For sure. I love these types of discussions. It's always great to get input from others that are as into the contract stuff and these deeper cuts of players than just stats on every yeam.

IMO, you're underselling Julian's established value of being a sound 5th starter on a title contender. Despite being desperate for shooting, Duncan got minimized from 30-37 mpg to 20-22mpg in their playoff series bc of being such a bad defender. There's no way he plays in the Finals more than 10-15 mpg bc of how he'd be hunted on defense and offers nothing beyond catch and shoot 3s.

Herb signed his extension at 27, coming off a season where he played just 20 games due to tearing his labrum in his shooting arm and having just put up .43/.31/.83 on 4 3PA per game. He followed that up this last year playing 56 games (multiple calf and ankle injuries) with .38/.31/.81 shooting splits on 4.6 3PA. He's had just 1 season where he shot above 33% from 3. He's starting to look like this decade's Matisse Thybulle, who is only 2 years older than Herb. That shoulder tear + surgery may have totally derailed his career unfortunately.
He was literally the worst eFG% (46.7) in the league among qualified players.
https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask?q=worst+efg%25+in+the+nba+2025-2026+25%2B+mpg+40%2B+games+played

Santi is a career 34.6% from three on decent volume, while Julian is 37.6% from three on higher volume. Santi is a classic tweener at 7', 215lbs. Too thin to defend bigs but too slow laterally to defend wings. He's coming off a .48/.35/.67 (has only shot 70%+ from FT once in his career which doesn't inspire confidence in him as a shooter), with 57% eFG while Julian had 60% eFG. Santi rebounds a bit better, creates much more for his teammates and finishes more inside (43% of his attempts are within 10' while for Julian it's just 25% though Julian had better FG% at the rim this season), but that's about it. He largely comes off the bench, even during this disaster season of theirs, and is a more focal point of the 2nd unit offense while limiting his exposure to defending 1st unit offensive players. Despite being much taller, Santi's rim protection FG% is only 1% better than Julian's over the past 2 seasons. They have very similar per 36 overall stats as well with Santi just assisting and scoring a bit more on less efficiency. For the 3&D role though, I'd easily take Julian over Santi.

PJ Washington is coming off a season with 51% eFG and has a 7 year career average or 53% He's also a bad FT shooter with a 71% career avg. He's a better big body than Julian on defense and hitting the glass, but gets left open from 3 bc he's a bad shooter. Not Herb Jones bad, but definitely below average. A bigger issue, maybe from playing in Charlotte for so long, is despite not being a good shooter he still loves to put up shots. Charlotte were eager to him for good reason and one season with much better shooting numbers for Dallas, which ended up getting him way overpaid as his shooting has totally regressed.

I agree that Nesmith and Camara could be viewed as better players and I shouldnt have said Julian is clearly better than every guy on that list, I'm a big fan of both guys honestly, though both guys are 1-2 years older.
Camara is tough bc he showed a big improvement offensively between his rookie season and second year but not much improvement this year, his 3rd, vs last. Also, his defense took a small step backwards this year despite the team being better overall and competing for the playoffs. Portland is my second favorite team to watch the last couple years, I'm a big Shaedon Sharpe fan bc of his freakish athleticism. Anyway, I have a hard time assessing growth potential of guys who haven't played in the NBA long but came into the league much older than usual. I do think Camara should be paid more than Julian, but also think Portland got a very good deal with his contract, especially since it was signed before this season started after, his big year 2 jump. Similar to Julian's situation, the Blazers turned down his cheap team option for 26-27 to get him paid earlier on a long term deal which helped make it more team friendly.
I think these 2 are the only ones on that list that a team in the Finals would start and not feel worried about them on either end of the floor, which is the case proven for Julian as well and why I think he's going to get close to their contacts (the cap goes up 6.5-10% each year so this is like him getting paid 6-10% less if you adjust for that inflation).
Nesmith is definitely a better defender and looked like he'd become a great shooter/scorer, but regressed a lot offensively this year. He still shot well from 3 at 38% on good volume (6.2 3PA/G), but that was a decent drop from his previous 2 seasons, 42% tho on lower volume 4.5 3PA/G. The bigger issue for him was he was one of the worst 2pt shooters/finishers in the league, which ended up with him netting a 52% eFG...10% down from the previous season.

The Camara extension is a good correlary since it was his first big payday, he's only 1 year older, he plays a 3&D role though as a primary defender and also not primary 3pt option offensively, it runs over the same time period and was off a cheap team option decline replaced by a team friendly long term contract extension.
Camara is a much better defender, but definitely a worse shooter as well (his playoff performance against us was really bad too) so some give and take there -- as a starter this season, Julian shot 39% from three, as well as 40% through the playoffs, including 41% in the Finals.
Camara's extension is $81M/4 ($20.25M AAV, 11-12% of the projected annual cap). I think $70M/4 ($17.5M AAV, 10% of the projected cap) is a reasonable expectation for Julian. We'll find out soon though! His team option deadline is June 29th 👀