Knicks · Roster Anaysis (page 1)

I’ve been looking at the Ex 9 contracts and other team rosters. We basically have 3.27mm of cap space for 1 to 2 roster slots and 5 Ex 9 vets all potentially worthy of an NBA roster.

Ranked I have two buckets.

Eubanks vs Wiseman for C
Agbaji, Konchar and Brown vs Nickel for Wing

I’m looking through camp to see who performs. What Agbaji and Wiseman look like.

Brown - lost the Divincenzo bet when Indiana paid him 22.5m for one year with a team option. Got that dawg in him that we love.

Agbaji - 6’5 3&D that got traded from CLE to Utah. Only good look was Toronto. Hasn’t earned meaningful minutes to make any real judgment but was on my pre-draft wishlist. Think Lil OG 6’5 with a 6’10 wingspan. Capable of shooting 40% from three. 39” max vertical.

Wiseman - Injury prone center that never lived up to the #2 draft pick slot. 6’11 with a 7’6 wingspan. If he can learn to do the little things - in the mold of Drummond, Mitch Robinson.

Eubanks - Safer play. Offensive minded center that does a lot of little things. Lower upside but higher floor.

Konchar - Same “safer” analysis. Think backup to Hart. Same connector at 6’5 that can’t really shoot the long ball. Recorded two triple doubles in limited playing time this season.

Now. We only really have 1 slot until we start making roster moves.

At wing, Dadiet’s value is hard to understand. Great looking shot. Not enough minutes to develop. If we can trade him, his value is clearing another 500k or so while adding one of the Wings.

You have to look at Kolek vs the Wings as well, given our depth at Guard. But Kolek’s contract is below the Vet Min. So we would need to use $200k+ of cap space to make a Kolek for Vet Min swap.

Then you have Deuce. Not a salary dump. I don’t see any Ex 9 guy as individually better than Deuce. But Brown is a cheaper replacement if we could unlock trade value from Deuce where we have a bit of roster overlap.

Once we consider trading Deuce, we open up the guys across the league I care about.

Enter two of my current favorite low salary players on other teams. (Martin - feel free to co-favorite these). Both are potentially fighting for minutes with other young players.

Moussa Diabate (Cha) (PF/C)
GG Jackson (Mem)(PF)

Both CHA and MEM have good TPEs available.

In a world where we can trade Deuce, Dadiet and Kolek. Perhaps add some of our 13 2nds between now and 2032, I’d consider adding both. I don’t know final values here, but these trades are pretty easy cap wise. If I had a sense of their renewal costs vs the KAT and Hart extensions, I’d be interested.

I’m pretty high on Agbaji. Probably my top choice if this set after filling the backup C third string C position.

The rough logic though is that you can cease 4.4mm of additional cap space by trading Deuce, Dadiet and Kolek. If those three resulted in Jackson and Diabate, you’d have 7.6mm - enough for 3 more vets

Brown, Agbaji and I’d probably give Nickel a 4 year 2mm per contract. Or if Wiseman stubs in camp, well, then Nickel gets a two way.

I’d be up for

Brunson / Brown / GTA
Bridges / Shamet / Clarkson
Hart / Agbaji / Nickel
OG / Jackson / Diawara
KAT / [Wiseman or Diabate] / Drummond

Good options.

For what it’s worth, Knicks could ship out Dadiet without taking back salary, and have enough cap space to sign 2 vets and fit in Nickel as 15th man under the second round rookie contract. They can also just put Nickel as a 2-way and keep that 15th spot open and sign another vet in January, which is probably more likely. I’m curious how this vet camp battle plays out. The big men are underwhelming but Wiseman has some intrigue to me. Maybe there’s something interesting still there. Brown vs Konchar vs Agbaji is awesome battle of wings who just seem to be out of a contract due to circumstance. It’s a game of musical chairs each summer and with a new draft class coming in, they are 3 vets just stuck without chairs. I’d love to keep 2 of those guys, as they are all useable nba players. My vote would be no 3rd center and bring in 2 2-way centers to eat minutes. Maybe Wiseman is still 2-way eligible? Along with Robbins and Nickel as 2-way guys. Then re-address the center position in January. I think it would work fine.

Knicks could trade Dadiet, sign 2 of Brown, Kanchar and Agbaji. Have Wiseman, Robbins and Nickel as the 2-way guys. Keep slot 15 open. I think this would be the way to go.

Ingteresting takes! Thank you for sharing.
You got Kolek and Dadiet going out trades?
Diabate be my choice over Wiseman (obvious to most of us!). Wiseman be interesting if he has the prerequisite skills to warrent his inclusion but his physical projections? Sports medicine as this level is over the top and pretty good at predicting. Only thing he stands out at was him being the 2nd over all pick. That 2020 draft was crazy!

I say the Knicks should trade Dadiet to free up space but not until the very last minute. We might be able to trade him as other teams assess their rosters after camp. Plus, don't sign anyone of the free agents in camp until other teams make their cuts. Perhaps players better then wiseman and Eubanks become available.

Nalod wrote:Ingteresting takes! Thank you for sharing.
You got Kolek and Dadiet going out trades?
Diabate be my choice over Wiseman (obvious to most of us!). Wiseman be interesting if he has the prerequisite skills to warrent his inclusion but his physical projections? Sports medicine as this level is over the top and pretty good at predicting. Only thing he stands out at was him being the 2nd over all pick. That 2020 draft was crazy!

Mem and Cha are the most obvious partners - Mostly due to the fact that their roster positions both have an exceptional amount of big men and a lower amount of guards. They also both have a large amount of TPEs. Mem is on a different life cycle. CHA is possibly one cycle behind us. They want to compete, but cleared out the low eFG shooters in favor of stat heroes. We have stat hero guards to spare.

I think my point is before we fill in the roster off the Ex 9 list, I think we arguably put the end of the roster next to the Ex9 and possible trade candidates and see what shakes loose. Both GG and Diabate would jump the rotation line.

The Dadiet trade does seem likely. The Deuce trade seems less likely but the positional salary at guard starts to look skewed.