With unprotected firsts going around like candy, the landscape of the NBA is changing once again. Booker and KAT, 2 well-assumed CAA long term targets have both signed extensions again and are locked into their current teams. D Mitchell is the remaining target, but there are questions about his fit with Brunson and if the Knicks can stomach the cost which will be a pick package beyond anything we have seen, given the inflation of dealing for a star player. If Murray gets 3 picks and Gobert brings back 4, we can expect it will be something that cleans out the Knicks for years. I’m guessing a minimum of 3 of our own unprotected picks, plus 3 more protected that we have acquired in trade.

If that’s not the move, will there be a more modest lower level target coming up, and if so, who? We can be relatively sure the Knicks won’t stockpile picks for their own use, and Leon can only sell deferring picks and moves for so long. At some point, the next shoe will have to drop. I have no doubt this front office is selling the Mitchell move, but will they meet the price, or what’s the plan B. It’s going to be really interesting, as Brunson is sort of the first move that pressures the front office to take a big step this upcoming season.

I guess KD is still out there- LA has their situation (lakers)

Maybe those things trigger further moves.

I feel like we are still missing a franchise talent- assume the FO is thinking the same. Remote chance for RJ to become more of that kind of player.

SergioNYK wrote:Wait and see what star player wants out next if Ainge wants too much for Mitchell. I'm down with giving up 4 (we have 6) first round picks in next years draft plus Obi or IQ for Mitchell but 3 unprotected picks is too much for me. I'm only giving up unprotected picks for someone like prime LeBron. With our luck those picks become top 5 in multiple years!

Exactly - Eddy Curry or LaMarcus Aldridge and Joachim Noah?

BRIGGS wrote:

EwingsGlass wrote:I would assist in facilitating Durant to Phoenix if we could snatch Bridges. I would also be interested in Anounouby if he becomes available.

Toronto has the best goods
Ny Knicks no slouch

I can see nets trading Durant to Toronto
We might be a player for Mitchell but is he a fit? We already have a lot of guns.

Agree that this will be a multi team deal. No way ONE of the teams he wants to go to can give up as much as Nets want. And he will definitely go to Phoenix or Miami. No one is trading for him knowing he prefers another location. I actually thought New Orleans would be a possibility. Brandon Ingram, couple of fillers and draft picks puts him along side you know who.

EwingsGlass wrote:I would assist in facilitating Durant to Phoenix if we could snatch Bridges. I would also be interested in Anounouby if he becomes available.

Either bridges or Anunoby would be excellent if available.

On the fence: Fournier

Even with Fournier here losing Burks means an elevated role for someone (I am assuming Grimes as we know Thibs loves him)

So our rotation looks like this:
Brunson/Fournier/RJ/Randle/Mitch
Rose/IQ/Grimes/Obi/Hart
fringe: McBride/Sims/Taj

Considering how excited I am about NEXT year's draft I really like this squad. There are some real odd pieces that will be interesting to see how/what the coaches do

Brunson/Fournier together is NOT an ideal pairing (defense) but if you DO play them together its best w/ Mitch where they can at least push the driver to the shotblocker (Houston was always good at this, I cant hang with you, but here... deal with Camby/Ewing)

Hart is a great pairing with Randle. Mitch is not a good pairing with Randle

If I had to puzzle together the two best line ups with these 10 I like the two the best:
Brunson/Grimes/RJ/Jules/Hart
Rose/IQ/Fournier/Obi/Mitch

Also (if Rose is healthy which obviously is rare) I am not sure which of those lineups is better. If Rose playing like he did 2 years ago its prolly the bottom

Next step is to let the connectors connect

Tweet was deleted or there was problem with the URL:

https://twitter.com/TommyBeer/status/1543251268159905792

So what we got in FA:

Brunson: a legit, young, healthy PG with upside, with a sweet eFG. As much as I like giving Quickley and McBridge a chance at starter mins, I feel dramatically more confident with Brunson on board. Worst case, Quickley keeps doing his 25mpg thing and McBride continues to be deep depth.
Mitch: Glad to have him back, glad the guy got paid. He did the Knicks a favor these past years with his original way-below-market $6.5m/4yr deal. That now looks like an $8yr/$66.5m deal.
Hartenstein - a center with a little bit of range, toughness, and upside to replace an injury prone Noel. His shooting really gives the Knicks a different look compared to what Mitch/Noel/Taj/Sims provided over the past few years.
Gained more 1st round picks (albeit protected) - either we'll get low 1st rounders OR we'll get unprotected picks like 5 years from now. Assets for the future are a good thing.
The Knicks seem pretty complete and have some extra minutes for the youths to compete for.

Outgoing:
Kemba: I wish it worked out, and I'm still shocked at how little he was able to provide.

Noel: He was absolutely great in 2020-2021, but his history and propensity to miss long stretches of seasons returned. In theory, your backup players play limited minutes so you sort of expect them to be ready to play minutes. But somehow he was hobbled all year. I'll miss the healthy version of him, but everyone won here - the Knicks got a good backup center in Hartenstein with offensive upside, and Noel ultimately got a pretty beefy 2-year contract from the Knicks so no bad blood should we re-acquire him in the future. :)

Burks: Kobe Bryant 1/4 of the time. His role was completely redundant with RJ and Fournier on the team. I think of this as akin to the Celtics losing Gordon Hayward - giving folks like Tatum/Brown/Smart more responsibility and room to grow. Burks was a really good player for us, but I think he was a little too good and was impeding the other guys long term.

I think it'll be interesting how Obi/Grimes/Fournier/Reddish/Quickley/Rose are deployed. The funny outlier on the team is Rose - much like Noel he was phenomenal in 2020-2021 before giving us close to nothing this past season. Indications are he's a good mentor for some of the young guys, but ideally we get more than than, we get a bit of the 2020-2021 magic back from him.

The only thing Randle and Fournier are doing here at this point is preventing us from fully developing some of our younger players. It's sad because we otherwise have a solid base to try to build off of, but those two contracts and players just limit us so much.