There is no incentive for Durant or Irving to take significantly less money to do this. You are talking about, at minimum depending on length of contract, Kyrie giving up nearly $3 million and Durant $8 million. If the years on the sign and trade are guaranteed for more years, multiply by the number of years the amount those players are giving up.
Durant gave up millions to sign that first contract with GSW and signed short contracts with the explicit goal of signing a four year deal at 35% of the cap this year. That was the entire purpose of his short contracts in GSW...to cash in now.
And given Durant just had an injury scare, he is, in no way, shape or form going to risk not signing that contract right now. You would be asking him to give up at minimum $8 million hoping he doesn't have a bad injury so he can opt out after one year to sign that contract he has been aiming to get. But if he injures himself badly, he probably would not opt out meaning losing another $8 million per year. If I am Durant's agent I laugh at all this, point out how much money he is losing, how much more he could lose if injured and tell him sign elsewhere because the Knicks are morons.
Kyrie gave up $3.5 to get to Boston by waiving his trade kicker. Now you want him to give up another $2.7 million, at a minimum to go to NY. Kyrie is a bit injury prone. Therefore, Kyrie will have the same concerns about injury risk possibly costing him more long term money.
Those players will not do that. No way.
And that's not to mention that the Knicks could save that $11 million by just outright signing those players to contracts at the levels you suggested without needing to dump a #3 pick and Smith. But Durant and Irving would never sign for $30 million, so there would be no incentive to dump Smith and the pick because after signing those max contracts, there won't be enough cap space to warrant saving more money by salary dumping Smith and the pick to attempt to create enough space for another star player.
Simply put, this trade lacks logic and common sense. There is exactly no chance of it ever happening.
As I pointed out above, there is no need in anyone taking a paycut if NYK cut salary in a trade like this. I was posting on my phone earlier and didnt complete the math out in posts.
They would have to take less to get a 3rd star if they did no trade.
Your math is wrong. I will assume not picking up any options and renouncing every free agent and releasing all player with unguaranteed contracts.
Ntilikina $4.855
Smith $4.463
Knox $4.381
Robinson $1.559
So total for four players $15.258
Add Thomas's million that is guaranteed and Noah's $6.431 that was stretched and salary is $22.689
Add in the cap hold for the the #3 pick of $6.524
Then add 7 empty roster spot cap holds of 900,000 each or $6.3
Total salary used $35.513
Total cap space available $73.487
Kyrie would sign for $32.7
Durant would sign for $38.15
Add those salaries in and total Knicks salary after signing Durant and Kyrie is $104.563
Total cap space left is $ 4.437 million
So:
1. Stop with the nonsense that Durant and Kyrie will take less money. They won't. So these are the real numbers you are dealing with.
2. Stop with the sign and trade nonsense. It's just unnecessary. The Knicks can just trade any of their players and the picks. And get more than what you are stating in a sign and trade. Besides, why try to help other teams? Dumb move.
3. Even if the Knicks salary dump every player except Kyrie and Durant and dump the #3 pick a total of $21.782 you are only saving $17.282 million because their roster slots become empty meaning they are replaced with $4.5 million in empty roster spot holds.
This means if they sign Kyrie and Durant and afterward empty out every other slot all the Knicks can open up is $23.519 million. That is not near enough for a max level free agent.
And if the Knicks do clear everyone but Durant and Kyrie and use the $23.519 million to sign a player or players they then would have to fill 9 roster spots using only a room exception and vet min contracts. That's just not smart business wise.
And how the heck do you sell Durant and Kyrie on this? "Oh, we are going to wash the roster clean after signing you two, use the remaining cap space to sign a player, but not another star level player and the rest of the roster will be vet minimum guys." Good luck selling that long term plan of success to them.
So again, your math is wrong, your logic is wrong, and this makes no business sense whatsoever.