The Problem with New York Knicks Trading Their 2015 1st-Round Draft Pick
There is nothing inherently wrong with the New York Knicks wanting or being open to trading their 2015 first-round draft pick. Given the circumstances under which they're trying to rebuild and their lack of other assets, gauging its value is, in fact, a shrewd play.
It's actually pulling the trigger on a deal that's the problem, the crux of which is this: For whom can they trade?
This is the dilemma the league-worst Knicks face, a very real impasse they're going to reach as the NBA draft nears and free agency begins.
Moving their first-rounder is something they're already considering, according to ESPN.com's Brian Windhorst in an interview with The Robin Lundberg Show (via ESPNNew York.com's Ian Begley). To be sure, the Knicks cannot trade the pick itself. Having dealt away last year's and next year's first-rounders, they would have to unload the selected player in July.
Any version of this is one in the same, though. The Knicks are in line to have the best lottery odds possible, guaranteeing themselves a pick that can fall no lower than fourth overall. And, in theory, they can use it in conjunction with their impending financial flexibility to be on the receiving end of a blockbuster deal.
Normally, this is where evidence to the contrary would be placed. Why would a team that's run itself aground by treating picks and prospects like transactional silage fall into the same trap? Wouldn't that negate Phil Jackson's roster teardown and all the losing it has incited?
Again, typically, yes. But the Knicks are not in a normal position. They are not most rebuilding outfits.
Teams preparing for a long, arduous reconstruction do not latch on to over-30 superstars like Carmelo Anthony. His contract spans another four years and more than $101.6 million, and it includes a no-trade clause. The Knicks, then, are not biding time; they're waiting to strike as fast and hard as they can.
Hence why, when pressed about the franchise's offseason plans, Jackson downplayed the value of top draft prospects, per the New York Post's Marc Berman:
"In the present day in the NBA, 19-, 20-year-olds, coming into the league, it’s really hard to project what that player will be like in his first contract situation. So what we’re trying to [see] what advancement can be made in the short-term.
How quickly we can get back in the hunt and right away to [compete] for the championship? We know what the first-round pick will mean to us, but we also know we will build the team on free agents.
We have 190 players or so who will be free agents. … That’s where our priority stands.
"
Put this way, the Knicks have to test the market for their pick, wherever it lies. Undeveloped prospects in their late-teens and early 20s, however promising, are not building blocks to them. Max-contract cap space and established stars are the foundations upon which they intend to build.
If that pick, that prospect, can be used to strengthen the latter vision, the Knicks are basically obligated to not just explore it but also to execute it.
Thus, the original query: For whom can they trade?
That's an unanswerable question at this point, with the Knicks' specific draft position and the NBA's definitive list of available talent unknown. But we do know the type of player they would have to land for any move to make sense.
"A pick as good as the one the Knicks are slated to have would command a high price in return—not just an impact player, but a star," wrote Sean Highkin for NBC Sports. "A DeMarcus Cousins, say. Not that Cousins will be available, but that’s the level of player the Knicks would need to be getting to make it worth their while to trade the pick."
Cousins is the exact type of player they would need. And, somewhat ironically, that exact player could be available.
Sources told Bleacher Report's Howard Beck that new Sacramento Kings head coach George Karl might be prepared to clean house to the degree that no one on the current roster is safe. Not even the 24-year-old center fresh off his first All-Star appearance.
But that's one player who's arguably worth dealing a pick that could be as high as No. 1.
Name some others.
LeBron James, Anthony Davis, Kevin Durant and Chris Paul are all good starts. They may even be the end of such a list. But none of them are readily available.
Not even Durant, who is set to enter free agency in 2016, is considered obtainable.
ESPN NBA analyst Tom Penn told ESPN Radio's Colin Cowherd on The Herd (via The Big Lead) he thinks Oklahoma City Thunder general manager Sam Presti might trade Durant rather than lose him for nothing. Presti did more than shoot down that notion; he disemboweled it.
Per The Oklahoman's Darnell Mayberry:
Forfeiting a top draft pick can only happen under an incredibly specific set of circumstances, as we saw last summer with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Kevin Love. The return has to actually be unequivocally worth it.
Striking a deal is even more difficult for the Knicks than it was for Cleveland. They don't have two other superstars in Kyrie Irving and James to fall back on, so the incoming player has to be a fortunes-turner, no matter what their preceding or subsequent free-agency plans may be. He also has to be someone who can succeed within the Triangle offense.
Complicated still, the Knicks don't have other assets to sweeten the pot.
Say that, against all odds, Durant becomes available. A top-four selection, even if it's No. 1, wouldn't be enough on its own. Other picks and prospects would have to exchange hands to get a deal done—trade assets the Knicks don't possess.
Tim Hardaway Jr., Cleanthony Early and Langston Galloway are their most valuable youngsters, none of whom would net a high- to mid-end first-rounder on their own. So even with Jahlil Okafor, Karl-Anthony Towns or D'Angelo Russell in play, the Knicks may still not have what it takes to land Anthony a superstar sidekick.
In lieu of that return, they're left to accept a far less attractive package assembled around a combination of fringe stars and role players. Even in this scenario, they're still left to ask the same question: For whom can they trade?
That's the vicious cycle of all of this, which is why, in this instance, it's more likely the Knicks hold onto their draft pick, if only because it's easier.
Safer.
Indeed, the draft is a crapshoot. Foregoing it and investing in the immediate picture over the big one is tempting, because as Beck writes, "Every draft brings as much false hope and heartache as it does enduring NBA talent. Trading a lottery pick, then, is a calculated gamble—a bet that the actual NBA player (or players) you acquire are better than the untested kid from State U."
For now, without knowing who they can land, the Knicks are in no position to make that calculated gamble. Once they know who's available, they'll have a better idea of what their pick is and isn't worth.
And finding out is part of the problem, because depending on who they can get, the Knicks may never be in position to make this gamble without also settling for less than what they absolutely need.
*Salary information courtesy of HoopsHype.
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