Charles Bassey and Ayo Dosunmu were among players who worked out for the Knicks at their facility on Tuesday, per SNY sources.
The workout also included Trey Murphy III, Tre Mann, and Isaiah Jackson, SNY sources confirm.
The Knicks have the 19th and 21st picks in next Thursday’s draft. They also have the 32nd pick, which is valuable because contracts for second-round picks are structured differently than first-round picks. And they have the 58th pick in the second round.
New York is probably considering dozens of different draft night scenarios at the moment. Some teams think the Knicks will try to use their picks in a trade for a higher pick in the first round. Other teams think they will use the picks to try and trade for a veteran player.
Of course, the Knicks could also use the picks to draft players.
If they do, the players they brought in on Tuesday all seem like realistic targets for New York.
(Some, like Murphy III and Jackson, project to be taken ahead of the 19th pick).
Jonathan Macri of KnicksFilmSchool first reported that Murphy III, Mann, and Jackson were working out for New York on Tuesday.
Below is some more information on Murphy III, courtesy of his trainer, Shawn Farmer, and Mann:
Some teams project Mann to be taken between 10 and 20. One scout views the guard as an exceptional shot creator – for himself and his teammates.
The scout said, in his observation, Mann is hard-working and doesn’t shy away from the big stage. The scout added that Mann had a professional approach to the game.
“He’s definitely high character,” the scout said of Mann, a McDonald’s All American and first team All-SEC player. “I like his approach.”
Farmer has worked with Murphy III for nearly a decade. He knows his game as well as anyone in basketball. Farmer, who has trained NBA, college, and top high school players, believes Murphy can thrive at the next level.
“Everybody’s saying he’s a 3-and-D guy and I agree with that. But he’s so much more than that and he brings so much more to the table,” Farmer says. “A lot of people are talking about his deficiencies being the lack of creativity. But a lot of that didn’t have to do with Trey lacking creativity. It was just the college offenses that he was in. So once he gets to the NBA, I think his entire game is going to open up.”
Murphy, a 6-foot-9 guard, is seen as someone who can space the floor and defend in the NBA.
Farmer said that Murphy can also play in isolation and in the pick and roll. Often with Virginia, Murphy was a screener or bumper in pick-and-rolls, but Farmer thinks Murphy will be able to take advantage of mismatches as a ball handler in the those scenarios.
And his work ethic and drive should help him succeed in the league.
A quick story to support that theory: During the pandemic, Murphy was home from school and looking for a place to work out. All of the local gyms were closed due to the pandemic, so Murphy called Farmer and told him he’d found an outdoor court that they could use.
This may seem normal to readers, but top college and NBA players rarely work out outdoors. They almost always play on hardwood courts.
“That’s Trey,” Farmer said.
A few days later, Murphy found an indoor court, but it was a 90-minute drive away from his home. So he and Farmer made the drive, worked out, and drove home.
“And his work ethic isn’t going to deviate when he gets to the NBA,” Farmer says. “He understands that the work really starts once you get drafted.”
ESPN’s Richard Jefferson conducted an insightful interview with NBPA Executive Director Michele Roberts on his YouTube channel The Sports Gap.
Roberts and Jefferson talked about the NBPA’s support for the George Floyd Justice In Policing Act, the midseason tournament, why her job is harder than NBA Commissioner Adam Silvers’ and other topics.
Early in the interview, Jefferson asks, half-jokingly, if Roberts has solved racism. The context here, Jefferson explains, is that the NBA dialed back some of the social change initiatives that had been implemented over the past year. The league said prior to the 2020-21 season that some of the social justice messages on jerseys and the floor would be discontinued and those messages would be ‘largely delivered off the floor'.
Roberts acknowledged that the NBA is a ‘for-profit business’ but added that, ‘If you think for one second that the members of this union aren’t affected by these issues, think again. So these players aren’t going to allow it.”
Here is a link to the full interview.
