The Downside of Improvement, Part Two

Someone else is going to enjoy the fruits of David Lee's labor

On Monday, we discussed Danilo Gallinari and how the second-year forward's improved play will make it harder to avoid a serious discussion about using him as a way to grease the doorway and push Eddy Curry out. After Tuesday night's 104-87 win over the Pistons, the ninth of the month for the Knicks, we must now add David Lee to the list of the players whose improvement might well benefit teams other than the Knicks in the near future.

Lee's probably not getting traded before the end of the season, mind you, but people have to be noticing what's happened to his game this season. In addition to cleaning up the offensive boards and scoring garbage points, Lee has developed a mid-range jumper that's reliable enough to also allow him to fake it and drive the ball to the hoop on occasion. It's the kind of development that boosts you up a tax bracket, especially when you're a free agent in a season full of teams with money to spend. 

As you surely know by now, the Knicks are one of those teams but that won't help them keep Lee. To create the cap room needed to sign LeBron James or whatever flight of free agent fancy, they'll need to renounce their rights to Lee and, as a result, the ability to sign him without having to fit him under the salary cap. They can still use him as part of a sign-and-trade under that scenario, and that will likely work out as the best-case scenario since they'll realize some kind of return on the progress Lee has made throughout his career. 

Lee's imminent departure is the true shame of the Scott Layden and Isiah Thomas eras. The mess was created by the Patrick Ewing trade, exacerbated by a variety of acquisitions from Howard Eisley to Jerome James and held an utter lack of long-term planning as an organizational philosophy. That's brought us to this year's expiring contractpalooza where fiscal decisions are all that matters and good players get thrown overboard to finally balance the books. 

That makes it bittersweet to watch the new and improved Lee because, as much as he helps the Knicks to their best month in years, somewhere in the recesses of the mind we know that we'll soon be watching him as a member of the Rockets, Thunder or Wizards.      

Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City and is a contributor to FanHouse.com and ProFootballTalk.com in addition to his duties for NBCNewYork.com.

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