ESPN.com: Knicks waive Joakim Noah, will clear cap space for 2019

Ian Begley and Adrian Wojnarowski report:

After waiving Joakim Noah on Saturday, the New York Knicks will use the stretch provision on the remaining year of his contract to clear salary-cap space in an effort to pursue top free agents in the summer of 2019, league sources told ESPN.

Using the stretch provision reduces Noah’s cap hit of $19.3 million in 2019-20 to $6.4 million, saving the team $12.9 million toward the cap. Stretching his contract, though, will cost the Knicks $6.4 million in cap space in the summers of 2020 and 2021.

In addition:

If the Knicks, as expected, do not give Kristaps Porzingis a max rookie extension by Oct. 15, they project to have $31 million in room next summer. The room does not factor in the salary owed to their 2019 first-round pick or the free-agent hold of Enes Kanter, who is in the final year of his contract.

The projected max contract next season for a player with seven to nine years of service is $32.7 million annually, and it is $38.15 million for a player with 10-plus years of service.

There are two ways to look at this:

1. It certainly suggests that the Knicks are all in on signing a max free agent next season.

2. It is possible, though, that they are just really intent on not cutting some of the guys that they have under contract and cutting Noah clears a roster spot.

Personally, I think stretching Noah for either reason is not a great idea, but especially if #2 is actually the intent. If they want to go all in on a max free agent next season, I at least get the logic. If you are that worried about losing Noah Vonleh or Luke Kornet, well, I am less impressed with that logic.

That the Knicks could not get Noah to take a single bit of a paycut (the Lakers got Luol Deng to take a $7.5 million paycut) is also quite disappointing.

Oh well, at least they didn’t do anything else that stupid this offseason! One terrible move is a huge upgrade for this franchise!

34 replies on “ESPN.com: Knicks waive Joakim Noah, will clear cap space for 2019”

At the time I thought the deal was a stupid overpay with too much risk at the back and it turns out I was wrong because Noah was never anywhere close to earning his salary, even when he was healthy.

DRed
July 4, 2016 at 4:49 pm
I will track Phil Jackson down and I will fight him for control of the club if he dumps Langston

DRed
July 5, 2016 at 12:23 am
Phil Jackson fight me you coward

I had forgotten just how many stupid moves we packed into one weekend.

Between this stupidity, with Begley reporting the team AGAIN wants cap space next summer for that top free agent that will firsure come, and Fizdale today answering for why the team was 28th in threes with stupid trope that means we will continue looking for long 2s, management ain’t lookin too good right now.

It’s real stupid, but as long as we don’t pull the trigger on a sub-par FA it’s not the worst. My concern is they’ll max KP and come to the conclusion that this summer is the only shot they’ll have at him plus a max FA.

I had forgotten just how many stupid moves we packed into one weekend.

Ooph, yeah, I remember going from, “Well, at least Phil got Galloway locked into a cheap deal” to “Oh, and there goes Galloway to make room for a couple of horrendous win-now free agent moves that will not lead to them winning now.”

It’s real stupid, but as long as we don’t pull the trigger on a sub-par FA it’s not the worst. My concern is they’ll max KP and come to the conclusion that this summer is the only shot they’ll have at him plus a max FA.

That’s absolutely what will happen. That was my concern a few weeks back, when they were going on and on about how patient they will be, when their “patience” will extend for literally one more season until they will sign whoever will come here next year for $32 million a year.

We just have to hope that somehow someone good does want to come here.

It’s real stupid, but as long as we don’t pull the trigger on a sub-par FA it’s not the worst. My concern is they’ll max KP and come to the conclusion that this summer is the only shot they’ll have at him plus a max FA.

That’s absolutely what will happen. That was my concern a few weeks back, when they were going on and on about how patient they will be, when their “patience” will extend for literally one more season until they will sign whoever will come here next year for $32 million a year.

We just have to hope that somehow someone good does want to come here.

Exactly. The only reason to do this now instead of waiting until next summer is because you’re already planning on spending that money. Plus, they’re going feel pressure to spend that cap space in 2019 in order to justify the cap hits in 2020 and 2021.

It’s not just the Knicks, teams with cap space and the stated will to sign free agents almost always do it, and often to their detriment, because they don’t get the person they wanted and they spend the money anyway.

I hate this, but mostly bc I hate the original decision to give Noah this awful contract in the first place.

Given that we are locked into it, I have to reserve judgement on mills and Perry until next summer. They may have reason to believe they can actually sign a max free agent.

If they do, this is a no-brainer. If they don’t, this is dumb.

I know it makes sense to say they should wait, but they might have done their homework. And there is benefit to not having a cancer in the locker room. It may not be worth 6.5mm over three years, but it does have value

1. Take meeting with Kevin Durant
2. Kevin Durant signs with a team that’s actually good
3. Sign Kyrie Irving so when he recovers from his knee replacement you’ll still have an elite superstar

They may have reason to believe they can actually sign a max free agent.

Oh, they can definitely sign a max free agent. The issue is whether they can sign one of the three guys who would make an actual difference (Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard and Kyrie Irving)?

2. Kevin Durant signs with a team that’s actually good

How many teams that are good can sign him?

I get that y’all think nothing good can ever happen here, but it’s not impossible. It’s a two-pronged choice.

1. Does he want to resign with GS? This may seem obvious, but if he resigns he will be fucking over Draymond Green and Klay Thompson. We look at everything through the prism of winning titles and chasing Jordan. Why? Isn’t it possible that a man would value not fucking over his friends more than an extra ring?

2. If he leaves, how many good teams a) can sign him, and b) are more attractive than us?

There’s no reason to be so fatalist. Good things can happen here.

That’s a good question. Philly will have space, yes? They’ll be more attractive than us. Who else?

Also, when’s our next window? Lee and Thomas come off in 2020 and THj’s option is that year. If the rooks are rotation guys by then that’s ~20 mil to play with. There’s an outside hope that they’ve got a plan for that if this summer is a bust. Probably not an AD sized plan tho.

I was hoping they just dropped Noah instead of stretching him and just take the pain for two years….

I really don’t see us getting a great free agent next summer. Lots of teams will have cap space, and most free agents will DND up re-signing with their own teams.

I really don’t see us getting a great free agent next summer. Lots of teams will have cap space, and most free agents will DND up re-signing with their own teams.

Yep, it’s a very curious plan for that very reason.

Yes, I really don’t get it. The timing is odd, if no money was spared. This has Steve Mills written on it.

Stratomatic "Porzingis, Ntilikina, Knox & Robinson are going to lead us to the promised landsays:

1. Signing a high level young free agent next year is so obviously the best thing we can do it shouldn’t even be a conversation.

2. The flaw in the plan is expecting a high level young player to come to NY while the team is still terrible. We may be even worse this year with KP out for awhile, no KOQ, etc.. unless we get a couple of pleasant surprises (like Frank). We’ve been down this road multiple times with multiple management teams and it is low probability for success for any team but especially bad if you are not already GOOD.

3. The risk is that if they get rejected by the players that would be a good signing, they feel compelled to sign “someone”. Then instead of giving out a 1 year filler contract to try to roll over some cap space to the following year (which would make sense), they give a mediocre player a long term contract and lock us into a team that’s not good enough.

Here’s an interesting article about all out tanking. I don’t agree with all of it because it’s not specific enough about certain circumstances where it does make strategic sense, but it does put some numbers on tanking in general.

http://wagesofwins.com/2013/10/31/are-we-really-still-talking-about-tanking/

Agreed on all counts. Noah wasn’t willing to give up any salary, so I would’ve made his ass sit for a year until we could negotiate a deal with him. Under this plan, it would probably require the team to cut Mudiay in order to keep Kornet & Vonleh and show the team doesn’t “need” Noah this season. See? Win-win!

On the flip side though, if he signs a vet minimum deal, his cap hit drops, right? If he were to sign a multi-year vet minimum deal, would his cap hit drop for each season of that deal?

I mean sure tanking doesn’t work in a vacuum. But we also can’t say it doesn’t contribute to success. I mean the Celtics didn’t tank (per se) but they undoubtedly didn’t need to because they made a trade with a team that tanked for them. The 76ers most definitely did tank and flaunted it (sitting out players for a year with injuries that were they not tanking would have had them playing that year). The Spurs tanked into Tim Duncan. The Celtics that year tried to tank into Tim Duncan. When you have a transformational player or players available in the draft and your team isn’t good enough to make the playoffs, much less contend for a championship, tanking needs to be on the table.

Does luck play a part? Sure it does. In the Tim Duncan example, the Spurs wouldn’t have been in a position to draft him if David Robinson wasn’t injured (Bad luck turns into great luck). The Celtics didn’t get the pick (Just bad luck). But you definitely try to get a player like Tim if you can. Same with Lebron’s draft. Tanking is there to increase the odds of getting that type of player. Players like that just don’t come around often enough for you to not try to get them if you can. Some drafts don’t have those players and there’s no real need to tank, but we can’t dismiss tanking just because it doesn’t work for everyone.

“Oh well, at least they didn’t do anything else that stupid this offseason” They? It was Jax who perpetrated the idiot move of giving Noah all that money and years. He gets to walk away free of blame while the guys who finally put a stop to the madness around here and are rebuilding this team from the ground up get painted with the “stupid” brush? Not fair dude. Put the blame for Noah where it belongs, right on Phil Jackson’s doorstep.

Phil Jackson didn’t stretch waive Noah. He made the awful signing, but that doesn’t mean he’s to blame for them stretch waiving Noah. The guys who just stretch waived Noah are to blame for stretch waiving Noah.

Well, it’s unanimously considered a dumb idea. Seems we found something we can all agree on.

I probably wouldn’t have done it, but I’m not sure the outcome is any different than if they waited so now vs. later is irrelevant to me. They already made it clear that they intend to be players in the FA market next summer. That pretty much eliminated the chance of a non-stretch waive or play it out. Carrying a dead roster spot is never ideal, so I guess getting rid of Noah’s rotting carcass and not having it hanging over the team as a source of endless drama and speculation is worth something. It will just take 2 more years to get rid of the stench completely.

It’s not a franchise-crippling move. Toronto somehow built a good team after jettisoning Josh Smith. At the end of the day, this team will rise or fall with KP and the other rookie-scale kids. The $6.5 mill shouldn’t make that much of a difference in those two years if good decisions are made between now and then.

Stratomatic "Porzingis, Ntilikina, Knox & Robinson are going to lead us to the promised landsays:

The right thing to do with Noah was dependent on whether he is likely to get any offers in the NBA now and our chances of landing a legitimate star free agent next year. If Noah has offers we could have played hard ball and gotten a discount. Just dump Kornet. We (fans) are more or less operating blind in that regard because we don’t know whether Noah is having negotiations and we don’t know what player agents are saying to the Knicks off the record about next year’s FA class.

Phil made a mistake giving Noah 4 years, but this management team destroyed any chance of salvaging the situation last year. I don’t care what anyone here says, he came to camp off surgery and wasn’t entirely fit. So he looked bad. When he finally worked himself into condition he was still a better all around C than either Kanter, O’Quinn, or Hernangomez. It was short lived, but he could still play enough. Then he got hurt again, used PEDs to try to recover, and was never given a chance to play again.

They screwed up the Noah , Hernangomez, and O’Quinn situations.

If they were going to let O’Quinn walk for nothing, they should have taken anything they could get for him and played Hernangomez and Noah instead. That would have kept both those guys happy. Then we would still have Willy (who looks good) and could eventually stick Noah at the end of the bench to work with our bigs as was originally intended (including Robinson) and buy him out later. They had 4 Cs and poisoned the situation with 3 of them. The only one left (Kanter) is probably going to leave for nothing or get overpaid by us.

Stratomatic "Porzingis, Ntilikina, Knox & Robinson are going to lead us to the promised landsays:

I like Robinson as a prospect. He’s long, a good shot blocker, rebounds the ball, and is a superior athlete. But right now he’s probably going to get into foul trouble a lot on defense and can’t do anything on offense other than dunk. From the look of his shot and FTs in limited minutes, I don’t think it’s going to be tough limit or stop him. They may even start a “hack a Robinson” strategy to put him on the FT line.

It’s not a franchise-crippling move. Toronto somehow built a good team after jettisoning Josh Smith.

Just curious, which team/player did you mean here? Smith never played for Toronto, right? And the team that jettisoned him, Detroit, sort of sucks, no? I would agree that Detroit’s suckiness is not due to Smith, though. I just wasn’t sure if you meant another player on Toronto. I can’t think of anyone off hand.

No worries, I just thought maybe some other guy had been stretch waived that I forgot about. A few other guys have been stretch waived, right?

By the way, didn’t the Pistons just release Smith outright? They didn’t stretch him, did they?

I think the Pistons did release Smith outright. But I think he didn’t have as many years remaining on his contract as Noah does. Maybe he had one year, if I recall correctly?

Same amount of years as Noah (slightly more, technically). He was in the middle of his second season (out of a four year deal). Although, I recalled them outright cutting him but now I’m seeing some reports that said that they did end up stretching him, as well.

Thanks for the info. Am I right they had to do the stretch now, once they waived him, and couldn’t wait until later?

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