The Knicks officially waived guard Chauncey Billups, designating him as the club’s amnesty player in order to free up his $14.2 million salary for Tyson Chandler.
But any team looking to pick up the 34-year-old veteran better beware.
“I’ m tired of being the good guy,” Billups told Yahoo! Sports. “I’m tired of being viewed as the guy. After a while, you just kind of get taken advantage of in these situations. I’ve been known as a leader, and I am a leader, but a leader can be as disruptive as he can be productive, especially when you carry a strong voice and people rally around you. This is about me now. This is about me, and teams should know that right now.”
Andy Miller, Billups’ agent, previously told Yahoo! Billups might choose to retire instead of report to a team he didn’t want to play for.
Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni told reporters Friday he was comfortable using Toney Douglas at the point or running the offense through Carmelo Anthony.
“I think the team will look more like an old Celtics team, in the sense of going through Bird a lot, and they had two rangy shooters in the backcourt, [Danny] Ainge and Dennis Johnson,” D’Antoni said. “It’s just going to change in the sense that I had [Steve] Nash or somebody like that having the ball all the time. Now, Melo will be doing the pick-and-rolls more, and that’s a good thing. Melo’s one of the best passers we have, and he’ll be involved in a lot more running the team.
“I’m not taking anything away from Toney or Landry [Fields] or [Iman] Shumpert, or whoever’s back there. Those guys I have a lot of confidence in and I do know they can make shots and defend, and that’s a good place to start.”
The Knicks will reportedly add veteran point guard Mike Bibby on a one-year deal, who could back up Douglas. Both are repped by agent David Falk.
“That’s a good name,” D’Antoni told reporters of Bibby.
