Pacome Dadiet’s place on the Knicks roster looks a lot less like a developmental bet and a lot more like a trade asset the team has been holding in reserve.
The latest reporting makes it clear that moving him was never some impossible contract dump. According to Jake Fischer of The Stein Line, teams around the league expect to get the equivalent of one second-round pick “every $5 million in salary (or thereabouts) absorbed via trade in the current landscape.” With Dadiet set to make around $3 million this season, New York was never staring at a deal that demanded a haul of sweeteners just to clear the money.
That matters because the Knicks have already used their draft capital in a way that gives them room to maneuver. They apparently have enough second-round picks on hand to trade, as the source put it, “like, five different Dadiets.” So the idea that New York kept him because he was too cumbersome to move doesn’t hold up.
There’s also the contract structure itself. Salary-dumping can get trickier when a player has years left on the books, but Dadiet’s deal doesn’t really create that problem. He has a team option for 2027-28 that has to be exercised by the end of October, and another team could have treated him as effectively expiring after this season, or waived him after acquiring him.
So if the Knicks could have moved Dadiet to open the door for Bruce Brown, or someone in that range, why didn’t they? The reporting points to the answer: they have more important uses for him.
Dadiet has yet to play this season, and the Knicks appear to value his salary slot as part of a larger plan rather than as a quick fix for another veteran-minimum signing. He is one of just three non-starters on the roster who will be trade-eligible before December, alongside Deuce McBride and Tyler Kolek.
That status alone gives him value, but the bigger edge is in the numbers. A veteran-minimum player would count for under $2.5 million in a trade, the same kind of figure Jordan Clarkson and James Wiseman eventually will carry. Dadiet’s roughly $3 million salary gives New York a little more breathing room - more than $500,000 extra, which sounds small until you remember how tight the Knicks are against the second apron.
And that extra cushion can matter a lot when the team is trying to make a deal work under those hard financial limits. The Knicks can’t take back more money than they send out, so every bit of additional salary flexibility helps. Dadiet’s contract is more useful than a minimum deal for that reason alone.
The source also notes that Dadiet could be used in a move for someone like Moussa Diabate without needing another salary piece attached, though that would still require draft compensation. That is not true for Wiseman, Clarkson, Tyler Kolek, or any minimum player New York might have signed if it had already moved Dadiet.
The difference can also swing the size of a possible deal. Pairing Dadiet and McBride together could bring back a player earning $6.9 million. If McBride were instead paired with another minimum contract, that number drops to $6.4 million.
In other words, the Knicks’ decision not to dump Dadiet says less about his present role than it does about his future utility. The reporting strongly suggests New York wants that flexibility for a bigger move, possibly sooner than December, and likely for something more meaningful than another minimum-level add-on.
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