The 2016-2017 New York Knickerbockers are going to the Playoffs

Okay, so I probably sound like a bit of a homer with that title at the top as the Knicks have been at the bottom of the Eastern Conference the past couple of years.

But why shouldn’t I be looking up today as a Knicks fan. The Knicks just offloaded two point guards, one who can’t play defense and one who can’t score along with Sideshow Bob for a former MVP

The Knicks receive Derrick Rose along with Justin Holiday and a 2017 second round pick for Jose Calderon, Jerian Grant and Robin Lopez. For those of you confused by that trade yes that means the Knicks gained the best player in a trade as well as a draft pick without giving up a draft pick of their own.

So where does this put the Knickerbockers right now?

Jeff Hornacek can now plug in Derrick Rose at point guard spot with Carmelo Anthony and Kristaps “Godzingis” Porzingis at the forward spots. The only other players currently under contract for the 2016-2017 season are Holiday and Kyle O’Quinn.

There is the possibility that they bring over last year’s second round pick Guillermo “Willy” Hernangomez to play along his former Sevilla teammate, Porzingis but he doesn’t seem ready for the jump to the NBA quite yet. Willy didn’t really play well in Europe last season as he barely saw the court for more than 10 minutes a game.

From last year’s team a few players that could help this Knicks squad include Langston Galloway, Lance Thomas and Derrick Williams. The rest of their free agents can all just go, that means you Sasha Vujacic (Every time Vujacic was on the court I would make sure the remote wasn’t in reaching distance because I was nervous about what might happen to my TV if I could grab it).

The Knicks have about $35 million to use right now. Bringing back Williams, Thomas and Galloway likely takes about $8-10 million off of the table and the team is left with $25-27 million and eight players on the roster. They need starting guys at shooting guard and center with the hopes of adding a lot of defense around Rose and Anthony.

In a perfect world without a salary cap the Knicks would bring DeMar DeRozan and Andre Drummond to round out their starting five. The problem with that is they can’t afford to sign the two of them with their remaining cap room and even just one of them leaves them with pennies for the remainder of the roster.

Bradley Beal is a more realistic and cheaper option than DeMar DeRozan but having two injury prone guards might not be the best recipe for success. Having Langston Galloway in your starting lineup at times the last two years is why the Knicks weren’t playing past April so we’ll stay away from Beal.

Dwight Howard has been rumored as a possible target for the Knicks but it just wouldn’t work out well. He was eaten alive in Los Angeles and it would be even worse in New York. He needs to stay in smaller markets where he isn’t in the spotlight. Plus he’s only getting older and adding him with Rose would just be a terrible idea. There can only be so many injury-prone players on a roster.

The Knicks pretty much robbed the Chicago Bulls in this trade so it’s pretty apparent that the Bulls are going the rebuilding route with Jimmy Butler as their main piece. If Phil Jackson were smart he would start looking at the Bulls roster for help immediately.

Joakim Noah might be the perfect piece at center for this Knicks team. He helps improve their “Swiss Cheese Defense” and rebounding which are two things that the Knicks have been lacking big time. He’s a guy that has that toughness down low that reminds you of Charles Oakley and is someone that Knicks fans would love to see at the Garden.

The other Bull that makes too much sense to possibly let get away is Pau Gasol. Gasol already has two rings with Phil in LA and would be able to come help out this team right away. He’d be a great guy for Porzingis to play next to as he is ideally who we’d love to see Porzingis become with slightly more range.

The last two guys the Knicks should add would bring help to their backcourt. Stay away from Beal and DeRozan and bring in Evan Turner and Jamal Crawford. Turner can play both shooting guard and small forward if the Knicks go small ball and would be a solid starting option at shooting guard.

The Knicks loved Crawford in the late 2000s, he just happened to be a product of the giant salary dump that led to the Knicks gaining Amare Stoudemire and yea just Amare Stoudemire.

If you look at how much the four of them made this past season it would almost fit into their remaining cap. Noah and Gasol would probably have to take pay cuts for this to work but it’s not a giant reach for this to actually happen.

This team wouldn’t be perfect but it would be a lot better than any team Knicks fans have seen since the early days of Anthony, Stoudemire and Chandler and who knows how far a team like this could actually go.

The Knicks already made one smart move this offseason, who’s to say they don’t keep it up.