Knicks Morning News (2024.08.03)

I’m speculating that Randle to opt in and then accept an extension in the 4yr/$160-170M range. He has an injury history now and is pushing 30, meaning that he will be pushing 32 when the extension kicks in. Getting in the area of $38-42M per season for his age 32-35 seasons, which would be around 22% of the cap, seems like a very fair deal for him. By then, he’d probably not be even in the top 40 salaries in the league.

One thing that I’m guessing might get in the way of it happening right now is that he does not want to be traded, so it seems that if he delays, he would at least not be eligible to be traded this season. But delaying also brings the possibility of a health setback into play.

In the NYP article, he is compared with Siakam, and even thought heir games are different, I think that’s a fair comparison in terms of both age and impact on the court, and Siakam is at 29% of the cap. Sabonis is better in some ways, but is at 28% of the cap for the next few years.

In my opinion, if Randle insists that he deserves to get paid like those players, Leon should call his bluff try to move him. But if he is willing to settle for Brunson money, Leon should sign him right away.

Raven, I’m more referring to the fact that this team is fully formed right now with no way to make major moves involving a stockpile of first rounders or cap space without breaking up Club Nova and OG. The only “core” question for the next two years are Randle, and to a lesser degree, Mitch. None of Brunson, Mikal, OG, Hart, or DDV are going anywhere, and neither Precious nor Deuce seems all that essential to what lies ahead.

So if Randle is extended (whether he opts in or not), my guess is that these next two years will determine whether Hart stays or goes. If we win a title (or come close enough to logically run it back) then my guess is that Hart stays. If we peter out at tough second-round losses or ass-kickings in the conference finals, then Leon might consider breaking up the Nova core, meaning putting DDV and Hart on the block in offseason 2026.

Just to be clear, the deal that I suggested is an opt-in, followed by a 4-year extension starting at $38M with raises, something like 4/$165M, with a player option in year 4.

This starts at about 22% of the cap and declines as a percentage of the cap until 2029-30, when it would be at about 20%.

I think that is a fair, absorbable, and movable contract for its duration, assuming that Randle stays reasonably healthy. Keep in mind that by 2029-30, there will be a bunch of players getting paid $70M AAV.

Yeah, ess, it’s much more useful to frame the discussion in terms of percentage of cap.

“I mean, this all boils down to how to define “low-ball,” and I hardly think the kind of “opt-in + extend off the opt-in number” scenario I was talking about is a “low-ball” offer. By definition, the first year of the extension would be more than $32.4M.”

Julius Randle is slated to make around 20% of the cap in 2025-26 if he opts in. That would be somewhere around the 50th highest salary in the league, and would actually decline in that ranking as a percentage of the cap (8% raises vs. 10% increases in the cap) You are suggesting that a player who was well on his way to a 2nd straight all-NBA slot in his mid-prime should settle for a salary in the same range as guys like IQ, Tyler Herro, Khris Middleton, and CJ McCollum. I consider that an egregious low-ball offer. If I were Randle’s agent, I would tell Leon to stick it and immediately threaten to opt out. If it turned out that I got less as a free agent, I’d live with it.

“…there’s still a wide array of possible constructions, but I don’t think, say, $32.4M in 2025-2026 combined with an extension with that begins with an 8% raise and then stagnates, totaling around 5/~$172M constitutes “low-balling”

That would amount to a 4 year/$139M extension. That is a low-ball offer. I would tell Leon “Good luck replacing my “better than Mikal Bridges” production for that money.

“It’s difficult to talk about this with you because you take all of the well-trodden, uncontroversial critiques of Randle very personally, but at the end of the day my opinion of him aligns pretty well with the consensus: he is a very good player whose flaws make him an awkward fit on a lot of teams, such that many teams would prefer a worse overall player that’s easier to fit into a lineup.”

I don’t take it personally, just pointing out that the current well-trodden, uncontroversial, consensus critiques of Randle carry about as much weight with me as the well-trodden, uncontroversial, consensus critiques of summer 2022 when nearly this entire board, including you, felt that Randle should be dumped because he sucked and that his impending extension was an albatross waiting to happen. I think that the assumption that there will be no market for him if he opts out is as ludicrous as the critique back then that his first all-NBA season was an empty-arena outlier, or that he wouldn’t emotionally recover from the whole thumbs down debacle and being pilloried in the press, or that he was in some sort of physical decline, or that he wouldn’t adapt to being off the ball more and handing the reins to Jalen Brunson. All of those opinions turned out to be dead wrong.

After seeing what iHart, IQ, and OG got paid, not to mention Siakam and others, Randle has every right to be insulted by any offer that is less than Brunson money at the very least. There would be zero incentive for him to opt in and accept that deal.

I will reiterate: I like him, am optimistic about his ability to contribute to winning at a high level on this team, and would be happy to see us lock him in. There’s nothing inconsistent between those things and thinking there’s not a robust market out there for him at two-digit AAVs that begin with a 3 (or 4).

But you didn’t respond to my question about what you think he will ultimately get paid in 2026-27. You said you would offer him, what, $35M? What would you do if he said no to that and demanded $40M? Would you be okay with him opting out and testing the market? It’s an important question, isn’t it? If your answer is that you would call his bluff, then your above statement seems pretty inconsistent to me. As I said, the issue is whether Leon can replace his production for whatever cap room/assets he has left after letting Randle walk for nothing. What would your plan B look like?