The Knicks’ season may not have ended with the playoffs loss to Miami because, by all appearances, they’re still playing games.
In a snit over the Rockets reworking the offer sheet to Jeremy Lin, the Knicks are in no hurry to respond to the deadline to match or decline the latest version of the proposal. And before that comes to a head, possibly tonight, the Knicks officially added point guard Raymond Felton, which would appear to be a major domino leading to the exit of the incumbent Lin.
The apparent conflict as to exactly how long the Knicks have to match Houston’s 3-year, $25.1 million back-loaded offer sheet revolves around when the offer actually was delivered. According to the collective bargaining agreement, teams have 72 hours from the time they receive an offer sheet to make their decision. The deadline is traditionally worked out between the teams without league intervention.
The Rockets maintain the sheet was delivered to the Knicks Saturday night after attempts were made to get it to them on Friday. The Knicks, however, have not confirmed the delivery date. Technically, the sheet is expected to be delivered to the team’s offices, but the Knicks brass was headquartered in a Las Vegas hotel as its team competes in the summer league there. The Rockets also maintain the offer was shipped to the Knicks’ New York offices.
The Knicks are upset with the change in the offer sheet’s original details, going from a four-year deal to a hard-to-swallow three-year version that has a killer $14.9 million final year. The Knicks would then owe roughly three times that ($43.4 million) in luxury tax. So they are in no mood to cooperate.
Still, around the league, some executives were not fully persuaded “Linsanity” was closing its New York run.
“I’m not convinced,” one rival general manager said. “The guy is a good player. The guy puts people in the arena. … That third year puts them in a tough spot. But I don’t think it’s about money for them.”
And while all that was occurring, the team weathered the nasty fallout of veteran point Jason Kidd’s DWI which apparently will have zero bearing on the Lin decision.
In the interim, Felton officially was re-acquired in a sign and trade, strengthening the position that Lin may leave after just 35 games in New York.
The Knicks re-acquired both Felton and forward Kurt Thomas, 39, from Portland for forward Jared Jeffries, via sign and trade, center Dan Gadzuric plus the draft rights to both Kostas Papanikolaou and Giorgos Printezis and a protected future second-round draft pick.
Like Thomas, Felton, 6-foot-1, 205 pounds is back for another run at the Garden, where he played in 2010-11.
So Felton’s arrival could signal Lin’s departure. Still, several executives around the league — who requested anonymity because they were not speaking about their own players or teams — thought the Knicks would retain Lin.
“They’ll have a huge payroll. They let [Landry] Fields go. Again, it’s that third year but at the end of the day, you’re worth what someone is willing to pay you and I just think they’ll end up keeping him,” the first exec said.
Another, from the West, chose to look at it from a marketing standpoint and said simply, “I would think they’d have to match because of his worth in other [non-basketball] areas. Maybe by the time that [tax hit] takes effect, you work something out in another area.”
And in the background of all this was Kidd’s Suffolk County arrest for DWI after he drove his vehicle into a light pole in Water Mill. Kidd was brought in, ostensibly, to mentor Lin and to come off the bench. Other than more details coming out about the incident, which occurred at 1:56 a.m. Sunday, there was little new on the Kidd front.
There was no statement from either the Knicks, Kidd or his agent, Jeff Schwartz, as of early last night. It is doubtful the incident, as shameful as it was, will have any effect on Kidd’s playing with the Knicks. In the past, teams or the league have imposed a suspension, normally two games, for such incidents.
fred.kerber@nypost.com