The New York Knicks were just trying to make some news official.
Whoops!
The Knicks earlier this week signed RJ Barrett to a contract extension, but as of Thursday had not yet made it official. Extending Barrett reportedly wasn’t precluding them from continuing their pursuit of Donovan Mitchell, who they had been linked to much of the offseason.
At 3:33 p.m. ET, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski dropped the bombshell that the Cleveland Cavaliers, seemingly out of nowhere, landed the star guard from the Utah Jazz.
Three minutes earlier, the Knicks made the Barrett extension official. And while Barrett is a fine enough player and should improve even more with Jalen Brunson in the mix, Mitchell at this juncture is a superior player to anyone on the Knicks roster.
It should be little surprise then that Knicks fans weren’t unanimously thrilled with the timing of the announcement, especially when the team PR account tweeted the press release 12 minutes after the Mitchell news went down.
At least one fan took a more positive approach to not getting Mitchell.
It's a deserved extension for Barrett, but the timing really was brutal.
LISTEN on the Audacy App
Sign Up and Follow Audacy Sports
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram