Short-Term Contract

The discussion on injuries brings me to the next subject - short-term contracts. I have been very fortunate - in each season, I signed a contract for 10 months, thus securing a cash-flow for the whole season. There are numerous players, however, who sign contracts for only a short period of time - anywhere between 1-month to 6-month - and travel from team to team throughout the season. Short-term contracts are very common nowadays and can be very beneficial to both, players and teams.
Basketball players live and die by the stat sheet (a very unfortunate fact). The "numbers" from your previous season are the main factor that determines your salary level for the upcoming season. So if you suffer a major injury, you don’t get to play due to high competition on your team, or you just didn’t have a good year, your salary level is likely to decrease. What can you do to prevent this? Unless you have a really good reputation among coaches and have been in the league for a while, little to nothing. The conversation between your agent and the team manager is likely to go like this:
Agent: I have a player for you, works hard, great defender, can shoot the ball, and wants to earn X.
Manager: Well that’s great, but well only offer him Y.
Agent: Why is that? His market value is X.
Manager: That may be, but with the numbers he had last year, we won’t pay him X, well only pay him Y.
Now let’s say you sign for 1 month and put up good numbers during the 4 games of this contract, your salary level will rise again and you can play the rest of the season earning the money you want.
The club managers use the short term contracts to substitute injured players or strengthen a team's roster for a playoff run. For example, let's say your forward, who scores 18 points a game, gets hurt and has to sit out for one month. You sign a profile player for a month, which is likely to give you the same numbers, while the hurt player is recuperating.
We had a similar situation this season. One of our big guys was hurt and the diagnosis was that he could be out for as long as 3 weeks. So the management decided to sign a high profile player for a month. Alexis started his season in the ACB, the top league in Spain. At the end of his 3 month contract he got hurt, so the team decided not to resign him. He played all of January with us, got back into shape from his injury, and in February signed a one month contract in the ACB. He chose not to resign with the team for the rest of the season and is now on his way to Chile or Puerto Rico to play in their respective Summer Leagues that last about 4 months.
Personally, I prefer to sign a one-season contract during the summer rather than waiting and see if better opportunities will come around. The competition is fierce and there are plenty of players who don’t sign with a team, because they waited for better opportunities. On the other hand, there is a lot of money to be made in the short-term market. I assure you that Alexis, playing 5 months in 3 different teams, has made a lot more money than I will at the end of my 10 month contract.