Ever since The Athletic reported last week that the Utah Jazz and New York Knicks have discussed a trade centered on Jazz All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell, a big question has been when such a deal could get done.
On Monday, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski appeared on his network’s show “Get Up” and shared some background on the latest in the negotiations.
Wojnarowski said the two sides “talked last week, and I think the Jazz got a sense of what New York might be willing to do.”
He added that there could be a few different potential frameworks in terms of who and what draft compensation Utah could get in return for Mitchell.
Calling it “a sliding scale,” Wojnarowski noted that certain frameworks might have fewer players and more future draft picks, while other frameworks might have the opposite.
In potentially a bit of a twist, Wojnarowski noted that the Jazz could explore potential deals with other teams, even as the Knicks have an appealing number of draft assets to include in a trade that other teams currently don’t.
He noted that there’s no real hurry on a deal, saying “I do think the Knicks and the Jazz will re-engage here at some point. Maybe it’s this week, maybe it’s next week, maybe it’s in two or three weeks, but the Jazz are not going to necessarily move quickly.”
To support that notion, Wojnarowski observed how talks between the Jazz and Minnesota Timberwolves went on for quite a while before the deal that sent Rudy Gobert to the Timberwolves was finalized.
That said, Wojnarowski said, “New York is motivated. They are motivated to get Donovan Mitchell, but I think they’re also motivated to not just give up everything to get him.”
Wojnarowski said that while the Knicks have plenty of draft picks to include in a trade, about half of them are from other teams that have protections on them, and the Jazz may not be as interested in those as they would be unprotected picks straight from New York.
“I don’t think the Jazz value those,” he said of protected picks. “They certainly don’t value those the way they do New York’s unprotected picks. Those have value.”