Richard Jefferson played 17 seasons in the NBA and called it a career back in 2018. But it turned out that the 39-year-old did have the option to extend his NBA career. According to him, it just would have meant that he’d have to play for the Knicks.
Any guesses how that turned out?
Jefferson joined the crew for the YES Network broadcast of Nets-Knicks on Sunday, and he straight-up said that he refused to play for the Knicks.
According to Jefferson, the Knicks were the only team to come calling after his 20-game stint in Denver. Faced with the dreaded reality of playing basketball for the New York Knicks or retire, Jefferson said that he knew his playing days were over. He opted to retire instead.
Jefferson said:
“I refused to play for the Knicks. Jason Kidd and Kenyon Martin — they don’t really care. Me — I was the one person that said, ‘Knicks? No. I’ll retire.’ That’s why I retired. They were the one team that offered me a job, and I decided to retire. It’s true. I decided to retire instead of playing for the Knicks. … I just knew it was time. When the Knicks were looking for me to play for them, I knew my time in this league was over.”
Ouch, Richard. After all, Jefferson does know how to kick the Knicks when they’re down.
As awesome as that story is — and trust me, it is great — it shows where the Knicks stand with NBA players today. They went into last offseason hoping to sign Kevin Durant, and they couldn’t even sign an admittedly washed Richard Jefferson. He quite literally wouldn’t take Jim Dolan’s money to be a Knick.
