Lakers May Throw Wrench in Knicks Off-Season Plans

Kobe to the Knicks? Fuggedaboutit.

But that doesn't mean the Laker star's weird wailing this week won't have an impact on the Knicks' off-season plans.

For those who have been living in a cave for the past two days, Bryant's trade-me-no-wait-don't plea has implications that will affect the 'Bockers. On the pipe-dream side, there's the possibility that Bryant could become frustrated enough to consider a jump to New York in 2009, when he can opt out of his current contract. That's both a long shot and a long way away, plus it would require two more years of salary discipline by team president Isiah Thomas to keep the Knicks under the cap — yeah, right.

However, Kobe's tirade indirectly affects the Knicks in a more important way: He puts the Lakers in pursuit of many of the same players. The entirely legitimate part of Bryant's lament is that ever since the Shaquille O'Neal trade, the Lakers have wasted the prime years of his career because they've been too scared of their own shadows to pull off a trade. Call them the anti-Knicks, if you will. Most obviously, they passed up a shot to acquire Jason Kidd in February when it wouldn't have even cost them that much.

Now that Bryant has fired a shot across management's bow, I'd expect the Lakers to become far more aggressive. That puts them in direct competition with the Knicks for the unusually large bounty of quality forwards that are expected to be on the trade market this summer. In no particular order, those include Memphis's Pau Gasol, Indiana's Jermaine O'Neal, Portland's Zach Randolph, Phoenix's Shawn Marion, Sacramento's Ron Artest, Utah's Andrei Kirilenko, and, possibly, New Jersey's Richard Jefferson. Free agents Rashard Lewis of Seattle and Gerald Wallace of Charlotte also are potentially available in a sign-and-trade deal.

Of those players, the one that stands out from the Knicks' end is O'Neal, whom Thomas coached in Indiana. O'Neal still has great respect for Zeke — apparently they don't run Knicks box scores in the Indiana papers — and has said he'd welcome a reunion. For his part, Thomas loves O'Neal's warrior mentality and, should Indiana make him available, it appears acquiring him will be one of his major efforts this off-season.

The Lakers' involvement would make this infinitely trickier. I should point out that league-wide admiration of O'Neal is not unanimous — he's been constantly hurt and makes nearly $20 million a season through 2010. That will limit the pool of bidders. But the Knicks need an interior defender to pair with the slothful Eddy Curry, and O'Neal is as good as any in the game.

The problem for New York is that L.A. can put better chips on the table. A package of Lamar Odom and young center Andrew Bynum instantly trumps anything the Knicks can use as a lure, and based on recent events I think the Lakers are much more likely to trade Bynum than they were three months ago (he was the reason the Kidd trade didn't happen).

In fact, that's a problem for the Knicks in almost any trade scenario, with or without the Lakers' involvement. In order to make a deal, the Knicks have to match salaries that come within 25% of the money they take back. To do so requires a string of players with big contracts that other teams want. The Knicks have plenty of the former and almost none of the latter.

The biggest problem is that the Knicks lack the coveted expiring contracts — no one of substance comes off the books until 2009. They could package Quentin Richardson and Jamal Crawford to match a max-salary player like O'Neal, but Richardson is radioactive for trade purposes because his back problem makes his contract uninsurable. The same goes for Eddy Curry (not that the Knicks would deal him anyway). And nobody will touch Stephon Marbury or Steve Francis regardless of what they're getting back, not to mention Jerome James, Jared Jeffries. or Malik Rose.

So that leaves the young ones, and they don't make enough to match a $15 million or so salary coming back in return. To interest Indiana, New York would have to offer something along the lines of Jamal Crawford, Rose, and Channing Frye, along with a draft pick or two. This package might work if there were no other offers and the Pacers were determined to get a deal done, but if and when Los Angeles bellies up to the table, the Knicks might as well fold their hand and go home.

The lack of tradable contracts similarly eliminates the Knicks' hopes of obtaining most of the other players listed above. If they can't get O'Neal, New York's pursuits in the trade market are likely to be limited to the same guys they've chased ever since Thomas came to town: faded pseudo-stars, overpaid mediocrities, and other assorted castoffs who have fallen out of favor in other NBA cities.

One player in particular fits the mold. File this one under "it's crazy, but it just might work," but of all the players I listed above, the one guy New York has a realistic shot at is Artest. He's from Queens, he wants to play here, and he'd be willing to play for Isiah. Obviously, there's a big risk here — the Knicks have a young locker room, and adding Artest to an already somewhat volatile mixture could be a recipe for disaster.

Additionally, I'm not sure Isiah is desperate enough to try something like this yet, not after getting a contract extension in March as a reward for owning the East's no. 8 seed for an entire day. Remember, he's seen the "Artest Experience" first hand, and there's no reason to live through it again when he's got such a cushy gig right now.

However, if the Knicks start slowly this fall, all bets are off. Artest's salary is small enough — $7.8 million this year — that either a straight-up trade of Crawford, or a two-flakes-for-one deal that hands over Robinson, Jerome James, and a draft pick (lottery-protected, please), would satisfy the league's salary cap requirements.

In the meantime, expect plenty of smoke and little fire. Other than a possible O'Neal deal, New York doesn't have the goods to pull off a big-time trade unless it's for a whack job like Artest. You'll hear plenty of rumors this summer about the Knicks pursuing trades for big-name stars, but without better chips it will be all strictly entertainment for their beleaguered fans. O'Neal was the one quasi-realistic trade possibility, but with the Lakers now likely to bid against the team, it adds one more daunting obstacle to the Knicks' hopes for an off-season upgrade.

jhollinger@nysun.com