Performance incentives *almost* would have been able to explain some salary cap hijinks, but in the end they can't. I'll explain because this would have been really tricky:
Performance incentives are classified as "likely" or "unlikely" based solely on last season's results. If the player/team met the incentive last season, it is "likely", if not, it is "unlikely", and there is no other data taken into consideration. Furthermore, "likely" bonuses count against the salary cap, but "unlikely" bonuses don't. Here's where the Pelicans could try to get tricksy...New Orleans won 27 games last year; the Kings won 28. If the Pelicans included a performance incentive (worth the maximal 15% of the base salary) in Tyreke's contract for the team winning 28 games, it would be "likely" for the Kings and count against our salary cap, but "unlikely" for the Pelicans and not count against their salary cap.
BUT, and this is a big exception, the sum total of base salary AND bonuses (both likely and unlikely) must fit into the team's salary cap at the time of signing. So let's say New Orleans has exactly $11.5M in cap space. They can't offer an $11.5M contract with a $1.725M performance bonus for 28 wins, because $13.225M does not fit into their salary cap. They could, however, offer this contract: $10M/$10.45M/$10.9M/$11.35M, with performance bonuses of $1.5M/$1.5675M/$1.635M/$1.7025M for 28 wins. That would be a 4/$42.8M base salary contract, with 4/$49.105M max value, which said max value is the exact amount of of an $11.5M starting contract with maximum 4.5% raises.
So it doesn't actually change the maximum it would force the Kings to match, but it might (if the Pelicans don't meet the benchmarks for wins) reduce New Orleans' payout. And make them look cheap to Tyreke, one would assume.