NBA Draft Lottery 2017: Who each team should take with the No. 1 pick
By John Buhler
New York Knicks: Markelle Fultz, point guard, Washington Huskies (5.3 percent)
The New York Knicks do not know what they are doing. They can’t fool us anymore with the allure of Madison Square Garden, The Triangle, or the idea that any self-respecting free agent will want to play there. Without power forward Kristaps Porzingis, this would unfortunately be a dead NBA franchise.
That being said, the Knicks have shown an ability to draft well with Phil Jackson calling the shots. He did take Porzingis No. 4 in the 2015 NBA Draft out of Latvia. With the exception of skipping his 2016-17 exit meetings, the kid has serious star potential in the Manhattan frontcourt.
New York has the seventh-best chance to garner the No. 1 overall pick at 5.3 percent. The Knicks lost the coin-flip tiebreaker with the Minnesota Timberwolves. They should be okay to find talent in this deep NBA Draft, but getting the No. 1 overall pick for the Knicks would be massive.
While Jackson and the Ball Family would be the biggest circus professional basketball has ever seen, New York needs to be pragmatic for once and just take the best player available at No. 1: Washington Huskies point guard Markelle Fultz.
Head coach Jeff Hornacek would have his guy. Maybe Fultz is young enough to buy-in into the ramblings of how great The Triangle is? A Knicks team with Fultz at point guard and Porzignis ideally at stretch five would give this dead franchise some legitimate reason to be excited for 2017-18. If Fultz isn’t Derrick Rose, this could work out wonderfully.