The Knicks are $3.58 million short of the second apron, and they just added a star. Late on a Friday night, New York agreed to send Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Karl-Anthony Towns.
The deal needed an earlier one to work. When the Knicks sent Bojan Bogdanovic and five first-round picks to Brooklyn for Mikal Bridges, they had to avoid taking back more salary than they sent out, or they would be locked into the $188.9 million second apron. They did it by including Shake Milton in a three-year, $9 million sign-and-trade with the Nets.
The numbers
New York has 13 players on guaranteed contracts. Marcus Morris Sr., Landry Shamet and Chuma Okeke are competing for the last two roster spots on non-guaranteed camp deals worth $3.3 million, $2.6 million and $2.4 million. Counting them, the payroll for 2024-25 stands at $185.35 million, against a second-apron line of $188.931 million. Rosters are due by Oct. 21.
Crossing the line would cost them plenty. A second-apron team cannot use the mid-level exception, aggregate contracts or send cash in trades, acquire players by sign-and-trade, take back more salary than it sends out, or keep trade exceptions from earlier years. Repeat offenders also see their first-round pick seven years out frozen and moved to the end of the draft. None of that applies to the Knicks yet.
They are already over the first apron, at $178.132 million. That bars them from signing buyout players whose old deals topped the $12.8 million non-taxpayer mid-level exception.
Who can move
If Towns, Bridges, OG Anunoby and Jalen Brunson stay put, the rest of the roster is Josh Hart, Mitchell Robinson, Precious Achiuwa, Miles McBride, Jericho Sims, Cameron Payne, Keita Bates-Diop, rookies Tyler Kolek and Pacome Dadiet, plus whichever two of Morris, Shamet and Okeke make it. Before the season, only Hart, Robinson, McBride, Sims, Bates-Diop and the rookies can be traded. Achiuwa, Morris, Shamet, Okeke and Payne become eligible on Dec. 15.
A package built around Robinson, McBride and a heavy dose of second-round picks is one option. Waiting until Dec. 15 is another, but it could leave the team short on depth for the first two months.
The starting five is versatile now, and the bench is thinner. Yahoo’s analysis said that unless the Knicks move salary out, they will end up a second-apron team this season, and the only open question is how they get there. The opener is Oct. 22 in Boston against the Celtics.
