With free company really fizzling out and solely about two months till coaching camp, Evan Fournier stays on the Knicks roster however is anxious that one other season in New York would wreck his profession.
“If I stayed, it would be a disaster, sportingly, for my career, everything,” Fournier advised French publication L’Equipe in a wide-ranging interview from his house in Manhattan. “A yr with out enjoying, I can handle.
“Two… that would be terrible.”
Fournier, who signed a three-year, $54 million deal in 2021, was pulled from Tom Thibodeau’s rotation in December and spent many of the season parked on the bench.
The 30-year-old stated he took it exhausting, at first.
“You want to spit on everyone. You have hatred,” Fournier stated. “Derrick Rose [who was also pulled from the rotation] and I checked out one another and stated to one another, ‘What the hell are we doing here?’
“During the 5x5s at practice, we were on the side like some prospects. Uncool times. And when I realized that wouldn’t change, I took things more slowly. I focused on me and didn’t let the rest get to me anymore.”
Fournier added that the reason from Tom Thibodeau was abrupt and the player-coach relationship was nonexistent.
“I have nothing to say because I have no [rapport with Thibodeau],” Fournier stated. “When he took me out of the five, he just told me he was going to try something else. Then at the first match of a road trip, he announced to me that I was leaving the rotation, and ciao.”
The earlier season, Fournier was third on the Knicks in minutes performed and set the franchise file for 3-pointers. But the staff struggled and Thibodeau changed Fournier within the lineup with the extra defensive-minded Quentin Grimes.
After six video games coming off the bench, Fournier was pulled from the rotation fully as Miles McBride and Immanuel Quickley ate up the backcourt bench minutes. The acquisitions of Josh Hart and Donte DiVincenzo additional pushed away the potential of Fournier ever rediscovering a task in New York.
Fournier stated he was pleased the staff didn’t commerce him earlier than the February deadline as a result of he didn’t wish to uproot his household. But the Frenchman, who’s getting ready to symbolize his nation at subsequent month’s FIBA World Cup, stated his worth has now tanked.
“If you want to trade me with a good return, why didn’t you use me?” Fournier stated. “I was coming out of a season where I was the fourth-best 3-point shooter in the league. Why not take advantage of it?”
Still, Fournier’s contract holds worth to the Knicks as an expiring $18.9 million. If they ever pull the set off on a deal for a star, Fournier would doubtless be included to match salaries.
There have been unsubstantiated rumors over the summer time of a deal to the Spurs, the place Fournier might’ve helped mentor his fellow countryman Victor Wembanyama. Fournier would’ve been happy if solely as a result of it’s a change of surroundings.
“I want a spot where I have fun again, where I can be myself,” he stated. “Would their game be more suited to me? It’s not the Spurs of 2014 anymore. But it is sure that playing for Pop [Gregg Popovich], learning from him, it would be a pleasure, an honor.”
Although the clock is working out on the offseason, Fournier nonetheless believes the Knicks will transfer him.
“I am going to be traded, it is not possible otherwise. Or I’d be stuck, and so would they,” Fournier stated, citing the Knicks’ wage cap state of affairs.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com