Knicks showing interest in Donte DiVincenzo and why they should sign him

“Several influential people within the Knicks organization are fans of adding Donte DiVincenzo to this roster.”

That is the quote being floated around by Ian Begley as the Knicks look to upgrade their roster.

The 26-year-old DiVincenzo is coming off a season with the Golden State Warriors, averaging 9.4 points in 26.3 minutes and appearing in 72 games.

Going into the 2023-24 season, DiVincenzo has a $4.725 million player option that he is expected to decline.

He is the type of player that every team in the league would pursue for the right price. The six-foot-four combo guard offers some scoring and helping stats while also contributing a lot on the defensive side.

Defense:

Touching on defense first, he averaged 1.3 steals per game which was top 20 in the NBA. He had at least two steals in 29 regular season games. DiVincenzo was a +2.3 in the defensive win shares category and +1.3 in defensive box plus-minus. He’s definitely consistently shown well over his career when it comes to impacting the game defensively. Looking at FiveThirtyEight’s Raptor rankings, DiVincenzo came in at +2.5 on defense which was tied for 21st in the league.

An underrated rebounder, he averaged 4.5 rebounds per game and averaged 5.8 in the 2020-21 season. His hustle would only add to what was one of the best rebounding teams in the league.

Offense:

On offense, he is a very capable scorer and has averaged around 9-10 points per game in his career. There were 32 instances this regular season where he scored in double figures. It’s not just the spot scoring with Donte that makes him intriguing, he is a good playmaker that would help the Knicks improve their assists numbers. The 3.5 assists he averaged this season would've been fourth on the team. Donte had 30 games this season where he had at least four assists. That could've helped a Knicks team that finished in the bottom three for assists per game. Adding another playmaker adds another element of unpredictability.

Yes, Donte DiVincenzo can help with outside shooting. Last season he hit 2.1/5.3 three-point attempts and shot them at an encouraging 39.7 percent. That would've been second-best on the Knicks behind Jalen Brunson. The 150 three-pointers he made were a career-high and he certainly would've been useful in the playoffs when New York couldn't buy an outside shot. Overall, he had a career-high 57.4 effective field goal percentage.

His +1.9 offensive win shares gave him a +4.2 win share total last season. Negative offensive box plus-minus is something he will need to improve on and was -0.6 last season. He still came out positive in win shares and box plus-minus and was also +1.3 value over replacement player.

Final thought:

DiVincenzo is definitely a player the Knicks should strongly consider bringing in. It would be his fourth team since getting drafted but the guard will be motivated and should get a chance to play significant minutes. He’s the type of player that Tom Thibodeau would love, with his high motor and hustle. Scoring, shooting, playmaking, and defense, DiVincenzo can give you a little of everything and be a Swiss army knife game to game.

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