Knicks Morning News (2023.07.01)

Responses to Alan’s points:
re: Kuzma, agree, but hey, there’s that salary floor out there. Maybe they view him as a tank commander.

re: Poeltl, first, my guess is that Masai believes that FVV was not worth nearly that money and that the team is still reasonably competitive without him and has cap flexibility. Second, Poeltl’s contract is at worst market value and possibly better as the cap increases. Personally I think he is somewhat better than Mitch in an apples-to-apples comparison, but I guess I would rather have Mitch on his bargain contract. I just don’t see a dilemma here.

re: Hali, yeah, that one will hurt forever since pretty much everyone here saw it coming. It just sucks that Obi’s play stagnated at a level where the gap is so glaring. I have had fun rooting for him and wouldn’t mind if we kept him, but alas…

re: Bane, exactly, he’s really good but $40M+ a year good? In any case, while I and many other KBers rightfully preferred Bane when we were on the clock, getting a player as good as IQ at that draft spot is a huge win for this FO. And I’m not sure that the gap is set in stone….IQ just might improve to the point where $25-30M is a bargain.

re: Watanabe, he seems like a guy who can be had at any point down the road on the cheap, and not sure Thibs would ever put him in the rotation given his proclivities. I think it’s at times like these where Thibs’ quirks are the most annoying.

We haven’t had much discussion about the picking up of McBride’s option. While yes, it’s a fringy move, I wonder if he is viewed as an insurance backup PG in the event that IQ is traded for a non-PG. I know that folks here think he has topped out as a non-rotation level third PG, but I still believe in his shot eventually coming around. And like IQ, he plays bigger than he is, and might a good option for staying in front of smaller, quicker guys like Trae, Spida, etc…

I just don’t see anyone out there in the bargain bin who I would rather have as our backup PG in the case that we trade IQ.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and state that I think Tyrese Haliburton is overrated and is not worth $50+M AAV. His defense is suspect, he doesn’t really create like a true max player, and he’s possibly likely to be injury-prone.

“Hali’s 23, he assisted on 45% of the Pacers buckets when he was on the court while averaging 11 assists per 36, he had a 63 TS% on decent usage. That’s a no brainer max player unless he’s the worst defender in the NBA, which he is not.”

I get this, but have a strong suspicion that that contract is not going to age well at all. We’ll see.

“that’s interesting. curious how strong your take is”

Not strong at all, I certainly wouldn’t try to convince anyone to change their mind. More of a reaction to the money than anything else. It could be a bit of “get off my lawn” thinking about how in my day a gallon of gas used to go for 40 cents.

“would you swap obi for hali straight up if you were not permitted to trade him under any circumstances for the next 3 seasons?”

I’ll go as far as to say that even though I would probably do it, I think it’s a better question than it appears to be just by perusing the stats. As DRed pointed out, he’s putting up crazy numbers, so it comes across as a no-brainer on paper. I just wonder if he’s ever going to earn that salary when it comes to actual wins and losses, especially in the playoffs. Put differently, is he as hard to defend as his numbers suggest? And will his body hold up? Here’s his injury history…nothing extreme, but it’s a pretty long list for a young guy, and he hasn’t even played a playoff game yet.

Post of the year, d-mar!

“feels like lillard to miami has been done for a bit. dame butler bam is a nice fit.”

As I mentioned yesterday, it surely seemed that letting Vincent and Strus walk with such little resistance pointed in that direction. I suspect that no matter how it plays out, there will be some rumblings about tampering.

“He expressed zero interest in the Knicks — that’s the point.”

sooooooooooooo tedious…

“Just watching actual evidence rather than fantasy, Z-Man. You’ll survive. And you can still dream. There’s no law against it.

Damian Lillard was a featured performer on Knicks-for-clicks for much of the last 10-12 months and there was never a single solitary stitch of evidence he had any interest in playing here. A smart GM and FO would see these things, dispense with the fantasies, roll up their sleeves, and get to work.”

I never saw a shred of evidence that Dame ever wanted to come here. I did, however see recent evidence that others did. See: Donovan Mitchell, Jalen Brunson, Mitchell Robinson. I believe we were on Bradley Beal’s list, and he had a full no-trade clause.

I agree that there are reasons for players (like LaVine, for example) NOT wanting to come here. But stuff like the location of the Knicks practice facility is a factor is just made-up bullshit.

Very happy that Donte is in the fold. Sadly, his acquisition will undoubtably cue the usual broken record…..blah blah blah hustlebunny blah blah blah purgatory blah blah blah …

“Not a good day for Grimes or especially IQ.”

Why?

For crying out loud, who cares how IQ, Grimes, or anyone else feels about today? This isn’t a rec league. The only concern should be about whether the moves made the team better.

Obi has a better opportunity. If Grimes or IQ is traded, so will they. I don’t see how this is in any way a bad day for them.

“I’m less worried about divvying up minutes than I am about having lots of duplicative players.”

So long as those duplicative players have a positive market value, I’m not worried about it at all. Look at it this way: how would you have felt if we traded Obi for Donte on his new deal plus two 2nds? Now imagine what kind of “Obi” we can get for IQ or Grimes plus two 2nds.

We are in a much better position than we were 24 hours ago. There’s still work to do, but this is a day of celebration.

“Well, it depends on their desires.

Do they want to stay in NY?

My guess is that neither Grimes or Quick wants to be traded from NY and I don’t want to see it either unless it’s a deal too good to pass up.”

But strat, the point is, should anyone here really care about how they feel? (beyond nostalgia, of course…I have that for Obi as well)

Do you think Marcus Smart is happy that he was traded? And he had a lot more cache with the Celts than Grimes or IQ have with the Knicks. But that’s a day in the life of a NBA multimillionaire.

Honestly strat, what you just posted doesn’t resonate with me at all. I’ll try to take it point by point.

re: Cam, the problem wasn’t that there was a minutes crunch. The problem was that Cam sucked, and Thibs knew it right away. OTOH, when Hart was acquired mid-season, Thibs had no problem finding minutes for him. It didn’t matter who those minutes came at the expense of, he made the team better.

As to the other questions about minutes being taken away from IQ, or Grimes, or RJ, if Donte is a better option, he should take minutes away from them. If he isn’t, he shouldn’t. But either way, Leon can decide who is most important to keep and who should be traded…and that we know that either way, the players we retain will be good players, is kind of cool for a change! The minutes game is a backstory at the moment. Teams are going to want players like IQ, Grimes and Donte. That’s what counts.