm not a moral victory guy," George said afterward, per AP. "It means nothing."
He added five steals, five rebounds and three assists, and Joe Mazzulla pointed to the decisions more than the shooting: "The game found him, he made some great reads throughout the game," the Celtics coach said, according to AP. Jayson Tatum missed 17 of 23 shots and finished with 13 points and 11 assists.
One night carries this much weight because of what Boston gave up to get it. The Celtics acquired George, 36 and in his 17th season, from the 76ers in a trade for Jaylen Brown, the 2024 NBA Finals MVP.
The coverage names only those two players, and AP dates the deal only to last summer. Any picks, other players or salary matching were not reported, and neither was George's salary this season or what remains on his contract.
The money is clearer for last season, which George spent with the Philadelphia 76ers. His $51.7M salary ranked 13th of the 435 rated players, and his production ranked 203rd, earned in 37 of the team's 82 games.
That rank reads first as a games story. Production is a season total, so a player who misses that much of the schedule sinks in the ranking whatever he does on the nights he plays.
AP reported that injuries and a 25-game suspension for a failed drug test limited him to 37 and 41 games in his last two regular seasons with the Sixers. About $28.4M of last season's salary went to games he did not play.
On the 76ers' sheet, his contract was 27% of the payroll and returned 6% of the production. A contract sized to carry a rotation carried a much smaller part of one, and the games he missed are the clearest part of why.
The result was a 3 WAGE Score in 2025-26, a Sunk Cost season. That number describes what last season's money bought, not his health today or whatever he is paid in Boston.
There is a real other side, and the spring is part of it. In 11 playoff games, George accounted for 15% of Philadelphia's playoff production as the 76ers lost in the conference semifinals. That is a short stretch and not a score, but it fits a reading in which availability, more than his play, drove the regular-season figure.
So what does the new season ask? Not another 38 points: the debut suggested the scoring is still there, at least for one night and 31 minutes. It asks for what last season's salary did not get, which is games.
"It was a rough camp for me," George said, per AP, which also reported that he was encouraged by his health. I'd argue Tuesday answered the question that matters least for the money: the scoring showed up on the first night, and only the games that follow can say whether the health holds.