Dennis Smith Jr. insisted today that he wants to remain in New York, but rumors persist that he wouldn’t object to a trade, writes Marc Berman of The New York Post.
Asked about that possibility at this morning’s shootaround, Smith responded, “I like playing for the Knicks. So whatever I’ve got to do, I’m going to take care of that.’’
When pressed on the topic, Smith said, “I want to be here” and “My thing is to take care of what I got going on now. I’m with the New York Knicks, so I try to be the best version of me with this team.”
Berman notes that Smith became concerned about his future in New York when the Knicks signed free agent Elfrid Payton in July and virtually promised him the starting point guard role. Smith’s camp considered asking for a trade at that point, but decided against it. Shams Charania of The Athletic reported this week that executives from several teams have contacted the Knicks about trading for Smith, and they believe he would welcome a fresh start.
“The way I look at it, of course, you come in and you want to play,’’ Smith said. “I don’t know how much you’re supposed to feed into it. You want to see (Payton) do well. You want to do well yourself. That’s what it’s really about.’’
Smith, Payton and Frank Ntilikina have been staging a three-way battle for playing time at point guard since training camp. Smith is currently at the back of the line, averaging just 16.1 minutes per night, and will miss his second straight game tonight with a strained oblique. He was slowed by a back injury in training camp and left the team for two weeks after his stepmother died.
The injuries and the lack of playing time are driving down Smith’s trade value, creating a difficult situation for team president Steve Mills and GM Scott Perry, who are already on shaky ground. Smith was the centerpiece of the deal that sent Kristaps Porzingis to the Mavericks in January, and it would be embarrassing for the front office to ship him off now without getting something significant in return.
So glad Dallas traded him. I thought he was trash when we drafted him
As it turns out, the trade that took Dennis Smith Jr. to the Knicks would have been bad for them even if you exclude Porzingis (since Hardaway Jr. is proving to be a more than able starter). Another genius move from NY’s front office.
The real reason they made the trade was to allegedly clear cap space, but I think that anyone could have predicted that they weren’t landing a superstar with it
Has anyone considered that Mills and Perry may have been on the take, may have taken money from Dallas ownership to push this deal through? Of course a trade like that is ownership level on the Knicks end, but the Tweedles clearly has a ton of influence on the final package accepted.
Nope
Not smart enough.
That knowledge is time sensitive. At some point, it was said that Durant favored the Knicks, but Irving the Nets. But who trusts Irving? Mostly I think the Zinger trade happened very quickly, before the rumors about Irving’s Nets preference would have made Mills more cautious.
Also, at the time, there was the rape accusation against Porzingis at the height of the MeToo witchHunt. He’s very lucky to have avoided being blacklisted.
I think we should keep Randle, RJ, Mitchell and Payton. Trade Knox, Portis and DSJ for draft picks or for Kat if he becomes available. Obviously in that scenario we would have to trade the Dallas draft picks