Lee obviously wants to return to NY, but if the Knicks aren't willing to pay him what he wants, then he'll be free to negotiate with any teams that have the cap space to offer him what he's looking for & stands nothing really to gain from working out a sign & trade to benefit the Knicks.

this means forget about any potential scenarios where we're dealing him to another rebuilding team... at this stage in his career this guy is going to want to start winning some games after 5 years of losing in NY... if he can't get that here, u have to figure he'll look for that opportunity elsewhere... once we renounce his cap hold this summer, our options to trade him are going to be extremely limited.

From his past public comments I suspect his criteria will be:

1) money
100) a city he likes
101) a winning situation.

TMS wrote:i agree w/u his top priority will be the money without a doubt... as to his other motivations, i can only guess as to what they may be, but the guy has to be sick of all the losing... wouldn't u? i'm just saying that he will have no motivation to accept any sign & trade scenarios if the Knicks are unwilling to pay his price to keep him in NY... at that point it's pretty much like us saying we don't think he's worth the investment, so why would he want to do us any favors by accepting a sign & trade when he stands to gain nothing from it, especially if the trade lands him into yet another rebuilding situation? i don't see it... if he does goes to a rebuilding team like the Nets this summer, it will be as a FA because they're giving him the biggest contract, not in a trade IMO.

the only scenario where a sign & trade benefits him is if we're not renouncing his Bird Rights... that gets him that extra year of salary he wouldn't be able to get anywhere else... otherwise if we do try & clear his cap hold this summer so we can sign 2 max guys, we give up those Bird Rights & it pretty much means he'll likely be walking for nothing.

Agreed. I get it, and think your post is totally on point. The key for us will be to try to arrange that appealing s&t scenario with a team he will accept, with the 6th year, for a player that makes sense for us. A very fine line indeed, and quite a difficult task. We'll need some top notch GM-ing, something that hasn't really been seen around here in a while. Here's hoping though...