The New York Knicks seem to have their regular season roster pretty much set, but like most teams, they want to bring in some extra guys on training camps deals for competition. In the spirit of that competition, the Knicks have reportedly agreed to a deal with former Michigan State point guard Travis Trice that will get him into Knicks training camp, according to Shams Charania of Yahoo Sports.
The deal is reportedly for one year and is partially guaranteed. Trice went unselected in the 2015 NBA draft but had workouts with a few teams in hopes of getting a training camp deal. Trice played for the Miami Heat's summer league team where he struggled in limited minutes. In seven summer league games, he averaged 4.4 points and 1.3 assists in just 10.6 minutes per game while making just 38 percent of his field goals and 33 percent of his threes.
Trice was a four-year player at Michigan State under Tom Izzo and was the best player on the 2014-15 Spartans team that made it to the Final Four. As a senior, Trice was one of the best players in the Big Ten as he averaged 15.3 points, 5.1 assists and 3.2 rebounds per game while making 37 percent of his threes. For his career, the 6-foot tall point guard made 40 percent of his long range shots and that is where he can probably be most effective at the next level.
Trice is undersized for an NBA player, and in college he was a high volume scorer for the most part. Even with those flaws, Trice still made all of the big plays for Michigan State a year ago and knows how to play the game, so maybe with a little development and coaching he could be a useful NBA player.
As it stands now, Trice's chances of making the Knicks roster aren't very good despite their weakness at the guard positions. Thanasis Antetokounmpo is the player Trice would likely have to beat out to get a spot and the Knicks have put a lot of time into him, so unless Trice really impresses at Knicks training camp, he will either be headed to the D-League or elsewhere to play basketball.
