Knicks Morning News (2022.11.23)

The Lakers aren’t trading their two firsts for Quickley and Mitch, probably not even one of them.

I do think Quickley has decent value around the league and could probably fetch a good team’s first. I think the Clippers can trade their first this year, and I could see them being interested because you can only expect so much from John Wall and Steve Ballmer laughs at your luxury tax.

But we’re not getting two unprotected firsts from the Lakers or anyone else. I love Quickley, but I mean, that’s like halfway to a star package.

Look, I hate the idea of trading Quickley from a watchability perspective and it’s not hard to see a nightmare scenario where he immediately puts it all together for whatever other team.

Thing is, I will make a narrow, backhanded defense of the front office if they do it: their screw ups have put us in a position where *depending on the return* we have to consider it.

With Quickley making genuinely next to nothing, we’re a bad team (don’t argue, 23rd in net rating speaks for itself). The front office hasn’t been able to take advantage of the production we’re getting from him on his pittance of a rookie-scale salary. Soon he’s going to get paid real money. How are we supposed to *improve* as incumbent roster spots take up more of the salary cap?

We necessarily have to make changes to the roster, no one doubts that. Ideally they would involve players other than Quickley, who has been productive and has shown potential for growth. The problem is trades are a two-way street, and there’s good reason to think the other potential trade candidates fall into either the “we won’t trade them” or the “no one wants them” bucket.

I don’t even necessarily endorse the idea and I would expect a serious return, but anyone who views it as a non-starter better have another realistic trade(s) in mind because we all know this 15 man iteration is on the express train to nowhere and it would thus be pretty dumb to lock it in.

“I think they’ll do the same things they’ve been doing.”

More terrifying words have never been spoken.

“2. If there’s a player they want that’s worth the salary commitment, they’ll make a selection.”

You are literally the only person I have ever heard posit that the “salary commitment” is some kind of risk in the context of draft picks.

Strat, these guys are only guaranteed two years! The NUMBER ONE OVERALL PICK gets a hair over $10M AAV! This is just not a thing at all.

“3. If there’s no one worth selecting they’ll trade down or roll the pick(s) out again.”

I guarantee you there will be someone “worth selecting.” It’s extremely hard to think of a first-round slot in literally any draft ever in which there was not.

I think what you meant is “if they’re not confident they can find one of the players worth selecting, they’ll trade out.” This makes the proposition a lot more frustrating, because so far Leon Rose’s “trade outs” have involved degrading the value of the traded pick.

Z-Man, do you think if a first baseman and a shortstop have the same wRC+ they are similarly valuable?

“everyone here seems more enamored with cam and obi (could be misreading that) but i would bet on quick being a good player on a playoff before those guys in a heartbeat, even tho he’s still somewhat of a long shot.”

I agree, but this is also why IQ might be the only one who could fetch anything in a trade.