NEW YORK (1010 WINS)-- Barclay's Center was buzzing as The New York Knicks used their third overall pick to draft Duke freshman RJ Barrett Thursday night.
Knicks general manager Scott Perry said the decision to choose the 6-foot-7, originally from Mississauga, Ontario,was not a tough one tough make.
"I just can't tell you how excited we are to be able to land RJ Barrett and add him to the New York Knicks," Perry said in a conference call a few minutes after the selection was made. "We love a lot of things about this young man starting with his tremendous competitive level; his desire to want to be great as a basketball player. He's highly accomplished. He had a tremendous freshman season here at Duke."
In an attempt make room under the salary cap to bring in free-agent stars, the Brooklyn Nets traded first-round draft pick Mfiondu Kabengele of Florida State to the Los Angeles Clippers.
They received UCLA point guard Jaylen Hands, taken in the second round, 56th overall, and a first-rounder in 2020 that came from Philadelphia for the 6-foot-10 Kabengele.
Brooklyn also drafted Georgia 7-footer Nic Claxton with the first pick of the second round.
"I don't know that we're necessarily focused on cap space and creating cap space and cap space alone," Nets general manager Sean Marks said. "This has always been about pivoting and taking different paths along the way and some of that leads to cap space and others lead to picks and collecting different assets along the way."
Brooklyn will receive forward Taurean Prince and a 2021 second-round pick in the deal, but more importantly the Nets cleared Crabbe's $18.5 million salary for 2019-20.
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