New York Knicks Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Atlantic Notes: Pleiss, Seraphin, Stackhouse, Green

September 11th, 2016 at 11:31am CST by Arthur Hill

German center Tibor Pleiss received an invitation to work out for the Nets, but seems likely to sign overseas, tweets international basketball writer David Pick. Pleiss is finalizing a deal with the Galatasaray team in Turkey. He will take the place of former NBA player Nenad Krstic, who has a lingering knee injury and is expected to retire (Twitter link). Pleiss was waived by the Sixers last week after being acquired in a trade with the Jazz. The 7’3″ center appeared in 12 games for Utah last season, but spent most of the year in the D-League.

There’s more news out of the Atlantic Division:

The Knicks were outbid in their attempt to re-sign reserve center Kevin Seraphin, according to Mark Berman of the New York Post. Seraphin agreed to join the Pacers last week and signed a two-year, $3.6MM contract on Thursday, with the second year as a team option. The deal starts at $2MM for next season, which topped the Knicks’ offer of $1.2MM, the minimum for a player who has been in the league for six years. It will still be a pay cut for Seraphin, who signed for the $2.8MM cap exception last season. The Knicks were hoping to keep Seraphin, who averaged 3.9 points in 48 games in 2015/16, as a backup to Joakim Noah. Berman expects Kyle O’Quinn to get a larger role with Seraphin’s departure, with Willy Hernangomez, Marshall Plumlee and Maurice Ndour as other options.
Jerry Stackhouse sees his new job as coach of Toronto’s D-League affiliate as the next step toward becoming an NBA head coach, writes Chris O’Leary of The Toronto Star. Stackhouse was named to the position Friday after spending last season as an assistant with the Raptors. With 18 years as an NBA player, Stackhouse hopes to use that experience to help some of the players with Raptors 905. “I spent just about as much of my life on the struggle that you’re watching some of these [D-League players] … making whatever they make, 25, 30 grand, but it’s a destination,” he said. “It’s where you want to get, it’s the sacrifices you have to make. I’m excited about it, I really am.”
The return of Gerald Green will give the Celtics a prolific scorer off the bench, writes Taylor C. Snow of NBA.com. In a look at Boston’s wing players, Snow notes that Green, who left the Heat for the Celtics this summer, can score the ball in a variety of ways.

Rambis Suggested Hornacek As Knicks’ Head Coach

September 9th, 2016 at 2:29pm CST by Arthur Hill

Knicks president Phil Jackson says interim coach Kurt Rambis first suggested hiring Jeff Hornacek as the team’s head coach, according to Charley Rosen of TodaysFastBreak.com. In the latest installment of “The Phil Jackson Chronicles,” Jackson states that Rambis and Hornacek had a working relationship that began when they both played for the Suns.

“It was Kurt Rambis who first suggested Jeff,” Jackson recalled. “They had played together in Phoenix for several seasons so Kurt had a good read on Jeff. The Suns’ coach was Cotton Fitzsimmons who had been an assistant at Kansas State under Tex Winter. So Cotton knew the triangle, ran pieces of it and believed in system basketball. It was there that Jeff teamed up with Kevin Johnson in a two-guard offense, which is how the triangle is formatted.”

Jackson had been impressed by the job Hornacek did in his two and a half years as head coach in Phoenix. In mid-May, Jackson held a six-hour meeting with Hornacek in Los Angeles, diagramming plays and discussing offensive and defensive philosophies.

“I liked the way he saw the whole game and how every part was interrelated,” Jackson said. “Jeff also said that he believes in visualization, that a shooter should visualize the ball going through the hoop every time he shoots. I could easily visualize him coaching the Knicks, and I was sold.”

Jackson and Hornacek flew back to New York for a private dinner with GM Steve Mills, but the media learned about the meeting and reported Hornacek’s hiring well before it occurred. Jackson says he wishes that hadn’t happened because the story broke before he could inform the other candidates who interviewed for the job.

Knicks Notes: Rose, Noah

September 5th, 2016 at 2:30pm CST by Luke Adams

When the Knicks acquired Derrick Rose in a June trade with the Bulls, the point guard’s legal issues weren’t really a part of the conversation. However, as Steve Popper of USA Today writes, that has changed since Rose’s deposition in a civil suit was released last week. While Rose has maintained his innocence, parts of his testimony are “troublesome” and raise additional questions about the Knicks’ decision to acquire him, says Popper.
Joakim Noah‘s father is excited to see his son joining the Knicks for the 2016/17 season, per Stefan Bondy of The New York Daily News. “It’s hard to find the words. You just feel blessed basically because when he was young and used to go to games together, that was his dream,” Yannick Noah, a former tennis champion, said at the U.S. Open this weekend. “Posters in the bedroom. Autographs. That was his dream. Knicks.”

Holiday Has Something To Prove

September 3rd, 2016 at 10:01pm CST by Arthur Hill

Headed to his fifth team in four years, Justin Holiday wants to show the Knicks that he’s more than a throw-in from the Derrick Rose trade, relays Marc Berman of The New York Post. Holiday, a 6’6″ shooting guard, divided last season between the Hawks and Bulls, moving in February after a three-team trade that also involved the Jazz. Holiday said he started to feel comfortable in Chicago after the deal, appearing in 27 games, starting four and averaging 6.5 points per night. However, the 27-year-old brother of the Pelicans’ Jrue Holiday found himself on the move again with the June trade to New York. “As far as talent goes, I think we’re one of the more talented team tins his league, especially in the East,” Holiday said of the Knicks. “Hopefully we do some stuff [the Warriors] did.’’ Holiday was a reserve on the Golden State team that won the NBA title in 2015.

The Knicks may not live up to Rose’s “super team” designation, but they raised their talent level considerably this offseason, writes A.J. Neuharth-Keusch of USA Today. New York’s addition of Rose, Joakim Noah and Brandon Jennings makes the team interesting, but their collective injury history limits the Knicks’ offseason grade to a B-minus.

Injury Concerns At Point Guard

August 31st, 2016 at 9:04pm CST by Arthur Hill

The Knicks are gambling with their point guard position by bringing in two players with significant injury histories, writes Tommy Beer of Basketball Insiders. New York traded for Derrick Rose, whose 66 games last season were by far the most since tearing his ACL in the 2012 playoffs, and signed Brandon Jennings, who suffered an Achilles tear in January of 2014. Beer lists several unsigned players the Knicks should consider as insurance: Mario Chalmers, Norris Cole, Kirk Hinrich, Nate Robinson, Jordan Farmar, Andre Miller and Lance Stephenson.

Salary Cap Snapshot: New York Knicks

August 30th, 2016 at 10:16pm CST by Eddie Scarito

Here’s a breakdown of where the Knicks currently stand financially:

Guaranteed Salary

Carmelo Anthony —$24,559,380 [Contract has 15% Trade Kicker//No-Trade Clause]
Derrick Rose —$21,323,252
Joakim Noah —$17,000,000
Courtney Lee —$11,242,000
Lance Thomas —$6,191,000
Brandon Jennings —$4,837,318 [Waived by team; $5,000,000 cap hit reduced by setoff]
Kristaps Porzingis —$4,317,720
Kyle O’Quinn —$3,918,750
Mindaugas Kuzminskas —$2,898,000
Willy Hernangomez —$1,375,000
Justin Holiday —$1,015,696
Sasha Vujacic —$980,431 [Actual Salary — $1,410,598]
Lou Amundson —$980,431 [Waived by team]
Ron Baker —$543,471
Maurice Ndour —$543,471
Marshall Plumlee —$543,471
Chasson Randle —$143,860
J.P. Tokoto —$100,000 [Waived by team]
Chasson Randle —$100,000 [Waived by team]

Total Guaranteed Salary= $102,613,251

Cash Sent Out Via Trade: $0 [Amount Remaining $3.5MM]

Cash Received Via Trade: $0 [Amount Remaining $3.5MM]

Payroll Exceptions Available

None [Room Exception used to sign Mindaugas Kuzminskas]

Total Projected Payroll: $102,613,251

Salary Cap: $94,143,000

Estimated Available Cap Space: –$8,470,251

Luxury Tax Threshold: $113,287,000

Amount Below Luxury Tax: $10,673,749

Last Update: 3/3/17

The Basketball Insiders salary pages and The Vertical’s salary database were used in the creation of this post.

Eastern Notes: Stephenson, Pistons, Knicks

August 28th, 2016 at 4:46pm CST by Will Joseph

The Nets and unrestricted free agent Lance Stephenson have nothing going on, Mike Mazzeo of ESPN.com reports (on Twitter). Mazzeo’s report squashes the rumors that suggested Stephenson was joining Brooklyn. Stephenson, a New York native, had made a post on Instagram with the caption, “Dreams come true,” which ignited the rumors.

Here’s more from around the Eastern Conference:

Reggie Jackson likes the moves the Pistons made this summer, which includes drafting power forward Henry Ellenson and signing Ish Smith, Jon Leuer and Boban Marjanovic, and expressed confidence that Detriot will make a deep playoff run, Brian Manzullo of the Detroit Free Press relays. “I don’t believe there necessarily is a ceiling,” Jackson said. “We can go as far as we want. But it’s really going to come from internal growth as a team. Not just in skills but mentally, as well, and being ready for the burden of the season.”
Lance Thomas, whom the Knicks re-signed to a four-year deal in July, applauded the hiring of Jeff Hornacek as coach because the coach wants to win and wasn’t interested in just landing a job, Kristian Winfield of Elite Sports NY writes.

Phil Jackson Regrets Not Acquiring Jae Crowder

August 26th, 2016 at 12:54pm CST by Luke Adams

Knicks president Phil Jackson met with Charley Rosen of TodaysFastBreak.com throughout the 2015/16 season to discuss the state of his franchise, and Rosen has been passing along the Zen Master’s comments in a series called “The Phil Jackson Chronicles.” In the latest installment of the series, Jackson admitted that he passed up on acquiring Jae Crowder in a 2014 trade, and views that as the “biggest mistake” he has made since joining the Knicks.

“One of the first deals I engineered when I came back to New York was to trade Tyson Chandler and Raymond Felton to Dallas for Shane Larkin, Jose Calderon, Wayne Ellington, Samuel Dalembert, plus a second-round pick that the Mavs owed to the Celtics,” Jackson said. “In talking with Boston, I was given the option of taking that pick or else taking Jae Crowder.

“I liked Crowder but I thought he wouldn’t get much of a chance to play behind Carmelo [Anthony], so I took the pick which turned out to be Cleanthony Early. While Cleanthony has missed lots of time in the past two seasons with us, he still has the potential to be a valuable player. Even so, I should have taken Crowder.”

Either Jackson’s comments or Rosen’s transcript seem a little off here, since the Celtics should have had no involvement in the Knicks’ negotiations with the Mavericks. The second-round pick that ultimately became Early was sent to Dallas by Boston in 2013, and the Mavs traded Crowder to the Celtics a few months after the Chandler deal, but the C’s weren’t involved in that Knicks/Mavs trade at all.

In any case, the main point of Jackson’s anecdote – that the Knicks had a choice of taking the No. 34 overall pick or Crowder – appears accurate, and of course Jackson ultimately choice the pick, using it to select Early.

At the time of the trade, Crowder was coming off a season in which he averaged just 4.6 PPG and 2.5 RPG in 16.1 minutes per contest. He was a career 40.9% shooter at that point in his career and hadn’t been more than a part-time role player, so it’s hard to criticize Jackson too much for not seeing a breakout coming — or not thinking that he could potentially get a similar player early in the second round of the 2014 draft.

Since then, however, Crowder has developed into one of the Celtics’ most valuable pieces. In 2015/16, he set career highs with 14.2 PPG, 5.1 RPG, 1.7 SPG, and a shooting line of .443/.336/.820. He’s also locked up on an affordable long-term deal through the 2019/20 season.

It’s impossible to know if Crowder would have enjoyed the same success in New York, or if the team would have been able to lock him up long-term, or even how his presence would have affected the Knicks’ other roster moves. But it’s still an interesting “what if?” worth considering, particularly since it may have had a domino effect on the Rajon Rondo trade between Boston and Dallas.

Stephen Jackson Interested In Knicks

August 25th, 2016 at 10:15am CST by Luke Adams

Stephen Jackson, another longtime NBA veteran attempting to make an NBA comeback, also appeared on SiriusXM NBA Radio this week (SoundCloud link). Jackson suggested he has “a good two years left” and named the Knicks, Bulls, and Pelicans as a few teams that would interest him. “I’m not one of those guys chasing the ring,” Jackson said. “I have one, so I’m really not one of those guys that’s looking to be a part of a championship team and try to steal a ring and not really earn it. … I just want to play basketball and do what I love to do.”

New York Notes: Rose, Carmelo, Lin, Nets

August 23rd, 2016 at 4:04pm CST by Luke Adams

Derrick Rose, traded by the Bulls to the Knicks two months ago, referred to his new squad as a “super team” last month, and recently doubled down on the assertion. In a conversation with Nick DePaula of The Vertical, the former MVP continued to rave about his new club and his new teammates.

“I just love the group,” Rose said. “I think everybody is on the same page. I love the culture that Phil [Jackson] is creating. Just the organization and franchise, I love everybody that’s working on it, and they seem like they’re very excited for everything. That just rubs off on people. … I think we have a chance to win every game, and in the league, that’s rare.”

While Rose expects a big year from the Knicks, Hoops Rumors commenters recently named the Nets as the most likely team to be the NBA’s worst in 2016/17. Here’s the latest out of New York on both squads:

Carmelo Anthony is riding high after winning his third Olympic gold medal this summer, but his supporting cast with the Knicks this season won’t be as star-studded as the one he enjoyed in Rio. Marc Berman of The New York Post examines the leadership role Anthony will have to assume for the new-look Knicks as they look to return to the postseason.
Nets CEO Brett Yormark, speaking at an event in Beijing, admitted that the Nets will market newly-signed point guard Jeremy Lin in an effort to tap into a new, Chinese-American fan base (link via Net Income of NetsDaily). However, Yormark says his team won’t try to recreate the “Linsanity” phenomenon, preferring to let things happen organically.
A separate NetsDaily piece focuses on the storylines to watch in Brooklyn with training camp around the corner, including Lin’s arrival, Bojan Bogdanovic‘s contract year, and the Nets‘ youth movement.