Ian Begley continues his standout debut season at SNY.com:
We’re basically a week away from the unofficial start to the trade season. On Dec. 15, players who signed contracts as free agents can be moved.
As that date approaches, the Knicks (4-18) are keeping an eye on potential moves that would improve the team, per SNY sources familiar with the matter.
According to various reports, players like Dennis Schroeder, DeMar DeRozan and Kevin Love could be made available via trade by their respective teams.
The Knicks, per a source, are keeping their ‘eye on a lot of players’ as we enter trade season.
Due to injury or subpar performance, New York has been without a player who can regularly break down a defense and create a shot for himself or his teammates for much of the season.
Teams in touch with New York, in casual conversations, have said that some members of the organization lamented the lack of a creator.
Perhaps that’s something New York would target via trade.
It’s worth noting that, under team president Steve Mills and GM Scott Perry, the Knicks have taken a stance that they wouldn’t trade future first-round picks in any transaction.
It seems unlikely that they would go against that policy at this point in an attempt to improve the roster.
Also, it’s worth pointing out that just because the Knicks are looking at potential moves to improve the roster, there’s nothing to suggest they are locked in on that course of action.
New York has several players – Marcus Morris, Wayne Ellington and others – who are on one-year deals and could be attractive to playoff contenders. So, they could also explore opportunities to move those players for future assets.
I would have to imagine that they’re mostly just looking to sell and if they could sell while taking a guard back, they might try to do that. This team sure would look a whole lot better if they had a decent shooting guard that would allow Barrett to play the three. If you have to keep Randle, then it’s gotta be him at the 4, Barrett at the 3 and Mitch at the 5, with a point guard and then a shooting guard who could actually shoot.
In other news, despite acknowledging that the refs were wrong to not award the basket and were wrong to deny Mike D’Antoni’s challenge on the play, the NBA has somehow still ruled that the mistake, in a game the Rockets lost in overtime, was not notable enough to force the last 8 minutes of the game to be replayed. That seems bonkers to me. “The Rockets had enough time to make up for the mistake” is just mind-boggling to me as a reason to turn down a protest. It just reeks of, “Eh, we just don’t want to, so we’re not going to.”