10:48 pm: The trade is official, according to an announcement from the Clippers.
8:56 pm: The Clippers have moved up by one spot in the second round of the draft, acquiring the No. 50 pick from the Knicks and using it on Nevada wing Kobe Sanders, per Law Murray of The Athletic (Twitter link).
The Knicks moved down to No. 51, acquiring the draft rights from Luka Mitrovic from L.A. in the deal, reports Jake Fischer of The Stein Line (Twitter link). New York used the 51st overall pick on French forward Mohamed Diawara.
Sanders, a 6’6” senior, transferred to Nevada after four seasons with Cal Poly. He averaged 15.8 points, 4.5 assists, 3.8 rebounds and 1.1 steals last season. He shot 46.2 percent from the field and 34.2 percent beyond the arc.
As for Diawara, the 6’8”, 20-year-old forward averaged 5.8 points, 3.1 rebounds and 1.4 assists for Cholet last season. Diawara is also good friends with Knicks 2024 first-round pick Pacome Dadiet, according to Ian Begley of SNY TV (Twitter link). He’s viewed as a good athlete and strong defender, as he often guarded the opponent’s lead ball-handler for France’s U-20 team, Begley adds.
Mitrovic was drafted in 2015 and has never played in the NBA, so it’s safe to say he won’t be coming stateside. Fred Katz of The Athletic notes he can’t even be used as a touching point in a trade since he wasn’t part of the last nine drafts (Twitter link), so there doesn’t seem to be a compelling reason why the Knicks dropped one spot, except that the team loves to stockpile draft-rights players.
These are the deals that build champions. Great Job by both teams.
“he can’t even be used in a trade since he wasn’t part of the last nine drafts”
Ok Brock Aller is just straight up trolling lol
Knicks are dumb for this. At least ask for cash. Basically gave away their spot.
I don’t know any of these players. Hopefully, the Knicks know what they are doing right now. Halliburton and Tatum out next year, it’s finals or Bust. It’s now or never for next season
Aller knows more about the cap, and all the ways it can play out, than anyone else in the universe. He undoubtedly has some obscure cap-trade use case in mind where he can utilize an obscure player right to make the deal conform. The Knicks ended up with the player they were going to draft at 50, but now have a tool to handle a case that only Aller has thought of, and might not even happen. But if it does happen, this obscure move would have been worth it.