We have a history of that already. We do not capitalize on expirings, even our best ones. Why do you think Knights any different? What has he done in the last 3 years to convince teams that he is impactful, and why do we think him playing fairly well on a bottom dweller is going to make a contender feel any differently about him and prioritize him over other players/expirings?
Do you really think it's worth doing so if if it is at the expanse of maximizing Garland's development?
We need late 1sts, 2nd round picks that I agree with. We need a lot of that. Just don't think it's that way.
Teams do not look at three years of data to see if an expiring is worth something. They look at how he plays during the season they are acquiring him.
As has been said, you play Knight. If he stinks, you bench him and hope someone wants him just to clear cap space for the future. If not, you let the contract expire and you move on.
I don't know how Knight will play this year. No one does. Reality is over the past 2-3 years, Knight missed a WHOLE season due to injury.
What we do know is he shot 37% from 3PT last year with the Cavs. We also know that in his last moderately healthy season before last year that he averaged over 11PPG off the bench.
Is Knight a stud? No. Is he someone that could provide scoring from the bench for a team without a strong PG backup? Possibly.
I doubt we would be trading expiring for expiring, so it's not just about what he can contribute now, it's also about what he can save in the future. The league looks like it has a lot of parity at the top this year, so I expect tons of teams will be taking chances on talent in February to get a final push and try to climb the ladder to get a higher seed.
And I also don't see how it will impact Garland's development. With Garland's lack of play last year, I think they will bring him along slowly. He's not going to be playing 36mpg at the beginning of the season. Even if he starts, my bet is he gets 22-24mpg to begin the season with the time increasing gradually. He is NOT used to the long season as a rookie, especially as a rookie that didn't play last year.
So I would argue that playing Garland TOO Much would also negatively impact his development. I see nothing wrong with Garland getting 22, Knight getting 20, and Delly getting 6. I suspect Sexton will largely play the 2 and Clarkson will also get a lot of bench time there.
But I doubt Garland goes over 24 much to start the season. So if Knight isn't playing, it is most likely Delly will. And if Knight performs poorly, Delly will get more minutes.
The idea that playing Knight will negatively impact Garland is ludicrous. I'm not advocating the Knight STARTS. I'm advocating that we play him and see what we have. You never know, we might even re-sign him if he plays well off the bench and comes at a decent price. The guy is only 27 and might be a decent backup PG. We won't know if we just blindly bench him out of fear of Garland not playing 36mpg.