[h3]Strike 2: Hill (and maybe Nash) staying in Phoenix[/h3]
Much like when Jason Kidd turned them down to stay in Dallas, Grant Hill has turned down the Knicks (and apparently more money) to stay with the Suns.
Agent Lon Babby confirmed Friday afternoon that Hill, who visited the Knicks on Monday, accepted a two-year $6.24 million offer, with the second year at Hill's option _ where he did not miss a game last season for the first time in his injury-plagued career. Babby cited "unfinished business" as the reason Hill turned down not only the Knicks, but a chance to play for his first championship ring in Boston.
Although the agent said the official Knicks offer he and Hill turned down was for one-year and the full mid-level salary of $5.8 million, he said the two sides also discussed a three-year deal (two years plus Hill's option for the third) worth a total of $10 million, with the same $5.8 million for the first season.
Boston, he said, could only offer their lower-level salary-cap exception figure of just under $2 million for this season. Babby, though, would not say what factors prevented Hill from signing there or with the Knicks.
One, though, according to the Arizona Republic and all but confirmed by the agent, was an apparent assurance Hill got from Steve Nash that the two-time MVP point guard planned to sign a two-year extension.
That would be another hit to the Knicks, who hoped to bring Nash to his off-season home via free agency next summer, if not trade for him this summer if Nash declined the extension and asked out with one year left on his current contract.
A visit Suns owner Robert Sarver, GM Steve Kerr and coach Alvin Gentry paid Hill on Wednesday in Orlando also helped sway the 36-year-old forward, Babby said
So if Kidd was strike one, then Hill and possibly Nash are strike 2. We're not going to say yet that the Knicks have already struck out this free agent/trade season, because they may get David Lee and Nate Robinson back cheaply for at least another season and our friend at the Daily News reports they may try to vulture Andre Miller away from the 76ers, who've apparently low-balled the veteran point guard.
And Donnie Walsh often has something else up his sleeve.
But so far, at least the players they've pursued publicly have spurned their advances. That, plus the NBA's salary-cap projections the other day that will likely hurt their Summer of LeBron hopes haven't exactly made this a summer to remember for Walsh and Co.
Yet.
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We also loved the report that Hill's wife was trying to coerce him to play in New York to help her music career.
How long a flight is it from Phoenix to Los Angeles?
with that being said it still doesn't change myopinion that the knicks should go harder for him than lebron imo he's just the better player, and to marionthebarber you sound kind of salty about the 05finals but come on give wade his props dude took over the 4th quarter and couldn't be stopped games 3-6 I know the refs game him a b.s call in game 3 butcome on my man deserves a little credit for what he did in that series
