NFL Tickets
The New York Knicks‘ need for a new point guard is now at the point of delusion, or maybe it’s hallucination because the Knicks’ front office is out of their minds if they think they are pulling off any of the rumored trades they have been tied to recently. Rajon Rondo? Kyle Lowry? Jeff Teague? How are the Knicks pulling any of those guys without a draft pick, a valued asset, or expiring contract?
Oh yeah, they’re not. The Knicks are stuck where they are at; hope you like Raymond Felton, Knicks fans.
New York has geared their entire approach at rebuilding their team for the free agency period of 2015. The bad part is that they saw their crosstown rival, Brooklyn Nets make big move after big move this offseason, and the Knicks tried to match them instead of cutting payroll until 2015.
Brooklyn brought in Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Jason Terry, and the Knicks traded for Andrea Bargnani. The Nets signed Andrei Kirilenko, so New York signed Metta World Peace. Even though the Knicks were clearly behind the Miami Heat and Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference hierarchy, they continued to add pieces, lose draft picks and commit more money to players that don’t help the bottom line that much.
Now the Knicks are full of bad contracts, and their only hope is to wait it out this season and next season for the summer of 2015 … and cross their fingers.
The Knicks are facing real threat of missing the playoffs. They cannot move any of their bigs for an upgrade because Bargnani and Amar’e Stoudemire are both overpaid, and Tyson Chandler is only slightly overpaid, but rarely healthy. They refuse to move Carmelo Anthony because they plan on re-signing him this offseason, and trading for another small forward doesn’t make sense when they have one of the four best small forwards in the league already.
The shooting guard spot is loaded with J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert and Tim Hardaway Jr. That leaves only the point guard spot to upgrade, but no one wants Felton or 36-year-old Pablo Prigioni.
The biggest issue for New York as far as upgrading their roster goes is that they do not have any draft picks that they can trade until 2018. They are sending this year’s first-round pick and their 2016 first-round pick to the Denver Nuggets, and this year is the only year they have a second-round pick, but it is a top-55 protected pick from the Sacramento Kings.
So unless the Kings finish with one of the five best records in the league, New York won’t have any pick this year. And the only reason why they have any picks is because the NBA restricts teams from trading their own first-round picks in consecutive years, so the Knicks have their 2015 and 2017 first-round picks but cannot trade them, and they have zero second-round picks.
New York’s game plan was to wait for 2015 free agency and try to land two more All-Stars to put next to Melo. That makes absolutely no sense considering the new CBA has put in such stringent penalties for being over the luxury tax in consecutive years that even teams like the Los Angeles Lakers — who have a billion dollar TV deal — are trying to avoid the tax.
New York’s idea to steal the Heat’s team-building ways was a good idea four years ago, but the only way that will work today is if they get NBA superstars to take drastic pay cuts. Good luck with that.
The fact remains that the Knicks need to make a move to make the playoffs this season, and missing the playoffs in an Eastern Conference that is historically bad cannot happen without heads rolling in New York. The front office is trying to save their jobs, but with the way they have botched that roster, they should all be fired even if the Knicks make the playoffs.
This team is playing for a Hail Mary in the summer of 2015 just like they did in the summer of 2010, but that heave fell incomplete with the Knicks only adding Stoudemire at a ridiculously bad contract, and that was the case even before he was injured. This year’s trade deadline is this front office’s last chance to save their jobs — the only problem is they need to find a counterpart as dumb as they are to trade with them.
Robbie Marbury is an NBA writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @rmarbury, and add him to your network on Google+
Share 
