ESPN Reports Mitch has signed with the Celtics:
Free agent center Mitchell Robinson, fresh off winning an NBA title with the New York Knicks, has agreed to a three-year, $47.4 million deal to sign with the Boston Celtics, with a player option in the third season, sources tell ESPN’s Shams Charania.
Robinson was the longest-tenured Knick and one of only two rotation players originally drafted by New York (Miles McBride being the other) who were heavy contributors in their championship run. In his eight seasons with the Knicks, Robinson averaged 7.5 points and 8.0 rebounds in just under 24 minutes a game.
Hukporti agreed to a one-year, $3.4 million deal with the 76ers on Wednesday, Shams Charania of ESPN reports.
The 76ers will add some athletic frontcourt depth behind Joel Embiid and Adem Bona, with Andre Drummond set for unrestricted free agency. Hukporti was used sparingly by the Knicks during the 2025-26 regular season, appearing in 54 games with 2.2 points, 2.9 rebounds and 0.5 blocks in 9.2 minutes per contest.
So the Knicks are looking for someone to play center. Applicants should be 6-10+ or taller, can rebound and defend at an NBA level, be able to hit a free throw, and can work around the peculiarities of a billionaire owner who is cheap when it comes to his sports team, but will spare no expense on his pretend rock band.
92 replies on “Knicks Lose Mitch (BOS) & Hukporti (PHI). Can You Play Center?”
I asked this in the previous thread which is now closed, so I’ll paste it here:
I’m going to apologize in advance for my own salary cap/apron ignorance. Okay, now that I have that out of the way…
Would it have been possible to have selected Tarris Reed at 24, and then also use the TP-MLE to sign Kevon Looney? I know it’s water under the bridge because that did not happen, but I’m wondering if that was a possibility given our unwillingness to act like a big market team.
I’m calling for taking a look at him https://x.com/freewave3/status/2070682175440146764
Does Jalen Duren also play bass, a la Waymon Tisdale?
If so, maybe Dolan happily goes over the second apron for someone who can serve to both back up KAT on the Knicks and back up JD on the Straight Shot.
I’d be fine with Cisse at this point. I’d even be fine with Looney, Ayton, Moses Brown, almost anyone who is a big body and has at least a little bit of NBA experience under their belt.
“no reason not to draft a center
One reason would be having someone in mind who is more NBA ready – if not better – than the choices available in the 2nd rd of this year’s draft.”
OK, then what are they waiting for now? For no one to be available?
i can do anything…
wanna/gonna believe our front office, scouting folks are in the background completely jazzed at the opportunity to amaze all with some player we have not really considered too much up to this point…
there are people who’s whole occupational purpose is to have spreadsheets like EB with players names and situations on ‘em…
so yeah, most likely will take more than nic richards or kevon looney to get me jazzed about this situation…
Steve Cohen appears to be as dumb as James Dolan.
While the main emotion I’m feeling is HATE for Dolan, I also worry about Mitch a bit; as intimated in the last thread he’s going somewhere that is not conducive to improvements in mental health. Besides even worse winter weather, when he missed free throws Knicks fans were mostly “C’mon, Mitch, you loveable lug, let’s hit the second!” Celtics hate-mongers will have no such compassion for an ex-Knick who can’t do Larry Bird things.
Can you imagine Jaylen Brown and Mitch in the same locker room lmao
Here’s my answer:
1 Brunson, Alvarado, Kolek
2 Bridges, McBride, Shamet
3 Anunoby, Hart, Dadiet
4 LeBron, Hart, Diawara
5 Towns, Looney, TBD
Looney is the regular season workhorse. LeBron plays backup 5 when you get to the serious games.
Bleacher Report and Yahoo Sports have both tweeted that Lebron is open to taking the vet minimum to sign with a contender, per Shams. I can’t find anything from Shams himself firsthand. Maybe he said it on TV.
That being said, HMMMMMMMMM. HMMMM
BTW imagine if we fill out the team all the way up to the second apron and then LeBron says he wants to come play for the vet minimum.
Get Looney to eat innings in the backup big spot and acquire Cisse to take Huk’s place as a development project.
Edit: Cisse is RFA
I’m not down on rostering LeBron, but:
1. He’s not coming here on a cheap contract, which means that he’s not coming here.
so
2. Let’s please not give it a lot of “airtime” and instead focus on the immediate issue, which is clearly backup centers.
1. Diabate
2. Cisse
3. Looney
4. Brown
5. Ayton
Let’s please just do something fairly quickly before this gets worse.
I hate to say that LeBron makes sense, as I am not a huge fan of his, but he really does make sense. Pretty much a perfect situation for him…and best case scenario for us.
We could offer $4M out of possible $6M. Whether Looney requires that much is still an open question.
I’ll use the 25th pick numbers because we were able to trade down:
The max you can give the 25th pick is $3,182,280. Most 1st rd picks do get the max.
The minimum number for the 2nd rd is $1,358,084. If he’s replacing Nickel or Kayil, you lose roughly $1.8M of the TP-MLE.
That leaves roughly $4M out of the max $6M you can offer. (If you lowball Reed, it’d be about $5.1M).
Dadiet Scenario
Reed costs only $200K more than Dadiet. If you dump Dadiet, you can probably structure another player’s pending deal to still offer the full TP-MLE.
Short version:
Reed for 2nd Rd pick -> -$1.8M
Reed for Dadiet -> $0
Regarding the draft, Katz (I think) said today that on draft night, the team had no way of knowing how much of a discount they might get from Shamet. Perhaps if they had been sure of that number, they would have made more/higher picks, since the guaranteed dollars would have mattered less.
Ayton https://x.com/HaterReport/status/2053486617894007023?lang=en
Still in shock. Mitch to the Celtics is so upsetting I honestly can’t think about anything else.
Just a dagger
Looney + Lebron better than Mitch?
It would be tough for Z-Man because on one hand he hates LeBron but on the other hand he loves to win an argument, and LeBron on the vet min would finally prove that you can get 80% of Mitch at 20% the cost.
LeBron is a much better basketball player than Mitch so of course..
All of this LeBron James talk sounds like pure fantasy to me. I mean, maybe Superman from the planet krypton will show up and be willing to take the Vet minimum too.
Can we pry Sorber loose from OKC?
LeBron will go to Miami for the minimum because of course he will
Golden State feels most likely. Riding off into the sunset, finally teaming up with Steph
If he really wants another ring and he is willing to take the vet minimum to do it, why would he go to Miami or Cleveland or GSW?
Sorry but those teams have no shot at a title.
The salary scale for the #24 pick is ~$2.8M, though most non-Pacome Dadiet picks get 120% of it, which would be ~$3.3M.
As best I can tell, if we gave Reed $2.8M and signed Nickel or whoever else to a rookie-minimum, we could use about ~$4.5M of the TPMLE. That should be more than enough for Looney.
Even if we had to give Reed 120% of the slot scale, ~$4M still seems like plenty for Looney. We know it was enough for Huk!
Dolan isn’t doing to bad https://www.instagram.com/p/DaEN_dGjBkr/
never thought i’d enjoy urbanish livin’ as much as i do…been learning best time to be out and walking about is early mornings…so cool seeing all the folks camped in/around coffee shops chilling and in a bunch of cases doing work…seems folks like hitting the salons and barbershops early too…
enjoy breakfasts foods a bunch, don’t eat much though before noon anymore…coffee frightens me, love the smell, tastes okay, tough on the nerves though – plus, like my energy buff in some delicious dark chocolate form…
got a chance to walk around some of the treatment centers around stanford, the area by the creek is so pretty…this whole area is some of the better urban planning I’ve come across…
absolutely packed with humans, still a lot of green all around though…it’s funny with all the pedestrians and cyclists, driving around is like playing reverse frogger game…
was up here in the mid-90’s doing semi-conductor manufacturing stuff…surprisingly dangerous work environment with all the acids and gasses used in the process at the time…
it was neat KfniNJ, recognized some of the things going on at your conference, interesting field to participate in 😊 hard to imagine the development you’ve seen over the years…
Sucks losing Mitch especially to the fucking Celtics but I’m willing to go out on a limb and say if Knicks sign Looney it might turn out to be an actual slight upgrade over keeping.
Cisse wouldn’t be the first player the Mavs let walk to us for nothing…
how does it go these days: guys got a suite in your head…evict him already, like yesterday…
especially if you can’t act on your feelings, like impotence personified…
As an agent, Leon likely developed a unique ability to read the pulse of FOs around the league. I imagine he’s way more dialed in than many of his counterparts as to every team’s pressure points and the potential roster shake-ups that could result.
The start of the season is months away yet. No need for him to make a panic signing now just because Mitch & Huk left on the same day. My bet is he’s got his eye on several situations in which he knows there is a good possibility of a useful big shaking loose. The answer at backup C may not be made apparent for awhile.
I would’ve dumped Dadiet with seconds to draft Reed if possible. Dadiet going to sit in the G league again all season ..
Lakers starting 5 at the moment ? https://x.com/LakersLead/status/2072357414171463838
If we signed LeBron to a minimum deal I would be sick to my stomach but would come around and root for the laundry as I always do. But for sure, if it became the LeBron farewell tour and he got predictably injured and just became a celebrity eating up a roster spot, you would hear plenty about it from me.
Anyway, it’s not gonna happen, so why gin up pointless discussion about it? Complete waste of time.
Anyway, the largest of all points I’m trying to make is, patience is a good thing when it comes to Leon. It payed off in spades in the past. Let’s see what happens before passing too much judgement, beyond what we all know, meaning that Dolan is who he is and will never change.
I think the difference between Dolan and Trump is that Trump is so dumb he just goes along with whatever the last person who has ear says.
I was hoping they were the same in that regard and someone could just talk to Jimmy at the eleventh hour and all would be fine. But I guess Dolan is just a stubborn, dopey Irishman.
LeBron’s farewell tour overshadowing a potential repeat season would be a vibe killer akin to Trump attending game 3.
I can see LeBron going to Miami to pair up with Giannis. Joining Steph is too KDish. I doubt LeBron wants that comparison.
I want Bron in Utah
Thank you darules.
What he said.
People doing things against their own interest is so on-brand these days.
He never did.
Folks like Dolan know they are right.
The New England Patriots?
I am having a similar feeling to 1994 when Mike Keenan quit the Rangers after the Cup and the vibes shifted. Luckily, the Knicks still have coach and core locked in.
no question nba fanboy me would now like to update my next destination wish for old king james…fuck cleveland…
come ball out in msg for a couple of years…join kevon looney and get yourself a couple of more rings…
want that elite team together vibe one or two more seasons – we are them for 2026-2027…
As a 10+ year vet, Looney can get paid $3,887,445 on a vet minimum contract and only count the 2-year vet min level of $2,450,000 against recognized payroll.
That $3.887M is so close to what the Knicks have to offer per the TPMLE (and might actually be more, if a 2RP is not rostered) that I highly doubt the Knicks will use the TPMLE on Looney.
Maybe for for a player of less experience than Looney the TPMLE might come into play as an alternative to the vet min, but, as things stand, I suspect Knicks will want to stay away from the hard cap consequence of the TPMLE, with so little real consequence in the compensation available to the player.
Seeing what some other bench types are getting in free agency is pretty sobering, and makes you realize we will likely be filling the Mitch slot with garbage.
Of the realistic options, Kevon Looney seems like the best bet by a mile, which is not saying much.
No doubt what he thinks. I worked for a small company in the dot-com era. The owner was a nepo-baby who helped the company by spending the summers whoring it up & skipping work most days, which led to a huge increase in productivity due to his absence and non-meddling. Pretty much any time he was out, and there were a lot, was a super productive day.
He got the company into consulting right when it started to get hot. Brought all his techs into his office to give them a “pep-talk”. He said we all need to work harder, that this was a huge opportunity, and then when into “rich people get rich because they work harder than poor folks – I got rich by working harder than everyone in here.” He truly believed it.
These folks always think the success of their organizations is by them alone, not the people who do the work for them.
Needless to say the company, although going into the right niche at the right time, would go under in a few years.
Dude, LeBron played 2,000 minutes last year and posted a 3.5 bpm.
And then he won a playoff series with Rui Hachimura, Marcus Smart, Luke Kennard, and DeAndre Ayton as his 4 other starters.
This ain’t his farewell tour. That’s at least two years away.
LeBron’s farewell tour comes when LeBron says it does.
Probably should have done without the “Irishman” part, oaktrees.
If LeBron joins the defending champs and wins the title, he chased a ring. If LeBron joins the defending champs and doesn’t win the title, he threw off their chemistry.
okay, hard to imagine there ever being a more useful veteran minimum type player than lebron james…in the history of sports…
i would loooooove to see josh mess with him incessantly…
shoot, maybe we could get bronny in here too, having small guards on the roster does not frighten us…
just joking, about some of that…
The only reason I wouldn’t want LeBron is if signing him stops us from getting backup centers, which it almost undoubtedly would.
Sorry, Mitch, don’t love you no more! There are 28 other teams !!
LeBron doesn’t give a fuck
I thought about this and think this is the main reason he wouldn’t come here. But maybe it’s not about “chasing rings” in the sense that he just wants to say he won another title.
It’s mor about the actual chase. He misses playing deep into June and he wants to do that at least one more time. He wants to experience the high of winning round after round and another title and wants to be on a team that legitimately can do that with the top professionals in the game, which we are.
His legacy is secure. All the people who hate on him for not being Jordan or whatever are just internet haters and I doubt he cares if people on twitter are roasting him for ring chasing. He’s not Durant.
sign him cheap, then trade him, to the pelicans, kings, jazz, bucks whoever has what we need…
it was funny watching golden state and the wiz not say the same stupid shit brad stevens did…
not for nothing, our division rivals just did us a bit dirty…no love mitch and huk…
Whenever my wife & I consider moving out of NYC, I insist on a place that is walkable. I hate driving and I hate sitting in traffic. I will never willingly live in a place where I have to use a car to get groceries or go to a bar or restaurant. This severely limits where I can live (in the US anyway). We really were shortsighted by doing all this car infrastructure.
I was in a city/town – can’t remember which. Upstate NY or New England somewhere. But it was right by a train station. And there was obviously a town all around it, and some factories. But you can see that a lot of it was demolished for stroads and strip malls. And it all looked like crap – a ton of concrete and so uninviting. I walked around to go to some shops after parking the car, and it was so awful trying to cross streets and such. And I’m thinking – you have a train there that goes to the city, just get rid of all this car-centric stuff, and build a town at that train station.
FYI – to answer a question – no I don’t aggregate data from thumbs up.
If last year was a fluke, Looney would be a great get. If it wasn’t a fluke, it’d be a problem.
Yes. Sign me up for Moussa.
https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/c/cissemo01.html
There’s a decent chance we’re living inside a black hole.
Also, I’m aware under Leon and Aller we do all kinds of weird shit with the draft and it’s worked out, so I’m trying to tread lightly on criticisms of our overall approach.
But you cannot convince me trading the 53rd pick for cash instead of just giving Onyenso a two-way or even a rookie-minimum deal was 4D chess. I mean, it would’ve been harmless to just keep him and cut him if he looked bad in summer league or something.
If we had an even minimally intriguing young guy at center this would all be a little easier to deal with. Instead we’re hoping Kevon fucking Looney will take our money.
Mike, come be my neighbor in Edmonds, WA. Yeah it’s on the other side of the slab, but it’s a beautiful town of 45k, I’m two miles max from everything from a grocery store (I usually drive because I don’t like carrying bags for a mile) to 30 or so restaurants/bars to the best health club I’ve found in my long life to the Puget Sound beach to the light rail or train station into Seattle and to the ferry over to Kingston. I can see Puget Sound and the snowy Olympics from my window, and a mile up the hill I can look the other way and see the snowy Cascades.
I had a decade in Manhattan in my 20s. It was perfect then, can’t imagine it now.
I know this is an out there suggestion. But could James Dolan play Center? Then he can be the hero of his own story.
“Life is just a carnival this is the ride we get to take for free!”
Have we outlived Taj Gibson jokes? I certainly hope not.
it’s okay Mike K., EB has a spreadsheet with us all included…hubie turned us over to HAL, we may all yet live forever, in some ai quantum thing kind of way…
i can feel the area around me pulling me outside…it feels alive…then i gotta drive somewhere and it hits – wow, so many people…
in general, think most folks are pretty cool, easy to connect with, very small percentage are assholes…
it’s just as you add more number of people in to the equation, the probability for running in to angry, rushed, chaotic people increases – depending on the time of day, dramatically…
made it a point last years at work, not to arrive until afternoon, when the energy of other folks was more subdued…people are generally in such a rush in the morning…later afternoon it kicks up again…
ideal arrival time would be after folks had their lunch…
favorite mode of transport has always been my feet…anything else it just feels like shit is happening a little too fast and have to concentrate more on keeping things together…
as far as living arrangements, two main options maybe, one is an older yet still thriving town…or, what they have in some places (rancho cucamonga), where they’ve built housing around outdoor malls…
don’t make a face, it’s a thing…it gets hot and windy a lot there though…
I think you make good points, Swifty. And I’ll add more:
I think he just wants to have fun. And the opportunity to be like Bill Walton on the ’86 Celtics crossed with Earl Monroe on ’73 Knicks is fun as hell. Plus he gets to play at MSG for a coach he already knows and respects. We would play some of the most beautiful basketball the world has ever seen.
LeBron has always loved playing unselfish basketball, and I think he would like to finally show off some of that ball-moving talent he’s had to suppress his whole career because he’s always been the man.
It’s like if Springsteen got to play with the Grateful Dead. He wouldn’t walk in and be like “I’m the fucking man, you guys all bow down to me, this is my show”. He’d be like “cool, it’s not all about me, I can just go on stage and jam with incredible musicians, and this will be fucking awesome, people will talk about it forever, and I will always remember it.”
Rich Paul say LeBron is going to choose happiness. That sounds like happiness to me.
True. I always say that about NYC when something crazy happens like someone climbs a tower. We have so many people that there are LOTS of outliers that are far from the norm.
But I’d like to add in my experience, the best way to make people angry & crazy is stick them in a car during traffic, delays, detours, etc. People really lose their mind behind the wheel. I’ve had elderly people give me the finger for no reason, people road rage swerve in front of me slowing down half the speed limit, see people drive over double yellow lines, onto sidewalks, etc. And I don’t even drive often!
The more you look at Looney the worse he looks. He only missed a short portion of the season with injuries, yet still managed to play only 300 or so minutes in 21 games. He didn’t play for the (checks notes) Pelicans because they didn’t think he was useful.
So maybe that oughta be a no on that dude.
A different view on Mitch https://x.com/TommyBeer/status/2072367235914469613
I’m looking for a warmer climate. But it sounds absolutely lovely. I want that, but where the temps don’t go below 50, and MAGA mouth breathers aren’t running the government. My options are limited.
The “Mitch isn’t worth 15M” takes make me want to scream.
The options weren’t “give 15M to Mitch or spend it on something else.” They were “give $15M to Mitch or spend $6M on garbage.” You take the risk because you’re at the tippy top of the win curve.
The rationalizing of this is pathetic.
Not really what happened. Keenan was absolutely toxic and almost ruined that Cup run. He famously benched the best defenseman in franchise history and Conn Smythe winner in a pivotal ECF game and then tried to blame it on Leetch’s shoulder being fucked. The ’94 story was so amazing because Messier, Leetch, Graves, and all the other veteran leadership rallied all the troops despite Keenan and got it done… barely. The vibe shift happened way before the Cup.
sounds like san diego…if i had a do-over, may have aimed myself in that direction…central coast is pretty nice too…
That assumes Dolan wouldn’t go over the second apron for LeBron on a minimum.
And actually he’s such a piece of shit that I honestly can’t rule that out.
“James Dolan is an ignorant lowlife” is one of the foundational principles of this board. Were I ever to get a tattoo, I’d have that inked on my chest.
“Leon Rose is a genius” is a concept of much more recent vintage but one that’s now widely accepted as gospel after he masterminded the building of a championship roster in the most unlikely way possible.
The idea of there being little to no daylight between Dolan & Leon on the subjects of the second apron, the absolute necessity of keeping Mitch – or pretty much anything else – creates enough cognitive dissonance amongst the fanbase to register on the Richter Scale. That makes it much easier to embrace nebulously sourced articles by beat writers who report that the owner and FO are now at loggerheads over the best way forward.
Those articles could certainly be accurate. Or not. I really don’t know and neither does anyone else outside the room. Apart from the owner himself, this organization holds its cards tightly to its chest. Moreover, it’s demonstrated in the past that it tends to proceed very deliberately, making incremental moves whose long term purpose is often impossible to read.
All of which is to say I’m not buying that today’s developments caught Leon with his pants down. Unless events eventually prove otherwise, I will continue to believe that Leon & Co. have had a plan for the backup 5 in place for some time that has yet to be fully executed. It may end up not working out but I’m sure it’s something more than grab onto whatever flotsam and jetsam is still hanging around on July 1.
ha, funny hearing you talk about crazy drivers – doing el camino real (premier crusin’ conditions) – you have to now deal with aggressive ai driving 3,000 pound death machines…that and those buses that are like a house tall and a half a block long…
We truly left the rationalizers with no rationalizations, and yet…
I mean, let’s say we had drafted someone who looks okay. Reed, Cenac, Jefferson, etc. Maybe we paired them with a vet-min/partial TPMLE guy like Looney or Drummond. I could hear an argument that we simply wanted to be out of the Mitch business, get younger, and kick the second-apron can down the road.
I would’ve been skeptical to say the least! We did just, you know, win the championship. But I wouldn’t laugh it off as post-hoc cope.
But we didn’t do anything like that. We let our best player by BPM and our 4th best player by EPM and DARKO walk for nothing with no replacement whatsoever. We even made sure to let some non-gag worthy replacement options come off the board before it happened. What’s more, every beat writer is screaming “THERE IS NO PLAN HERE” at the top of their lungs.
Not really different, people have been saying that on this blog for two weeks.
He’s like Mitch jr…. right down to the sub-.500 ft shooting and 5 fouls per 36.
Hey LeBron….Don’t you regret not coming to the Kniiiiiiiiiiiiiicks!!!???
Gondrezick if you want to argue that Leon’s the idiot who came up with this plan go right ahead. But even I think that’s a little harsh.
Raven….today is my first day as a Seattle inhabitant…I am in Fremont…temporarily until I find a house…just drinking a cold brew and enjoying the 68 degree temps..
I don’t really love the LeBron idea because he shot threes so poorly last year, but he would give us another ball handler, albeit a slow one.
Let’s all take some deep breaths. I’m going to trust in Leon and Aller for at least another week. I’m pretty sure they considered this situation months ago and have ideas/plans.
With Cisse being an RFA I looked at Dallas’ cap space. They have none. They have the full TPMLE ($15m) and biannual exception ($5.5m). And a logjam at center with Lively, Gafford, Bagley as well.
I think if Leon & Co. like him, he might be gettable. But we’d need to like his chances of developing. Dallas didn’t lock him up during the season despite his analytics-friendly production, and while we have benefitted infinitely from Dallas’ poor pro scouting decisions, it is a data point.
I’m arguing nothing of the sort. All I said is that I – and everyone else outside the inner circle – have no idea who is responsible for what so spilling barrelfuls of digital ink on assigning blame seems like a pretty pointless exercise.
What I am fairly certain of is that this FO has seen this coming for awhile now and has planned for it accordingly. I’m willing to wait and see how it all plays up before breaking out the pitchforks.
If he’s a non-injury prone Mitch sign me up. My theory with Mitch is that his development stalled because he kept getting hurt and had to spend offseasons rehabbing instead of working on his game. Remember how Thibs wouldn’t let big men develop a bag until they mastered the basics? Mitch got as far as developing into a defensive anchor and not fouling before he could get permission to try any offensive moves. Hartenstein got permission to pass out of the high post and do his floater once he cleared that bar.
You really have to put your head in the sand to believe that when there’s credible reporting and a recorded interview.
I’m worried because now we need *two* guys at center, not just one. Tough to pull that at this late date.
Who singlehandedly derailed Leon’s roster more:
a) Sam Presti
b) Jaime Jaquez Jr
c) Tyrese Halibuton
d) James Dolan
He probably saw it coming but refused to believe that his owner’s own goal will be the largest obstacle he will have to overcome during his Knicks tenure.
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