With just days to go before the NBA’s Trade Deadline, the New York Knicks have finally had one of their players not named Julius Randle reported to be drawing interest from another team.
SNY’s Ian Begley said on Sunday that there are teams interested in Knicks center Mitchell Robinson, and he specifically mentioned the Detroit Pistons are one of them.
"Begley stated, “Robinson would fit… the same timeline as rookie Cade Cunningham” and that “it’s unknown” whether or not Detroit would seek to acquire Robinson via trade or in free agency. Robinson, if not extended by New York or another team prior to the start of 2022 free agency, will be an unrestricted free agent."
Mitch has always been one of the Knicks’ best players since they selected him with the 36th pick in the second round of the 2018 NBA Draft.
Should the Knicks trade Mitchell Robinson?
After an injury-plagued 2020-21 season, Robinson struggled to start this year, but he has been a force of late.
In January, Robinson averaged 10.6 PPG, 9.1 RPG, and 0.9 BPG in 26 minutes a night across 13 games. He also shot an absurd 82.6% from the field.
Defensive and offensive rebounding has always been his calling cards, so seeing him be an active presence in the paint on offense has made him even more valuable to the Knicks in 2022.
Robinson is very much your prototypical run and jump center, but at just 23-years-old it makes sense for both New York and Detroit to see him as a nice future building block.
I am sort of surprised though given that Motor City has their own very promising center, Isaiah Stewart, who as a sophomore is already just as good as Robinson.
I would even say Stewart is clearly a better offensive player while having a higher game-to-game stat ceiling at the age of 20.
Regardless, if Begley is right, then the Knicks may need to entertain a trade with the Pistons if they plan on getting something out of Robinson, assuming they don’t plan on extending him or fear they can be outbid in free agency.
So, let’s look at what a deal at the deadline may look like.
Would you consider this trade for Mitchell Robinson?
I’m going to present two different trade scenarios, one of them is a dream trade while the other is more realistic.
Here is the dream trade:
In this deal, both teams would be able to acquire their center of the future.
Maybe Detroit wants to have a committee at center by playing both Robinson and Stewart. Maybe they think they can slide Stewart to power forward.
Who knows what their intentions for Stewart are as it pertains to a Robinson acquisition, but let’s assume Detroit sees the latter as the better piece moving forward.
This would be a very good trade for New York in my opinion.
I’m not saying I have a dog in this race (though I’d love to see Mitch stay in NY), but being able to transition from Robinson to Stewart is something the Knicks can’t pass on if they were willing to part with Robinson.
Stewart has two more years on his rookie contract, meaning in those two years combined the Knicks can pay a center who is just as good, with upside, about half of what Robinson will probably make in one year on his next contract.
Sure, losing Deuce this early into his career will sting, but one could argue that Stewart will one day be much better than the two players combined.
This trade may be highly unlikely anyway, so moving on…
You can see now why I wanted to dream option for a minute there first, right?
This is the type of trade I see Steve Mills making in my nightmares.
Unfortunately, this is probably the best the Knicks can do in a trade with Detroit and it’s not pretty.
The Pistons do not have much that makes sense for them to offer that would qualify as equal value.
Robinson is worth a first-round pick, but he also isn’t since he will be an unrestricted free agent this summer.
In any trade, the Pistons would need a commitment to a contract extension from Robinson if they are going to be willing to make a move, and that’s after NY decides they’ll trade him.
This is the type of trade New York would only make if there were no other offers from other teams and if they knew for a fact that Robinson wanted out, neither of which is going to be the case.
Even if all of those factors lead to a reality where this trade happens, how can the Knicks possibly justify it?
I would rather lose Robinson for nothing than for a backup center getting paid $25 million over the next two seasons as a replacement.
Not to mention Cory Joseph is a 30-year-old third-string point guard with a player option he’ll probably take for 2022-23.
Does A Trade Between The Knicks and Pistons Make Sense?
I think I made it clear on the last slide, but let’s elaborate a bit for a moment; the Knicks trading Robinson to Detroit would probably suck.
As far as we can tell right now, Isaiah Stewart would not be on the table.
Stewart is the only player that would both make sense for the Knicks to ask for and any other player NY would be interested in is simply too valuable.
Robinson being a pending unrestricted free agent is tricky enough.
The fact that Detroit could hypothetically trade for him and then still lose him is another wrench thrown into this conversation.
It looks like the Pistons will have to wait and see what the Knicks do with him.
If it were up to me, I extend Mitchell Robinson as soon as possible if I’m the Knicks front office.
While I wouldn’t be surprised if he commanded as much as $18-20 million per year over 4 years, I don’t see any team giving into that.
A more reasonable contract for both parties is a 4 year deal in the $10-14 million range.
Unless a trade that they can’t refuse comes out of nowhere at the deadline, New York should plan on locking up a stud in Mitch as their center of the future.
Detroit can try, but they simply lack the assets to justify trading for a player on an expiring contract.
Unless they are willing to give up one of their best assets in Stewart, and NY would still have to be interested in sending a lottery pick back to make a fair deal, then no such deal is gonna happen.