Guard-less Knicks won?t call Iverson

tripleaamin9

Benchwarmer
http://www.nypost.com/p/sports/knic...bPXlRzEaf6O?utm_medium=rss&utm_content=Knicks
The Knicks desperately need guards. Allen Iverson desperately needs a job.
But The Post has learned Iverson is one CAA client the Knicks won?t pursue, deeming it too big a gamble. The mercurial 76ers great appeared in Philadelphia on Wednesday for his former team?s Game 6 against the Celtics and told a national TV audience: ?I want to play basketball so bad.?
Knicks coach Mike Woodson was on Larry Brown?s Sixers staff for two seasons coaching Iverson, 36, who last played in Turkey in 2010-11.
Knicks general manager Glen Grunwald acknowledged on Friday?s conference call announcing Woodson?s new contract that the Knicks will seek to solidify the backcourt this offseason. Even if they re-sign point guard Jeremy Lin and shooting guard Landry Fields, which Grunwald says is the plan, the Knicks need help.



Rookie combo guard Iman Shumpert (torn ACL) may miss the season?s first two months and Baron Davis is out for next season. Toney Douglas is the only guard under contract.
?We have two guards who are restricted free agents, so we?ll be able to retain them,?? Grunwald said of Lin and Fields. ?The question is then how we fill out the rest because Baron suffered a pretty bad injury and he?s not going to be able to play next year. And Shump is going to be out a bit recovering from his injuries. We?re going to have to see if we can upgrade the rest of the roster while Shump is out.??
The Knicks are waiting to see if shooting guard J.R. Smith, arrested Thursday in South Beach, will decline his $2.5 million option for next season. The Knicks could retain Smith anyway if he opts out by giving him a 20-percent raise that would not count against their $5 million mid-level exception, which is being reserved for Lin.
But free-agent sharpshooter Steve Novak probably is a goner unless the union wins its mid-June arbitration hearing to restore Novak?s ? and Lin?s ? Bird rights.
?J.R. has an option to come back to us next season,?? Grunwald said. ?We hope he will exercise it. Steve is a free agent. We want to have him back, too. But Stevie has the greatest freedom of any of the players as he is unrestricted.??
The Knicks may have only the $2 million lower exception to lure another free-agent point guard with Raymond Felton, Derek Fisher and Gary Neal possible targets in that category.
Grunwald acknowledged the Knicks? five-game first-round flameout to the Heat was a failure despite a parade of injuries.
?We wanted to do better than last year,?? Grunwald said. ?We got a test in the playoffs, and we didn?t quite pass the test. We lost to the Heat and it wasn?t as close as I would?ve liked.??
Brown, a Woodson confidant now at SMU, said the Knicks could use another talented big man, too.
?Woody and I talked, I think they need another big guy to complement Amar?e [Stoudemire] and Tyson [Chandler] to give them depth,?? Brown said.
Brown added he thought Stoudemire wasn?t right this season.
?He didn?t look healthy to me,?? Brown said. ?The last year and a half [I coached] in Charlotte he was phenomenal.??* Grunwald said he never considered fining Stoudemire for the fire-extinguisher incident. ?No one suffered more than he did,?? Grunwald said. ?He felt bad enough.? ... Former Knicks coach and president Isiah Thomas told ESPN Chicago he is looking for a college coaching or NBA GM/coaching job.
 

RunningJumper

Super Moderator
Too big of a gamble? A vet. min. contract that isn't guaranteed? Him and Chandler would have the most winning experience in the post-season.
 
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Weissenberg

Grid or Riot
With all due respect, no matter how much I'd love to see AI playing NBA basketball again, he has too much of an ego. Melo-Iverson combo didn't work in Denver and I wouldn't expect it to work here either.
 

RunningJumper

Super Moderator
With all due respect, no matter how much I'd love to see AI playing NBA basketball again, he has too much of an ego. Melo-Iverson combo didn't work in Denver and I wouldn't expect it to work here either.
Why not? Iverson wouldn't be playing the same, and he's healthy. We need to go after players who will come up in big games. It's like the people who don't want Nash because of his age, newsflash, our last championship was in 1973, we have a core of exceptional young players, let's not pass up great veterans. Did J.R. Smith's off the court issues make a bunch of Knicks fans to not want him back? No! They just didn't like his the amount of shots he was taking and missing, and Woodson allowing it. I'm not saying I don't like J.R., but to say Iverson would be a gamble is ridiculous!
 

goldenchild1688

Benchwarmer
a gamble? a player who will more then likely sign for the vet minimum and can probably still be productive in spots is a low risk high reward
 

Sage

Rotation player
Would he be expecting to start? I think he could do some good things with the second unit and his shoot first mentality would play well coming off the bench.
 

CA7

Scoring Champ
20 minutes a game, 12 points off the bench for us would be good

during the playoffs he'll play 25+ minutes for us we can utilize his game and minutes like Pop did with the Spurs vets
 

Crazy⑧s

Evacuee
How long has he been out of the game?

I've never liked him as far as his narcissism goes.

That whole ' MVPs don't come off the bench ' when he was in Detroit.........Just embarrassing.

Is he another multi-millionaire baller that went broke?
 

NYNYK

Benchwarmer
As much as I loved watching AI play, I'm not sure about his dedication. It seems like he lost his fire in the later years and that practice speech disgusted me. But we are desperate for a back up pg right now esp since Lin just had a recent knee injury and shouldn't be playing the minutes he used to play. So I would say go for it.
 

21 Shump Street

Benchwarmer
Like everyone else has said, low risk high reward.

Im kind of surprised so many are for this signing, I know he could add talent off the bench, but I thought KO posters were for adding players with a 'winning' attitude. Don't think Iverson fits this bill.
 

Sage

Rotation player
What's changed in my attitude is that we have Lin, he'll start. On previous occasions where he's been brought up the depth chart competition was Nate/Douglas, so Iverson would have started and with his shoot-first mentality, not been a good fit.

We could use his kind of spark off the bench, plus last time he had issues he left on his own, so I kinda think it's low risk.
 

Eman

Benchwarmer
If he could bring like nine points, five assists to this team off the bench, it'd work just fine.
 

orangeblobman

Rotation player
In my healthy mind, I would call this ridiculous.

But we are talking Carmelo Knicks, then it all makes a lot of sense.

Bring on AI, bring back Marbury, bring back Isiah, Glen Rice, we should make a move for Gilbert Arenas.
 
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