Anticipating mammoth contracts for undeserving players, the creation of another super team, and mass switching of teams by established veterans, NBA commissioner Adam Silver suggested to Players Association president Michele Roberts that the league increase the salary cap gradually when the new television contract pumped $24 billion into the league’s war chest.

The players responded with a resounding no. So the salary cap this summer increased by an unprecedented $20 million to $94.1 million when the money from ESPN, ABC, and TNT kicked in with the new contract.

With the increase in salary cap space for nearly every team — some such as the champion Cavaliers already had exceeded $94 million in salary expenditures — it allowed for a rather offensive increase in salaries for players who were considered average or midlevel talent.

Evan Turner got lured away from the Celtics with a four-year, $75 million contract by the Trail Blazers. Turner earned $3.6 million last season with the Celtics and was fourth on the team in scoring.

The Nets, looking to fill salary cap space, offered a four-year, $75 million offer sheet to Portland’s Allen Crabbe, who averaged 10.3 points per game last season. With a salary floor of $84 million, teams have to fill their rosters with bloated salaries on players who likely don’t deserve such rewards.

Therefore, you have players who were buried on benches, such as Cleveland’s Timofey Mozgov, signing for $64 million over four years with the Lakers. He earned $4.9 million last year in Cleveland.

And in terms of the super teams, Kevin Durant just joined the Warriors to give them four All-Stars in the starting lineup and making them the first team ever to have two MVPs — Durant and Stephen Curry — below the age of 30. Blame the increased salary cap for this. The Warriors astutely signed Curry and Klay Thompson to long-term contracts that were considered pricey at the time but moderate now, and then invested in another long-term deal with Draymond Green.

With Curry, the two-time MVP, earning only $12.1 million this coming season (less than New Orleans’s Solomon Hill, who averaged 4.2 points per game last season), the Warriors were able to squeeze Durant into their salary cap as long as they dumped other salaries.

So general manager Bob Myers renounced the rights to Harrison Barnes, who signed a maximum contract with the Mavericks, traded Andrew Bogut to the Mavericks, and then allowed Leandro Barbosa, Brandon Rush, Festus Ezeli, and Marreese Speights to sign elsewhere.

Myers essentially had to clear out the rest of the roster, keeping Andre Iguodala, ShaunLivingston, and Ian Clark, and then adding Zaza Pachulia and David West on minimum contracts. Myers is seeking bench depth willing to make a championship run on a minimum salary. It’s quite similar to what the Heat did six years ago when they signed LeBron James and Chris Bosh to join Dwyane Wade. All three accepted below the maximum contracts to make it possible.

Curry and Thompson are both playing below the maximum contract, while Green is playing on a max deal — an average of $17 million — that’s well below Durant’s salary because of service time.

Forming super teams is what the NBA wanted to avoid when it created maximum contracts, but the owners did not prepare for the influx of TV money. The league believed it could convince the players to accept a staggered cap increase so that just one or two free agent classes would not benefit from the stunning raises.

But the players’ union felt the gradual increase would financially benefit the owners and wanted their money now. Hence, the increase.

The owners and union each have the option of ending their current 10-year deal after this season. Both sides are expected to opt out, although it’s difficult to understand why the union would want to change how the pie is divided.

To sign Durant, the Warriors were able to benefit from the increased salary cap, cap-friendly salaries from Curry and Thompson, and the ability to clear cap space by dumping players. The Bulls did the same thing to sign Wade, dealing Jose Calderon to the Lakers and Mike Dunleavy to the Cavaliers.

This summer was going to make some NBA fans uncomfortable with the extravagant salaries, but it’s really not the players’ fault this time. TV money caused this spending spree.

CALCULATED GAMBLE

Without Wade, Heat must reload

The Miami Heat’s website is filled with photos of Dwyane Wade in tribute to his 13 years with the organization. Wade shockingly signed with the Bulls, ending a remarkable run with the Heat but also years of contract upheaval that was never quite resolved.

Wade was never the highest-paid player on the team in any of his 13 years. He sacrificed money so the team could acquire Shaquille O’Neal and then LeBron James, and finally last summer so the club could acquire players for a title run this past season.

Finally, Wade wanted to be compensated for his sacrifices, especially after seeing Kobe Bryant sign a two-year, $48 million contract to finish his career. The Heat offered two years, $40 million in a market in which Ryan Anderson just signed a four-year, $80 million deal. Anderson has played more than 66 games in a season just once in his first eight NBA seasons.

So Wade perceived the offer as disrespectful and the Bulls seized the opportunity to sign the hometown kid for $7 million more. The Heat, headed by president Pat Riley, appeared resigned to losing Wade and not particularly broken up that he’s gone after 13 years. Miami didn’t want to pay Wade his price and wanted to move forward with younger players. The Heat gave a maximum contract to Hassan Whiteside, who has had his share of maturity issues. Investing $94 million in Whiteside is a calculated risk. The Heat will discover quickly if South Beach and playing for Erik Spoelstra is enough to attract major free agents.

The common denominator when the Heat attracted big-time talent was the presence of Wade, who is among the best shooting guards of all time. Without Wade, the Heat are a team that may not make the playoffs. The status of All-Star Chris Bosh remains uncertain. He wants to return after missing parts of the past two seasons with blood clot issues. He wanted to return late last season for the playoff run but the team’s medical staff wouldn’t clear him because of the risk.

There is hope that Bosh will return next season at full strength. He, along with Whiteside, Goran Dragic, and the emerging Justise Winslow, make for an intriguing team. But the Heat desperately need more. They agreed to a one-year deal with former Knick Derrick Williams to supplement the bench.

Regardless, Wade’s departure leaves a huge hole in the organization and on the roster. It’s too late in free agency to sign an impact player, so unless Riley uses the remaining cap space to make a trade, the Heat will enter next season just trying to reach the postseason. In the offseason, the Heat have lost Luol Deng (Lakers), Joe Johnson (Jazz), and have seemingly passed on re-signing Gerald Green and Amar’e Stoudemire. Also, point guard Tyler Johnson, who has averaged 7.4 points during his two-year NBA career, signed a $50 million offer sheet with the Nets.

Miami’s best option is to develop Winslow and Josh Richardson into starters and save its salary cap space for next summer. Riley is a cunning executive who can sell free agents on the Heat’s tradition, location, and the opportunity to win.

It would have helped if Wade was back for at least two more years, but the organization did not want him for three years. He proved durable last season, playing 74 games and averaging 19 points. What has lowered his scoring average for several seasons is his reluctance to attempt 3-pointers.

Wade amassed three consecutive seasons of at least 206 3-pointers attempted from 2008-11, but in the past five years he has only attempted 300 total, including just 44 last season. Perhaps the Heat would flourish more offensively with a floor-stretching shooting guard.

Richardson, a second-round pick in 2015 from Tennessee, was a 46.1 percent 3-point shooter as a rookie. But is he prepared to inherit the starting position? It’s a major risk for a franchise that was highly successful during most of Wade’s tenure.

Yet, it’s pretty apparent that the Heat wanted to move on and there was no easy way to do it. The Lakers paid the price for allowing Bryant to end his career on his own terms, basically using last season as a farewell tour while the team’s younger pieces just watched instead of developing.

Wade definitely has something left and would have contributed to the Heat winning a playoff round, but even with Bosh, Whiteside, and Dragic, Miami was not a championship-caliber team, and Riley realized that. So why cripple the team’s chances of improving by keeping Wade for three more years? It’s a harsh approach and one that may backfire on Riley if he cannot attract another impact player.

ETC.

Thunder employ Westbrook plan

The Oklahoma City Thunder seemingly did everything right over the past few years to win an NBA title. General manager Sam Presti, a Concord native, scored big in the draft, signed quality free agents, and put together a championship-caliber team for years headed by Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook.

And to perhaps secure Durant’s return on a new contract, he dealt longtime teammate Serge Ibaka to the Magic for three players, including budding star Victor Oladipo, to join Westbrook in the backcourt for another title run.

Still, it didn’t work. Durant had been mentally exhausted from trying to win titles with a team that always seemed one player short. He was wooed by being part of a Big Four in Golden State and slipped away, convinced that he needed a new environment, that he had outgrown Oklahoma City and the culture, and was ready for change.

The Thunder, meanwhile, have perhaps their toughest sell job in convincing Westbrook, whose contract expires after next season, to stay as the face of the franchise. Westbrook, a Los Angeles native, has been rumored to be destined for the Lakers for years. And Los Angeles will be able to offer Westbrook a maximum contract next summer.

So Presti has to determine in a short period whether Westbrook is invested into the franchise long term. Westbrook hasn’t made a statement since Durant signed with the Warriors and he may be intrigued by leading the franchise to the next phase with a talented core with Oladipo, Steven Adams, Enes Kanter, Ersan Ilyasova, and potentially Dion Waiters, who is a restricted free agent.

“We’re not going to be deterred,’’ Presti said. “We’re going to continue to advance. There’s a new beginning here for the Thunder and we have to embrace that and we have to lean into that. None of us were under the illusion that Kevin Durant would be here forever. We understand that this is a business. We also understand that part of the NBA has changed even when you prefer that wasn’t the case.’’

Presti is calculating in every move. He is one of the league’s more astute and prepared general managers. He will have the Thunder competitive and improving, but the question is whether this smaller market can keep its best players.

“Those of you have been around us with the eight years we’ve been here, we’ve never been impulsive, we’ve never been reactionary, we’ve never been careless with putting this franchise in the best positive position to be healthy and be competitive,’’ Presti said. “We wouldn’t change that right now. We’ll be intelligent with how we go forward. Although the organization will be different without Kevin, the principles he helped establish.’’

The key is luring Westbrook to agree to an extension after next season. After losing Durant for nothing but salary cap space, the Thunder do not want the same scenario with their All-Star point guard. If they were to offer Westbrook in a trade, they know they would not get back a full return because of his impending free agency.

It’s a tricky situation because Westbrook, like Durant and Dwyane Wade, may want to pursue the courting process. He may want to experience the same process of being wooed by the likes of Tom Brady and Stephen Curry. That’s understandable.

The attraction of being the face of the franchise may not be good enough to entice Westbrook to stay in Oklahoma City long term, especially if Presti can’t sign the necessary pieces to create not only a competitive club but a championship-caliber club. So the recruiting of Westbrook begins now.

Layups

With free agents signing seemingly by the hour, the market is beginning to develop for restricted free agents. The market is saturated with RFAs whose current teams are just waiting for other clubs to make offers so they can match or let them go. Two of those players are the Celtics’ Tyler Zeller and Jared Sullinger, both of whom are coming off solid seasons. Zeller, a 7-footer who can run the floor and is a decent perimeter shooter, could be attractive for up-tempo teams. Sullinger fared better than expected last season when he was projected to be out of the rotation. A team seeking a physical big with midrange shooting ability may make a bid for the 24-year-old. Toronto, Miami, the Lakers, and Houston are seeking big men . . . Another big man looking for work is former Celtic Brandon Bass, who opted out of his contract with the Lakers after a trying season in Los Angeles where he was relegated to playing backup center. Bass is a pure pick-and-roll power forward with midrange shooting ability. Many veterans will be forced to sign minimum contracts when the market begins drying and teams approach the salary cap . . . What will be interesting in the offseason is whether Cleveland coach Tyronn Lue, who led the franchise to its first championship, will get a contract extension or a raise. Lue signed a long-term contract to be coach in February after David Blatt was fired, but the price of a championship coach may have risen given the $5 million annual deal signed by the Lakers’ Luke Walton and $7 million by Scott Brooks, neither of whom have won a title. Minnesota’s Tom Thibodeau signed a $10 million contract to be the coach and president of the Timberwolves, which set the market.

Gary Washburn can be reached at gwashburn@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter at @GwashburnGlobe. Material from interviews, wire services, other beat writers, and league and team sources was used in this report.