Knicks shopping David Lee - rumor

rainmaker

rainmaker

Hall of Famer
http://realgm.com/src_wiretap_archives/59642/20090607/knicks_hoping_to_sign_and_trade_lee/


I would love to get my hands on this guy. If we had a young, 3-man rotation consisting of Spencer, JT, and Lee, that would be a very promising young nucleus.

It looks like we will draft a pg with our top pick in the draft. Rubio, Flynn, and Holiday are the names I hear most. If we are going to pick up another big that will make an impact next season it will be through free agency or a trade. If Lee is available, I really want Geoff to go after him. I don't know what the Knicks are looking for in return, Kt's contract could be attractive to them since it comes off the books next summer, but acquiring Lee is something we should definately look in to.
 
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rainmaker said:
I would love to get my hands on this guy. If we had a young, 3-man rotation consisting of Spencer, JT, and Lee, that would be a very promising young nucleus.

It looks like we will draft a pg with our top pick in the draft. Rubio, Flynn, and Holiday are the names I hear most. If we are going to pick up another big that will make an impact next season it will be through free agency or a trade. If Lee is available, I really want Geoff to go after him. I don't know what the Knicks are looking for in return, Kt's contract could be attractive to them since it comes off the books next summer, but acquiring Lee is something we should definately look in to.
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So is he being shopped, or you just putting out a hypothetical? Because your title makes it sound like they are. Link?
 
rainmaker said:
I would love to get my hands on this guy. If we had a young, 3-man rotation consisting of Spencer, JT, and Lee, that would be a very promising young nucleus.

It looks like we will draft a pg with our top pick in the draft. Rubio, Flynn, and Holiday are the names I hear most. If we are going to pick up another big that will make an impact next season it will be through free agency or a trade. If Lee is available, I really want Geoff to go after him. I don't know what the Knicks are looking for in return, Kt's contract could be attractive to them since it comes off the books next summer, but acquiring Lee is something we should definately look in to.
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The same people that didn't want Blake Griffin because it would just fix a problem we don't have are going to be upset about this too. If we draft a PF or C with our 23 or 31 thats fine, but we don't want someone that we know is going to demand starting minutes taking away from our building blocks... Lets focus on getting a PG first then a SF and then we can start talking about bench players.
 
Warhawk said:
So is he being shopped, or you just putting out a hypothetical? Because your title makes it sound like they are. Link?
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I saw the same thing on several sites this morning. Real GM being one of them. All in the rumor sections. So he didn't make it up, but it is just a rumor. Its a rumor that makes sense however. According to what I read in the Real GM piece, the Knicks are trying to shed salary, so all their looking for is ending contracts. In other words, something like KT straight across for Lee.
 
Kings Faithful said:
. Lets focus on getting a PG first then a SF and then we can start talking about bench players.
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I disagree. We should focus on adding as much talent as possible, and if you can get a player like Lee for an expiring contract in KT, why not do it? And at this point, I think getting a quality big man is just as important, if not more important than getting another SF.
 
Vlade4GM said:
We shouldn't be commiting cap to a big with crap defense.
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I've liked Lee for some time, but, ultimately, this is what I end up thinking when looking at our existing roster. Our rebounding would finally be a plus, but our D would be pretty atrocious, and I find myself wondering if we could get Thabeet for Hawes.

So I'm not saying that I hate the idea, but I don't see it as a complete transaction. We'd need to do something else to make it work. Otherwise we might as well get Shawn Bradley as our big man coach.
 
Bricklayer said:
Not needed any longer at what he would cost and Hawes/JT/Lee would be hopeless defensively.
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I'm not really sure why you've given up on Hawes and Thompson on the defensive end. While I'll agree that neither will ever be a great shot blocker, I see no reason, that with the right coaching they couldn't become decent to good defensive players. Lee on the other hand has been in the league long enough to get a read on.

Thompson was the defensive player of the year in his conference, so he at least has shown the inclination to play defense. And I'm not equating his conference with the NBA. I just think the jury is still out on both of them, especially Thompson who is blessed with more athleticism than Hawes is. God I just love dangling participles..:)
 
We don't need Lee. Or Blair either for that matter. We need someone who doesn't have a first name for a last name...err, I mean...we need someone that can actually play defense and block shots. Blair is a better fit than Lee though, with Thompson and Hawes already on the roster.
 
bajaden said:
I'm not really sure why you've given up on Hawes and Thompson on the defensive end. While I'll agree that neither will ever be a great shot blocker, I see no reason, that with the right coaching they couldn't become decent to good defensive players. Lee on the other hand has been in the league long enough to get a read on.
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I know you are really high on Thompson -- and you can read that either way ;) -- but if anything his hustle game may have been disguising his defeciencies rather than being a great sign for his future.

And while one or the other or both of them may eventually become decent defenders -- indeed, if they cannot we should just dump their asses now -- there is no way in hell they ever become good enough to carry David Lee to being a strong defensive frontcourt. Give them a true anchor up front and let them try to develop into decent enough support defenders and maybe -- that's a reasonable hope. Give them a sieve up front and ask them to cover for it and there is just no freaking way. They covered for nothing last year -- probably the least effective full size frontcourt (i.e. not G.S. or N.Y.) in the league defensively. Spencer is afraid of contact, and Jason lacked instincts, timing and length, and he's old for a rookie. He's not one of these rookies from the last decade, he's a rookie circa 1990 or something when everybody used to stay 4 years. Those guys can still settle in and grow -- Otis Thorpe is a good example of a guy with similar first year numbers. But they don't radically change their games or capabilities at that age. Like rebounders, good defenders defend from the time they enter the league. A poor one may become respectable, a good one great, but its rare for a terrible one to become a good one.
 
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Bricklayer said:
Not needed any longer at what he would cost and Hawes/JT/Lee would be hopeless defensively.
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After watching Earl Clark, I'd be intrigued with a Hawes/JT/Clark scenario...and Earl might even be able to motivate Hawes and JT into a couple of blocked shots.

:)
 
Clark has some serious potential defensively for sure. He'd be able to switch off onto wing players better than anyone else in the league with his agility.
 
If we have settled for Hawes/Thompson front court going forward, then the 3rd big MUST be a very good defender/rebounder/shotblocker who can ideally play PF and C.

Adding another average defender to an already average defenders will ensure we NEVER do anything significant
 
I do not want any Knicks on this team. Now, back in Feb - Nate for K9 was a different story, but we do not need any Knicks on our team at this point in our rebuild.
 
We're talking about a sign-n-trade for David Lee. And committing any long term salary to a role player at this point is just dumb. Please let there be no more stupid MLE or sign-n-trade for guys who are not stars.
 
bajaden said:
I'm not really sure why you've given up on Hawes and Thompson on the defensive end. While I'll agree that neither will ever be a great shot blocker, I see no reason, that with the right coaching they couldn't become decent to good defensive players. Lee on the other hand has been in the league long enough to get a read on.

Thompson was the defensive player of the year in his conference, so he at least has shown the inclination to play defense. And I'm not equating his conference with the NBA. I just think the jury is still out on both of them, especially Thompson who is blessed with more athleticism than Hawes is. God I just love dangling participles..:)
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Agreed. They need coaching and time to become good defensive players. If we could have a good coach, and then a couple of years of stability (not firing the coach), I think we would see good team defense, Hawes and JT included.
 
Bricklayer said:
I know you are really high on Thompson -- and you can read that either way ;) -- but if anything his hustle game may have been disguising his defeciencies rather than being a great sign for his future.

And while one or the other or both of them may eventually become decent defenders -- indeed, if they cannot we should just dump their asses now -- there is no way in hell they ever become good enough to carry David Lee to being a strong defensive frontcourt. Give them a true anchor up front and let them try to develop into decent enough support defenders and maybe -- that's a reasonable hope. Give them a sieve up front and ask them to cover for it and there is just no freaking way. They covered for nothing last year -- probably the least effective full size frontcourt (i.e. not G.S. or N.Y.) in the league defensively. Spencer is afraid of contact, and Jason lacked instincts, timing and length, and he's old for a rookie. He's not one of these rookies from the last decade, he's a rookie circa 1990 or something when everybody used to stay 4 years. Those guys can still settle in and grow -- Otis Thorpe is a good example of a guy with similar first year numbers. But they don't radically change their games or capabilities at that age. Like rebounders, good defenders defend from the time they enter the league. A poor one may become respectable, a good one great, but its rare for a terrible one to become a good one.
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First off, let me make it clear that in no way am I advocating a sign and trade for Lee. I agree with that any other big we bring in should be someone that can help out on the defensive end. Whereas our opinions about Thompson are subjective, there's no point in beating a dead horse. I just think he'll turn out to be better on defense than you do. We'll see.

Hawes is another story. He's not as athletic as Thompson, but he is longer, which lends itself to being a shot blocker. To me his problem tends to be lack of strength in the low post. Which leads to another quandry. How would putting on another 20 or 25 pounds of muscle affect his knee's. Would they be supportive of the extra weight? I don't know the answer, but if not, then he'll never be a good low post man defender against the bigger centers in the league.

Which brings us back to low post help. I'm more and more starting to lean in the direction of Gortat. He's a freeagent, and played for a couple of dollars and a bag of chips last year. I know that the Knicks have expressed interest in him and have said they might use their MLE to sign him. Obviously we have the cap space to pay him more. But do we really want to tie that much money up in a one dimensional player. It is of course possible that the Knicks are just blowing smoke.
 
bajaden said:
Hawes is another story. He's not as athletic as Thompson, but he is longer, which lends itself to being a shot blocker. To me his problem tends to be lack of strength in the low post. Which leads to another quandry. How would putting on another 20 or 25 pounds of muscle affect his knee's. Would they be supportive of the extra weight? I don't know the answer, but if not, then he'll never be a good low post man defender against the bigger centers in the league.
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If done effectively, it should in the long run help his knees as the muscles around his knees will help support the motion. I know it's a sidebar to the original conversation, but thought it would help.

As for Lee, I also think that ship has sailed. At least, I hope it has. He doesn't bring anything different to the team than what we already have, or may have.
 
I'm no Lee fan and at this point I don't see us going after him.

bajaden said:
Which brings us back to low post help. I'm more and more starting to lean in the direction of Gortat. He's a freeagent, and played for a couple of dollars and a bag of chips last year. I know that the Knicks have expressed interest in him and have said they might use their MLE to sign him. Obviously we have the cap space to pay him more. But do we really want to tie that much money up in a one dimensional player. It is of course possible that the Knicks are just blowing smoke.
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Speaking of Gortat, hoopsworld (yeah I know) wrote that we seem to be interested in him.

Several teams have commented to HOOPSWORLD that Gortat is on the top of their free agent board including the Sacramento Kings and Houston Rockets. The New York Knicks have also expressed interest, which should come as no surprise considering the Knicks' director of pro scouting is former Magic GM John Gabriel, who does most of his scouting at Magic games.

source: http://www.hoopsworld.com/Story.asp?story_id=12884
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I would like to sign Gortat. He is definitely a less flashy signing than say, the Birdman, but he is a great post defender, rebounder, and can also block some shots. He is also 25 years old, which is pretty young and could fit in well with our rebuild.
 
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