The New York Knicks and Cam Reddish are all but set to part ways before the February 9 trade deadline according to SNY’s Ian Begley.
“The Knicks are widely expected to trade Reddish prior to the Feb. 9 deadline,” he reported. “Reddish’s side expects him to be traded by the deadline and has no interest in the Duke product continuing to collect DNPs after the deadline if he is not traded.”
Reddish hasn’t appeared in a game for the Knicks since early December, and he’s been unable to see the floor even in blowouts, so the writing has been on the wall for him for a while now.
What’s surprising is the former lottery pick started for the Knicks earlier in the year before coach Tom Thibodeau removed him from the lineup and cut the rotation down to nine players. In 20 games this season, Reddish averaged 8.4 points per game.
What Teams Are Interested in Reddish?
Reddish is still young enough that he’s worth rolling the dice on for other teams, but there haven’t been many teams willing to take the risk as of yet. The Milwaukee Bucks appear to be the best suitors for Reddish and they’ve talked about a Grayson Allen swap.
“The Milwaukee Bucks have been offering wing Grayson Allen to multiple teams, per sources, for various players on the block, including Reddish,” Bleacher Report’s Eric Pincus reported January 26.
On the west coast, the Los Angeles Lakers were once thought to be suitors, but the trade for Washington Wizards forward Rui Hachimura has essentially taken them out of the running.
There aren’t many other teams around the league that could use Reddish at the moment, and that’s especially true when considering this is a player who hasn’t played since December.
Why Isn’t Reddish Playing?
Begley believes Reddish not playing runs deeper than basketball, and it could be a factor in the Knicks wanting to move him.
“But Reddish not playing garbage-time minutes is strange,” he said. “It suggests that there are factors beyond basketball that lead to Reddish’s DNPs. The aforementioned frustration between the front office and coaching staff over Reddish’s initial usage is worth noting here.”
He was able to get an initial starting role with the Knicks because of the injury to Quentin Grimes to start the season. With Grimes now healthy and starting, this left Reddish on the outside looking in. It’s easy to envision a world with him coming off the bench, but Thibodeau decided to go a different direction, and that is what led Begley to hypothesize something else going on behind the scenes.
According to Begley, Reddish voiced his frustrations to a Knicks coach before he was taken out of the rotation on December 4.
“At one point before that Dec. 4 game, Reddish expressed displeasure to a Knick assistant coach about the way Thibodeau was using him, per people familiar with the matter,” Begley wrote. “Reddish has not played since he expressed that displeasure.”
Reddish has denied requesting a trade, and reiterated that point in December, a few days after he was taken out of the rotation.
“I haven’t requested any trades. I have not,” Reddish said, according to the New York Post. “Y’all seem to know more than me, for real. I don’t know what y’all talking about, but I haven’t requested no trade, nothing like that.”
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Knicks ‘Widely Expected’ to Trade Cam Reddish: Report