Knicks Morning News (2023.02.09)

Nothing as boringly predictable at KB as watching the same silly heads explode over a minor trade deadline transaction involving a shitty pick for a good player.

And how enthralling it is to listen to the same drone who clamored endlessly for including the same cherished pick we just traded (*) to unload our best player and only all-star in a salary dump.

(* at the very least….this one is lottery-protected and highly likely to convey in the 18-22 range)

Drone on, troll!

I’m surprised that no one seems to have brought up the fact that Dolan just fired a shot across the bow of this management team, saying that he expected the team to make the playoffs this year.

Not that that has any bearing on the merits of the deal, just that it underscores that the FO was never going to tank or build through exercising all of its own draft picks. If one is evaluating this trade through any lens other than that, one is willfully ignoring that Leon’s first transaction was to hire Tom Thibodeau, the most ping pong ball-averse coach in the association.

“But I guess I’ll say it again:

I WOULD HAVE DUMPED JULIUS RANDLE LAST SUMMER AT THE BEST PRICE I COULD GET!!!! IF I HAD DONE THAT AND HE PLAYED LIKE THIS FOR HIS NEW TEAM, I WOULDN’T LOOK BACK!!!”

Which continues to be one of the dumbest takes ever shared on this board, and is one of the many reasons why I find your bluster so incredibly tedious and vapid. Troll on, though!

For the record, I am in lockstep with TNFH’s assessment of the trade, which is approval in the context of the FO’s chosen and unalterable but questionable “hybrid” strategy for building a contender.

Hart is definitely my kind of Knick…a smart, hard-nosed, team-oriented badass. I’m not all that worried about the “floor” of this trade, which is that we lose him for nothing this offseason and don’t get to draft a second player in the first round or have that pick for a draft-day deal. This FO is simply not going to make more than one first round pick in any given year, and we still have the DAL pick which is likely to convey in the same range as the pick we just traded. So it becomes a question of what that asset was worth in the deadline trade market in terms of improving the team right now, and possibly going forward. Through that lens, I don’t think you are getting a better player than Josh Hart for a pick that is certain to convey as #16-24 pick, most likely in the #18-22 range. As TNFH demonstrated, you are getting 90% of OG for 20% of the cost, unless you (foolishly, see: Julius Randle) believe that he is over the hill at age 27.

“An important caveat to my slightly pro-trade take: we damn well better either keep Hart on a reasonable deal or make a good trade with him this offseason. If we made this deal without such assurances, that would be moronic.”

Nah, it would just be risky. In the previous thread, this FO was repeatedly characterized as “risk-averse” or “conservative.”

But that’s not really true. First, the “hybrid” strategy is fraught with risk by definition. Second, doing things like 1) waiting to extend Mitch even though he might leave for nothing, 2) betting on Julius recovering from a down year rather than, as you put it, selling before his contract became even more of an albatross, 3) signing RJ to an extension on blind faith, 4) not pulling the trigger on an all-in trade for Spida….these kinds of things involve a lot of risk…just with a different downside.

As to this trade, it is indeed a risk, with both upside and downside. If I’m judging it right now, I’m not factoring in assurances that are impossible to discern. I have to ask “is it a risk worth taking?” just as I would ask when drafting a project with a high ceiling but a low floor vs. a sure thing with a limited ceiling.

For now, I’m far more concerned with how much he helps the team this year than worried about what will happen in the offseason with regard to this particular trade. Let’s hope he plays like someone we actually WANT to be on the team beyond this year. Then I’ll worry about whether we can extend him or lose him.