Now that the New York Knicks have been eliminated from the postseason, there is only one question:
What is next?
The Knicks defied expectations this season, going from what many perceived as a team buried in the bottom of the standings to a roster of overachieving players.
The hard part now comes with taking that next step from first-round fodder to a team that can have success in the playoffs.
Managing expectations
No team in the NBA this season outperformed expectations more than New York. Predicted to win 24.7 games when the season started and finish with the third-worst record in the NBA, New York won 41 games and reached the playoffs for the first time since 2013.
The work by the Knicks this season has not gone unnoticed. In the most recent edition of ESPN's Future Power Rankings, New York jumped from No. 27 last March to No. 7.
New York's 22-win improvement was not a result of taking a one-year approach, spending recklessly in free agency or making shortsighted trades for a quick fix. Instead, it was about the Knicks hiring the right coach in Tom Thibodeau and identifying the right talent (either in free agency or in trades) that fit his style of play.
The end result has given New York a blueprint to use as the front office builds the roster, not only this offseason but in the future.
Fair or unfair, now the focus will turn to how New York can, at the minimum, duplicate the success from this season and ideally take another step forward. A team that many thought would be in the lottery now goes from under the radar to one expected to win each night and contend for a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference.
Roster building in the NBA is humbling, and history has proved that one ill-advised transaction can send a team that overachieved in one season to one stuck on the treadmill of mediocrity for the foreseeable future.
Own free agents, cap space, trade market or a combination of all 3?
Entering this offseason, the Knicks have multiple options for continuing to improve the roster:
Building through the draft, internal development of their own players and re-signing key free agents such as Derrick Rose and Alec Burks.
Looking to land a big-name free agent with up to $50 million in cap space (though at the expense of their own free agents).
Making a big trade, using a combination of cap space, draft picks and young players on controllable contracts.
Let's take a look at all three paths in more detail.
Own free agents
The "placeholder" phrase is usually referenced when a player is on a one-year contract and the team has no intention to sign once the season ends -- and was unfairly used (by this writer) when describing the Knicks' additions of Derrick Rose, Alec Burks, Reggie Bullock and Nerlens Noel.
Each of those four has proved to have value to New York, giving the team reason to bring them back in 2021-22.
Rose, now a decade removed from his pre-injury MVP season, continues to show that age is just a number. In his 35 regular-season games with New York, the 32-year-old Rose averaged 14.9 points on 48.7% shooting from the field. In the first-round loss to Atlanta, Rose averaged 22.8 points and shot 50.7% from the field and 50% from 3. He finished third this season in league's Sixth Man of the Year voting.
After splitting time in Golden State and Philadelphia last year, Burks signed a one-year, $6 million contract in November. The guard scored double-digit points 28 times this season while shooting 41.5% from 3.
Bullock started 64 games at small forward this season, averaging 10.9 points. He ranked second among all small forwards in defensive real plus-minus.
Noel started 41 games at center and averaged 2.2 blocks per game, ranking third in the NBA behind Myles Turner and Rudy Gobert.
Of course, the question for each will come down to both price and length of a new contract. The four players have outplayed their current contracts by a total of $28.4 million, per ProFitX, with Rose coming in at $15.1 million. (He earned $7.7 million this season.)
Would New York commit multiyear contracts and at a significant cost to keep the same roster together?
The 2015-16 Miami Heat are a good example of the downside of falling in love with your own free agents. The Heat finished that season 48-34 and lost in the second round to Toronto. In the offseason, they signed their own free agents to four-year contracts: James Johnson ($60 million), Tyler Johnson ($50 million) and Dion Waiters ($47.3 million).
The following season, they finished .500, and they missed the playoffs in two of the next three seasons.
Cap space
In November, the Leon Rose-led front office took a conservative approach in its first offseason at the helm, mostly adding players on one-year contracts. Now, a season later, the Knicks are once again in position to have more than $50 million in cap space available. The difference now is that the goalposts have moved; New York is no longer in the early stages of a rebuild.
New York could make a big splash in free agency, but doing so would likely mean having to renounce some of their own free agents, including Rose, Noel, Burks and Bullock. It is unlikely that New York could re-sign all four players and still have significant room available to target a player such as Kyle Lowry, DeMar DeRozan, Dennis Schroder or Lonzo Ball.
The Knicks front office showed patience last offseason, and that should continue again if their primary targets are off the board.
The disgruntled All-Star
There will be a time in the next year, maybe as soon as this summer, when the next All-NBA player will ask out of his current situation. When he does, the Knicks will have a decision to make.
Do they push all their assets to the middle of the table if a player like Damian Lillard or Bradley Beal becomes available or do they continue to let this roster grow organically?
The James Harden trade in January confirmed that the asking price for a franchise player with multiple years left on their contract is three unprotected firsts, rights to swap first and players with high upside on controllable contracts. Right now, the Knicks check the boxes on all three categories.
As their crosstown rival Brooklyn Nets showed, signing stars like Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving with cap space is the more efficient way to build a roster, because it does not deplete existing depth.
However, there is no Durant or Irving in this year's free-agent crop (unless, of course, Kawhi Leonard elects not to remain with the LA Clippers), and the Knicks next best chance to acquire an All-Star could be on the trade front and not in free agency.
When Randle signed a three-year, $60 million contract in 2019, the conversation two years later was certain to be about whether New York was going to guarantee the last year of his salary.
At the time when he signed the contract, Randle was not viewed as an All-Star, and only $4 million of his $19.8 million salary was guaranteed. The small protection in salary gave New York an out if the forward underperformed and it wanted to go in a different direction.
Now, two years later, even after a disappointing playoff showing, Randle's contract is seen as one of the best bargains in the NBA.
According to ProFitX, Randle outperformed his contract in 2020-21 by $13 million, and he is on pace to earn close to a max contract when he is a free agent in 2022.
Because Randle does not meet the renegotiation requirements (third anniversary of a four-year contract) to bump up his salary in 2021-22, the only financial option that New York has is to offer Randle a four-year, $106 million extension.
Despite an underwhelming performance in the playoffs, it is likely that Randle turns down that extension, not because he does not want to play in New York but because the $23.7 million starting salary is $11 million less than what he could earn with New York or perhaps another team in 2022.
A five-year contract with the Knicks in 2022 projects to come in $100 million higher.
"I want to be a part of building something from the ground up. There's no better place than New York to do it, no better organization or fan base that's hungrier ... than here in New York," Randle said on The Woj Pod. "I want to be a part of that, honestly, for the rest of my career. I wanted to be one of the greats here ... I don't think there would be any better place to win other than here."
Unlike rookie extensions that cannot be extended once the regular season begins, there is no deadline for Randle to sign an extension, because he is in the last year of his contract.
One argument in favor of Randle signing the extension, even if it is below the value he might be able to get on the open market in 2022, is his minutes load. He played more minutes than any NBA player in 2020-21. Can his body sustain playing at the same All-NBA pace with a heavy workload for a second consecutive season?
That is a question Randle will have to answer this offseason on whether to pass on $106 million in guaranteed money or bet on himself as a free agent.
Note: ProFitX is a dynamic financial and performance index powered by Artificial Intelligence with front-office optics displaying 17 visual and time-series models for 480-plus NBA athletes. The Athledex models historical, dynamic and future performance data to monitor and project insights on contracts, performance, injuries, team fit, development and potential.
Offseason cap breakdown
Team needs
Starting PG and SF
Depth at every position except PF
Resources to build the roster
Cap space: $50 million-plus in 2021-22 and $13 million at the draft
The draft: two first-round picks and a second-rounder (from Detroit)
Future draft assets: own and Dallas (2023)
Exceptions: $4.9 million room midlevel (if under the cap)
Cash: $5.8 million to send or receive in a trade
Dates to watch
• Randle has $4 million guaranteed in his contract, with the remaining $15.8 million becoming guaranteed if he is on the roster past July 31.
• The Knicks have until Aug. 1 to exercise the $1.8 million team option of Mitchell Robinson. If the option is declined, Robinson will become a restricted free agent if New York tenders him a $2.1 million qualifying offer. If the option is exercised, Robinson would then become an unrestricted free agent in 2022.
• New York has until Aug. 1 to tender Frank Ntilikina a one-year, $7.0 million qualifying offer. The one-year contract is $1.3 million less than what Ntilikina could have received because the guard failed to reach the starter criteria in his contract. The former top-10 pick played a career-low 33 games and 9.8 minutes per game this season. If the Knicks make the qualifying offer, they would have until mid-August to pull it without Ntilikina's consent.
Restrictions
• Robinson cannot be traded until New York exercises the team option in his contract.
• The guaranteed portion of salary for Randle ($4 million), Luca Vildoza ($0) and Norvel Pelle ($0) count as outgoing salary in a trade.
Extension eligible
• Besides Randle, the Knicks have until the day prior to the start of the season to extend former lottery pick Kevin Knox II. The forward appeared in only 16 games after the All-Star break, playing a total of 68 minutes.
• Robinson becomes extension eligible if the Knicks exercise his $1.8 million team option for 2021-22. Before breaking his right foot in late March, Robinson had been averaging 8.2 points, 8.1 rebounds and 1.5 blocks. He is eligible for an additional four seasons and up to a projected $55 million in new money.
The draft
The Knicks head into the draft with four selections: their own first-round pick, a first-round pick from the Mavericks, an early second-round pick from the Pistons that has similar value to a first-round pick and a late second-round pick (from Philadelphia).
New York also owns all of its future first-round picks and has a future first-round pick from Dallas that is top-10 protected in 2023, 2024 and 2025. If it does not convey by 2025, it turns into a 2025 second-round pick.
Here's how ESPN's Jonathan Givony and Mike Schmitz have New York selecting in July:
No. 19 (via DAL): James Bouknight | SG | Connecticut
No. 21 (own): Ziaire Williams | SG/SF | Stanford
No. 32 (via DET): Day'Ron Sharpe | C | North Carolina
No. 58 (via PHI): Santi Aldama | PF | Loyola Maryland
Knicks president Leon Rose was active in his first draft in November. The first trade saw New York send a 2020 second-rounder (from Charlotte) to Utah and move up four slots in the first round (from No. 27 to No. 23). The first from Utah was then sent to Minnesota as a part of a three-team trade with Oklahoma City. In return, the Knicks received the rights to Immanuel Quickley (No. 25) and a second-round pick from Detroit in 2023.
Now that the New York Knicks have been eliminated from the postseason, there is only one question:
What is next?
The Knicks defied expectations this season, going from what many perceived as a team buried in the bottom of the standings to a roster of overachieving players.
The hard part now comes with taking that next step from first-round fodder to a team that can have success in the playoffs.
Managing expectations
No team in the NBA this season outperformed expectations more than New York. Predicted to win 24.7 games when the season started and finish with the third-worst record in the NBA, New York won 41 games and reached the playoffs for the first time since 2013.
The work by the Knicks this season has not gone unnoticed. In the most recent edition of ESPN's Future Power Rankings, New York jumped from No. 27 last March to No. 7.
New York's 22-win improvement was not a result of taking a one-year approach, spending recklessly in free agency or making shortsighted trades for a quick fix. Instead, it was about the Knicks hiring the right coach in Tom Thibodeau and identifying the right talent (either in free agency or in trades) that fit his style of play.
The end result has given New York a blueprint to use as the front office builds the roster, not only this offseason but in the future.
Fair or unfair, now the focus will turn to how New York can, at the minimum, duplicate the success from this season and ideally take another step forward. A team that many thought would be in the lottery now goes from under the radar to one expected to win each night and contend for a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference.
Roster building in the NBA is humbling, and history has proved that one ill-advised transaction can send a team that overachieved in one season to one stuck on the treadmill of mediocrity for the foreseeable future.
Own free agents, cap space, trade market or a combination of all 3?
Entering this offseason, the Knicks have multiple options for continuing to improve the roster:
Building through the draft, internal development of their own players and re-signing key free agents such as Derrick Rose and Alec Burks.
Looking to land a big-name free agent with up to $50 million in cap space (though at the expense of their own free agents).
Making a big trade, using a combination of cap space, draft picks and young players on controllable contracts.
Let's take a look at all three paths in more detail.
Own free agents
The "placeholder" phrase is usually referenced when a player is on a one-year contract and the team has no intention to sign once the season ends -- and was unfairly used (by this writer) when describing the Knicks' additions of Derrick Rose, Alec Burks, Reggie Bullock and Nerlens Noel.
Each of those four has proved to have value to New York, giving the team reason to bring them back in 2021-22.
Rose, now a decade removed from his pre-injury MVP season, continues to show that age is just a number. In his 35 regular-season games with New York, the 32-year-old Rose averaged 14.9 points on 48.7% shooting from the field. In the first-round loss to Atlanta, Rose averaged 22.8 points and shot 50.7% from the field and 50% from 3. He finished third this season in league's Sixth Man of the Year voting.
After splitting time in Golden State and Philadelphia last year, Burks signed a one-year, $6 million contract in November. The guard scored double-digit points 28 times this season while shooting 41.5% from 3.
Bullock started 64 games at small forward this season, averaging 10.9 points. He ranked second among all small forwards in defensive real plus-minus.
Noel started 41 games at center and averaged 2.2 blocks per game, ranking third in the NBA behind Myles Turner and Rudy Gobert.
Of course, the question for each will come down to both price and length of a new contract. The four players have outplayed their current contracts by a total of $28.4 million, per ProFitX, with Rose coming in at $15.1 million. (He earned $7.7 million this season.)
Would New York commit multiyear contracts and at a significant cost to keep the same roster together?
The 2015-16 Miami Heat are a good example of the downside of falling in love with your own free agents. The Heat finished that season 48-34 and lost in the second round to Toronto. In the offseason, they signed their own free agents to four-year contracts: James Johnson ($60 million), Tyler Johnson ($50 million) and Dion Waiters ($47.3 million).
The following season, they finished .500, and they missed the playoffs in two of the next three seasons.
Cap space
In November, the Leon Rose-led front office took a conservative approach in its first offseason at the helm, mostly adding players on one-year contracts. Now, a season later, the Knicks are once again in position to have more than $50 million in cap space available. The difference now is that the goalposts have moved; New York is no longer in the early stages of a rebuild.
New York could make a big splash in free agency, but doing so would likely mean having to renounce some of their own free agents, including Rose, Noel, Burks and Bullock. It is unlikely that New York could re-sign all four players and still have significant room available to target a player such as Kyle Lowry, DeMar DeRozan, Dennis Schroder or Lonzo Ball.
The Knicks front office showed patience last offseason, and that should continue again if their primary targets are off the board.
The disgruntled All-Star
There will be a time in the next year, maybe as soon as this summer, when the next All-NBA player will ask out of his current situation. When he does, the Knicks will have a decision to make.
Do they push all their assets to the middle of the table if a player like Damian Lillard or Bradley Beal becomes available or do they continue to let this roster grow organically?
The James Harden trade in January confirmed that the asking price for a franchise player with multiple years left on their contract is three unprotected firsts, rights to swap first and players with high upside on controllable contracts. Right now, the Knicks check the boxes on all three categories.
As their crosstown rival Brooklyn Nets showed, signing stars like Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving with cap space is the more efficient way to build a roster, because it does not deplete existing depth.
However, there is no Durant or Irving in this year's free-agent crop (unless, of course, Kawhi Leonard elects not to remain with the LA Clippers), and the Knicks next best chance to acquire an All-Star could be on the trade front and not in free agency.
When Randle signed a three-year, $60 million contract in 2019, the conversation two years later was certain to be about whether New York was going to guarantee the last year of his salary.
At the time when he signed the contract, Randle was not viewed as an All-Star, and only $4 million of his $19.8 million salary was guaranteed. The small protection in salary gave New York an out if the forward underperformed and it wanted to go in a different direction.
Now, two years later, even after a disappointing playoff showing, Randle's contract is seen as one of the best bargains in the NBA.
According to ProFitX, Randle outperformed his contract in 2020-21 by $13 million, and he is on pace to earn close to a max contract when he is a free agent in 2022.
Because Randle does not meet the renegotiation requirements (third anniversary of a four-year contract) to bump up his salary in 2021-22, the only financial option that New York has is to offer Randle a four-year, $106 million extension.
Despite an underwhelming performance in the playoffs, it is likely that Randle turns down that extension, not because he does not want to play in New York but because the $23.7 million starting salary is $11 million less than what he could earn with New York or perhaps another team in 2022.
A five-year contract with the Knicks in 2022 projects to come in $100 million higher.
"I want to be a part of building something from the ground up. There's no better place than New York to do it, no better organization or fan base that's hungrier ... than here in New York," Randle said on The Woj Pod. "I want to be a part of that, honestly, for the rest of my career. I wanted to be one of the greats here ... I don't think there would be any better place to win other than here."
Unlike rookie extensions that cannot be extended once the regular season begins, there is no deadline for Randle to sign an extension, because he is in the last year of his contract.
One argument in favor of Randle signing the extension, even if it is below the value he might be able to get on the open market in 2022, is his minutes load. He played more minutes than any NBA player in 2020-21. Can his body sustain playing at the same All-NBA pace with a heavy workload for a second consecutive season?
That is a question Randle will have to answer this offseason on whether to pass on $106 million in guaranteed money or bet on himself as a free agent.
Note: ProFitX is a dynamic financial and performance index powered by Artificial Intelligence with front-office optics displaying 17 visual and time-series models for 480-plus NBA athletes. The Athledex models historical, dynamic and future performance data to monitor and project insights on contracts, performance, injuries, team fit, development and potential.
Offseason cap breakdown
Team needs
Starting PG and SF
Depth at every position except PF
Resources to build the roster
Cap space: $50 million-plus in 2021-22 and $13 million at the draft
The draft: two first-round picks and a second-rounder (from Detroit)
Future draft assets: own and Dallas (2023)
Exceptions: $4.9 million room midlevel (if under the cap)
Cash: $5.8 million to send or receive in a trade
Dates to watch
• Randle has $4 million guaranteed in his contract, with the remaining $15.8 million becoming guaranteed if he is on the roster past July 31.
• The Knicks have until Aug. 1 to exercise the $1.8 million team option of Mitchell Robinson. If the option is declined, Robinson will become a restricted free agent if New York tenders him a $2.1 million qualifying offer. If the option is exercised, Robinson would then become an unrestricted free agent in 2022.
• New York has until Aug. 1 to tender Frank Ntilikina a one-year, $7.0 million qualifying offer. The one-year contract is $1.3 million less than what Ntilikina could have received because the guard failed to reach the starter criteria in his contract. The former top-10 pick played a career-low 33 games and 9.8 minutes per game this season. If the Knicks make the qualifying offer, they would have until mid-August to pull it without Ntilikina's consent.
Restrictions
• Robinson cannot be traded until New York exercises the team option in his contract.
• The guaranteed portion of salary for Randle ($4 million), Luca Vildoza ($0) and Norvel Pelle ($0) count as outgoing salary in a trade.
Extension eligible
• Besides Randle, the Knicks have until the day prior to the start of the season to extend former lottery pick Kevin Knox II. The forward appeared in only 16 games after the All-Star break, playing a total of 68 minutes.
• Robinson becomes extension eligible if the Knicks exercise his $1.8 million team option for 2021-22. Before breaking his right foot in late March, Robinson had been averaging 8.2 points, 8.1 rebounds and 1.5 blocks. He is eligible for an additional four seasons and up to a projected $55 million in new money.
The draft
The Knicks head into the draft with four selections: their own first-round pick, a first-round pick from the Mavericks, an early second-round pick from the Pistons that has similar value to a first-round pick and a late second-round pick (from Philadelphia).
New York also owns all of its future first-round picks and has a future first-round pick from Dallas that is top-10 protected in 2023, 2024 and 2025. If it does not convey by 2025, it turns into a 2025 second-round pick.
Here's how ESPN's Jonathan Givony and Mike Schmitz have New York selecting in July:
No. 19 (via DAL): James Bouknight | SG | Connecticut
No. 21 (own): Ziaire Williams | SG/SF | Stanford
No. 32 (via DET): Day'Ron Sharpe | C | North Carolina
No. 58 (via PHI): Santi Aldama | PF | Loyola Maryland
Knicks president Leon Rose was active in his first draft in November. The first trade saw New York send a 2020 second-rounder (from Charlotte) to Utah and move up four slots in the first round (from No. 27 to No. 23). The first from Utah was then sent to Minnesota as a part of a three-team trade with Oklahoma City. In return, the Knicks received the rights to Immanuel Quickley (No. 25) and a second-round pick from Detroit in 2023.
