Josh Hart knows Donovan Mitchell will be linked to the New York Knicks for Mitchell’s entire NBA career until a trade happens.
Mitchell, who was born and raised in New York, thought he was going to get traded to the Knicks last summer. However, the All-Star got dealt to the Cleveland Cavaliers instead.
“Those are never going to go away,” Hart said about the Mitchell-to-Knicks rumors. “He’s from New York. New York is never going to let that go away. So you’ll never know what happens. That’s for the future, that’s for Knicks Twitter to talk about, and have rumors about, and put up stats of God knows what. But everyone knows that will be an underlying thing.”
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Josh Hart, Donovan Mitchell, New York Knicks Updates
Mitchell averaged 28.3 points, 4.3 rebounds and 4.4 assists last season in 68 games. He scored 71 points versus the Chicago Bulls in January and led the Cavaliers to 51 wins. However, the Knicks defeated Mitchell and Co. in the first round of the 2023 playoffs in five games.
In November 2020, Mitchell signed a five-year, $163 million rookie-scale extension with the Jazz. He’ll make $32.6 million this season and $34.8 million in 2024-25. Mitchell has a player option worth $37 million for the 2025-26 season. He has already stated that he won’t sign an extension with the Cavaliers this year.
On a recent episode of “The Hoop Genius“ podcast, former Knicks general manager Scott Perry revealed why the Knicks didn’t acquire Mitchell from the Jazz.
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Josh Hart, Donovan Mitchell, New York Knicks Updates
“Obviously, we made a push to trade for him,” Perry said. “But it was going to be done within reason. He was a good player, but he needed more around him to win because if he was that singular force, Utah probably would’ve been in the conference finals if he were that singular force. But he wasn’t that singular force. That’s not a criticism against him. That’s just an evaluation that you must make.”
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