NBA: 5 takeaways from the biggest summer in league history
Taking a look at the five biggest takeaways from one of the most exciting and unpredictable NBA offseasons
As the 2019 NBA offseason slowly comes to an end, there’s no question that the Association as we know it has changed. From Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving signing with the Brooklyn Nets to the Los Angeles Lakers becoming relevant again, let’s take a look at the five biggest takeaways from what could possibly be the NBA’s most exciting offseasons in recent history.
(Also, don’t miss our latest edition of Around The Arc podcast, where we discuss the latest free agency happenings and the biggest signings of the summer.)
The Knicks – Fyre Fest of the NBA
Yikes. I think we should all be especially nice to New York Knicks fans for a couple of weeks. The plan for the Knicks has always been to hit a grand slam in the 2019 offseason. It was never a secret that the Knicks thought that Kevin Durant was coming to play at Madison Square Garden, and when he and Kyrie Irving were spotted chatting in the hallway during All-Star Weekend, rumors swirled that they were planning to team up and play for the Knicks once the season ended.
As we found at the start of free agency, Durant and Irving will be playing together…just not for the Knicks.
It would have been bad enough to just miss out on Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving – 29 teams missed out. But it makes it so much worse when the one team that lands both guys just so happens to play 30 minutes away in Brooklyn. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the Knicks then went on to make a series of very questionable signings.
Three years and 63 million for Julius Randle (per Spotrac) may prove to be a steep price, but I actually don’t mind that signing; Randle is a nice piece. The problem is every other signing after that. Using their open cap space on Bobby Portis, Reggie Bullock, Elfrid Payton, and Taj Gibson is just a plain misuse of their money. The Knicks could have become a junkyard for the rest of the league’s bad contracts, accepting future draft picks in exchange for taking on contracts that contending teams don’t want.
In doing so, you build a foundation for the future by selling your cap space to the highest bidder and taking your chances in the draft lottery.
The Atlanta Hawks are a perfect example of this with their trade for Allen Crabbe’s contract. They know they aren’t winning this year and were willing to take on that deal in exchange for two first-round picks. That’s the way you’re supposed to operate. The Knicks didn’t want to do that though and instead built a team full of rotation players. It’s team-building 101, and the Knicks failed.
The Knicks are the NBA equivalent of Billy McFarland – big promises and zero results. At this point, if you still believe that ownership and the front office will figure this out, then I can only assume that before you found this article you were texting your friends about how pumped you are for Fyre Fest 2 while simultaneously applying for a Magnises credit card. Snap out of it.