Karl-Anthony Towns is in New York for Knicks media day. The blockbuster brings him to the Big Apple was agreed upon, and the whole basketball world knows where he will play this season. However, Towns will not speak at the Knicks’ media day, and no one on the team is allowed to discuss the deal under league rules. So what’s going on?
Well, the answer is both deceptively simple and perhaps quite complicated. Here’s the short version: the business is not technically complete. As of this moment, Karl-Anthony Towns is still a member of the Minnesota Timberwolves, while Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo are Knicks. Where things get complicated is why the deal has yet to be completed.
We mostly know the answer to that. It’s a salary issue. And we’ll dive into it in a second. First, we have to cover the weird dance of the Knicks’ media day, where coaches and players couldn’t comment on the trade because it’s not yet official.
“Can’t comment on it,” coach Tom Thibodeau said. “Nice try.”
“Who is Charles?” star guard Jalen Brunson joked. “Don’t know who that is.”
So why is the money in the yet-to-be-completed deal so complicated? Both the Knicks and Timberwolves were on the first apron before making this trade. Teams above the first apron cannot bring in more salary than they send in a trade. That meant they couldn’t trade with each other unless the dollar figures going both ways were equal, because picking up more money in a trade triggers a first apron hard cap that neither team is currently able to work around. This is where the Charlotte Hornets come in. They agreed to pick up the necessary money as a third party to make this business work.
But the reporting now suggests that this will not be a traditional salary. No, to make the money work here, it looks like the Knicks will sign and trade several of their own free agents to Charlotte for matchup purposes. Those players are Charlie Brown Jr., Duane Washington Jr. and DaQuan Jeffries. That means negotiating three separate contracts that fit within sign-and-trade rules, meaning the deals must last at least three years (although only the first one must be guaranteed).
To complicate all this further? Washington signed a contract with Partizan in Belgrade, which means he will have to work out a buyout there to participate. Most international contracts have NBA redemptions, so it shouldn’t be a real steal, but that doesn’t mean Partisan has any reason to operate on New York’s timeline.
That’s what we know, or at least what’s being reported at the moment. It is also worth noting that we do not know where this trade stands in terms of physical and medical reports, and it is also possible that both teams could try to expand the deal by including other veterans and options with a possible fourth team. We know the basic framework at play here. We can reasonably assume that the trade will eventually happen. But, just as the NBA forces draftees to wear the wrong hat on draft night when a trade is reported, league rules dictate that tampering rules be followed until the deal is official. Right now, Karl-Anthony Towns is not a member of the New York Knicks, and until all the i’s have been dotted and all the t’s have been crossed, the team must act as if no trade has taken place.
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