Chris Paul may wind up a Knick, but it won’t be until the summer.
As five teams continued to pitch Paul offers at the motivated Hornets, the Knicks have turned their attention everywhere but the Big Easy, remaining in the hunt for Grant Hill and centers Jeff Foster and Kurt Thomas, and are hoping to hear decisions today.
According to an NBA executive, the Knicks’ talk for Paul with New Orleans “is dead.’’ Meanwhile, rumors fly Paul could be dealt in the next 48 hours.
The Knicks’ lack of involvement in the trade scenario should not be surprising. It is hard to imagine a team having enough assets to trade for Carmelo Anthony one season, then months later still having enough young pawns to snare Paul.
The Knicks don’t even have a first-round pick to dangle until 2016 and their best young player, Landry Fields, is a second-round pick who most teams thought would go undrafted.
In fact, the day after a tentative agreement was reached to end the lockout, The Post reported the new CBA, while giving the Knicks potential cap room to snare Paul in 2012, hurt them in other ways. The Post reported the new CBA gave New Orleans a legitimate chance to trade Paul for more than a rental.
The owners agreed to allow the extend-and-trade provision after initially removing it. The new CBA also gave teams the opportunity to gain a players’ Bird rights if traded before Jan. 1. Hence, a team such as the Clippers can trade for Paul without an extension and get more leverage in the summer because they could sign him to a five-year, max contract in the summer.
The Clippers, Warriors, Lakers, Celtics, and Rockets are deemed as having made the best offers for Paul, according to reports. Nevertheless, a report suggested Paul won’t re-sign with Golden State.
The Knicks hope Paul either is not traded or dealt to a club in which he ultimately does not wish to re-sign with in July.
Even if Paul, Deron Williams, who said he’s “90 percent’’ sure he’s re-signing with the Nets, or Dwight Howard aren’t available to them, the Knicks can put their 2012 cap space to plenty of use in a deep free-agent class that also will feature point guards Steve Nash, Jameer Nelson, Raymond Felton and Jason Terry, forwards ex-Knick Danilo Gallinari and Kevin Love, and centers Andrew Bynum, Ray Hibbert and Kevin Garnett.
Hill is a priority because the Knicks feel he can slide into their starting shooting guard slot, be a glue piece as a leader and allow Fields to be their Sixth Man.
Hill, 39, is enamored with playing in New York, according to sources close to him, because he realizes his future business interests would be enhanced. Though he is leaning to the Knicks, he is reluctant to leave the Suns’ training staff, which has the reputation as the best in the league. The injury-prone Hill, who had disastrous ankle and foot problems, has been in perfect health since coming to Phoenix four years ago.
“He wants to be healthy, but he also wants to win,’’ a person close to Hill told The Post. “He understands where Phoenix is at. Those are all things milling through his mind.’’
Meanwhile, Thomas is trying to determine his landing spot. He got a jolt of interest in New York after a good conversation with his former teammate, Knicks assistant general manager Allan Houston. Hill and Thomas are the two oldest players in the league and both played for coach Mike D’Antoni.
* Small forward Shawne Williams, a huge revelation last season, won’t be at training camp tomorrow when it opens, still unsigned. The Knicks have offered him a one-year deal at the minimum, $980,000, but he has a couple of more lucrative offers. The Nets have inquired. … The Knicks have interest in re-signing young forward Derrick Brown, who was signed in March but rarely played. … Amar’e Stoudemire and Chauncey Billups are expected to report to voluntary workouts today, the last day of such get-togethers.