The Knicks, like their crosstown rivals, are without a pick heading into Thursday night’s draft and would like to acquire one, preferably in the first round. However, that could be easier said that done given what they have to work with. The Knicks can offer only $1.8MM to another club in a trade thanks to the $1.4MM they gave the Raptors in the Andrea Bargnani deal, writes Ken Berger of CBSSports.com in an update to yesterday’s column.
Just $1.8MM in cash compensation wouldn’t be enough to buy a first-round pick off of a club in a thin draft, let alone one of the deepest in NBA memory. Teams are placing a high value on those late first-round picks and Howard Beck of Bleacher Report (via Twitter) surmises that they might not be able to even land an early second-round choice with that amount of money. The silver lining for Knicks fans, however, is that they probably couldn’t have landed a first-round pick even with the max $3.2MM at their disposal (link).
During his first season in New York, Bargnani only appeared in 42 games, averaging 13.3 PPG, 5.3 RPG, and 1.1 APG in 29.9 minutes per game. To land the former top pick, the Knicks gave up a future first-round pick, two second-round picks, and – as we learned today – a nice chunk of change that could hurt their flexibility this offseason.