New York Knicks: Designing an ideal Carmelo Anthony trade to New Orleans Pelicans

Third Team

At this current juncture, it appears as though the New Orleans Pelicans and New York Knicks will be unable to come to terms on a trade. The last hope for the two sides would be to find a third team that could facilitate a deal.

That may be easier said than done, but the Knicks could enlist the services of a talent-hungry organization that’s willing to gamble on potential.

Omer Asik is all but unmovable, which makes Solomon Hill and E’Twaun Moore the best hope of getting a trade done. Hill has certainly underwhelmed, but a third team may be willing to accept Hill and a quality young player from the Knicks in order to get this deal done.

There are options here—namely the Brooklyn Nets and Utah Jazz—but it’s fair to question if they’d welcome Hill’s financial burden.

Brooklyn could swap Trevor Booker for Hill, but it would be giving up an expiring deal for three remaining years at a steep price. Utah could swap Alec Burks for Hill—and it may be willing to do so due to Burks’ injury history—but Burks would join two other highly-paid shooting guards in New York.

There are possibilities to explore and evaluate, but one can’t help but feel as though the options are scarce and the potential return disconcerting.