Knicks’ OG Anunoby returns on five-year, $212.5M deal: Report

The New York Knicks are having a very good week.

Knicks star OG Anunoby plans to re-sign with the team on a five-year contract worth $212.5 million, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Anunoby achieved unrestricted free agency by declining the player option for the final season of the four-year, $72 million contract he signed with the Raptors in December 2020. Three years after signing that deal – a period in which Anunoby averaged 16.6 points and 5.3 rebounds per game, shot 38.2% from three-point range and emerged as one of the most versatile defensive stoppers in the League. Toronto traded him to the Knicks in exchange for forward RJ Barrett and guard Immanuel Quickley.

From the Raptors’ perspective, the trade served two purposes. In Quickley and Barrett, Toronto added two pieces to the rebuilding core that might fit better alongside the franchise’s newly capped cornerstone, Scottie Barnes, than Anunoby or a similarly styled forward, Pascal Siakam, who was later spun off to the Pacers. team eager to bring him back after their sprint to the Eastern Conference finals. The move allowed the Raptors — who had “rejected offers from multiple first-rounders for Anunoby during previous trade cycles,” according to Yahoo Sports senior NBA reporter Jake Fischer — to avoid losing Anunoby for nothing if he decides to go undrafted market and find a deal richer than the four-year, $118 million extension that represented the most Toronto could offer him.

Anunoby helped him in his efforts to find that richer deal with his play at Madison Square Garden, where he immediately proved he was a good fit for Tom Thibodeau’s team on both ends of the floor, leading the Knicks to second place were lifted into the competition. the Eastern Conference and their first 50-win season in 11 years.

Anunoby averaged 14.1 points, 4.4 rebounds and 1.5 assists in 34.9 minutes per game across 23 games for the Knicks during the regular season, and 15.1 points, 6 rebounds and 1.1 assists in 36 minutes per night in nine appearances during the New York playoffs. Both stints were interrupted by injuries: a loose bone fragment in his right elbow that required surgery, with a subsequent flare-up after the return that sidelined him for most of the final two and a half months of the regular season, followed by a strained left hamstring that cost him Games 3 through 6 against Indiana in the second round, and limited him to just a five-minute cameo in the Knicks’ Game 7 loss.

While injury concerns surrounding a player who has only reached the top 50 appearance mark once in the last four seasons should give interested prospects at least some pause, the tremendous impact Anunoby has proven on both ends of the pitch to have ensured that the market for his services would remain frothy.

Guys with the combination of size – 6-foot-1, 240 pounds, with a 7-foot-2 wingspan – athleticism, agility, instincts and aptitude for legitimate defense everyone are rare. According to BBall Index positional data, only 10 players who logged at least 1,000 minutes last season split their defensive responsibilities as evenly across all five positions as Anunoby: Jalen Williams, James Harden, Jaylen Brown, Kelly Oubre Jr., Malcolm Brogdon, Moses Moody, Naji Marshall, Ochai Agbaji, Paul George and Taurean Prince. Of those eleven players, Anunoby had to face by far the toughest attacking opponents. He ranked in the 98th percentile in average matchup difficulty and the 99th percentile in how often he controlled the opponent’s most used playmakers.

Guys who can do that while also clearing the floor for teammates by shooting well above league average from three-point range? Even rarer. Anunoby has knocked down 38.3% of his long balls over the last five seasons, attempting 5.6 triples per 36 minutes of floor time – a combination of volume, accuracy and consistency that only 35 players have managed over the last five years . He has become particularly lethal from the corners, drilling 40% of his corner looks in each of the last five seasons – and better than 44% in each of the last three.

Add that to the creation of defensive occurrences – on-ball steals, secondary rim protection, deflections on relief rotations – that can help bolster a transition attack, and his (occasional) ability to put the ball on the deck and create a look for himself to create. the mid-range when possession stalls and Anunoby becomes a force multiplier, taking a team on either side of the pitch to the next level just by stepping on it. That certainly proved true during his half-season in New York: The Knicks gained Anunoby’s minutes in all 23 regular-season games he played for them, went 26-6 in the 32 regular-season and postseason games he suited up for, and outscored him. opponents by a whopping 16.3 points per 100 possessions in his minutes.

That kind of all-around impact is worth its weight in gold for a potential contender — and now it’s landed Anunoby a contract that will see the soon-to-be 27-year-old through his likely athletic peak, more than doubling his career earnings in the process.