The NBA off-season is beginning to wind down, but there’s always the possibility for one or two more moves to drastically shift the landscape of the NBA. Just last off-season, the Celtics acquired Jrue Holiday in late September. With Summer League almost in the books and teams evaluating the margins of their roster, a lot of attention is going to be placed on the small ways that teams can get better.
If there is one thing the Knicks have done this offseason, it’s to think big. This summer, they sent over an unprecedented haul of picks – five total first-rounders and an unprotected pick swap – for forward Mikal Bridges. Usually, the players that demand such a haul are All-NBA caliber. Whether or not the move was the right one remains to be seen. However, the Knicks front office is clearly not a team that is afraid to push in their chips for a team that they believe can win right now.
The Timberwolves are in an interesting situation. After the franchise’s best season since their 2003 Western Conference Finals run with Kevin Garnett at the helm, they now face the prospect of an increasingly expensive team. The core of Anthony Edwards, Rudy Gobert, Karl-Anthony Towns and Jaden McDaniels are all locked up on extensions that leave Minnesota with very little flexibility. The restricitive second-apron penalties force them to consider the possibility of trading one of those names either this off-season or during the next one.
Rumors of Towns being traded to New York in order to fix this problem have persisted for weeks. Knicks insider CP The Franchise on Knicks Fan TV suggested this about New York’s interest in KAT on July 10:
“Think about this. We talked about all the moves that they made this offseason to get themselves some more wiggle room with the cap. They made the Shake Milton trade, they signed him, they put him in the Bridges trade. You have Brunson, who’s considering taking considerably less to sign an extension. They didn’t sign Julius Randle to an extension. They didn’t sign Julius to an extension. I’ll tell you this: they’re bigger fans of Karl-Anthony Towns.”
