The New York Knicks walked into this offseason without a first-round pick, paying the price for last year’s trade to land Mikal Bridges.
Still, they managed to pull in one intriguing flier by signing undrafted guard Dink Pate, hoping his raw skill set can blossom.
Pate is set to join the Knicks for the NBA Summer League, where he’ll try to show flashes of why he was once such a hyped prospect.
This might be a slow burn, but sometimes the best stories start with uncertain odds and a whole lot of patience.
Pate’s numbers don’t jump off the page, but his frame certainly does
At 6’8″ and 210 pounds, Dink Pate has a rare frame for a guard, something that immediately makes scouts perk up.
He spent last season in Mexico City, averaging 10.1 points, 5.2 rebounds, and nearly two assists per game.
His shooting splits, however, weren’t pretty — he hit just .407 from the field and a rough .258 from beyond the arc.
Pate’s biggest hurdles are consistency and efficiency, two critical pieces if he wants to carve out a real NBA role.
From high school phenom to raw professional project
Pate was once a highly ranked high school player, skipping the college route entirely to join the G League Ignite program.
Over two seasons there, he averaged just 9.4 points on 9.3 shots per game, showing that his offensive game was still very much in the oven.
The Knicks are essentially gambling on tools here: long arms, elite athleticism, and an innate creativity handling the ball.
It’s like buying a house that needs a total renovation — if it comes together, the payoff could be massive.
What Dink Pate needs to improve to make an NBA jump
For Pate, the glaring issue is his jumper. His three-point numbers are shaky, and he hasn’t shown much consistency from mid-range either.
But he’s still a teenager with plenty of developmental runway, and the Knicks aren’t expecting him to be a star right away.
His ball-handling is advanced for his age, and he’s flashed intriguing court vision, which could let him run some second-unit sets down the line.
Summer League will be his first real audition to show he belongs in an NBA program long term.
- The Knicks just bought a lottery ticket in undrafted guard
- Knicks reportedly reached out to Women’s NCAA champion head coach regarding vacancy
- Knicks might bail on promising center’s growth sooner than anyone expected
The Knicks will give him time — but how much?
New York knows Dink Pate is more of a long-term lottery ticket than a surefire roster piece for this season.
He’s the type of project that might need two or three years in the system before they know what he truly is.
If he starts to hit shots more consistently, suddenly you’re talking about a big guard with defensive switchability and offensive upside.
The Knicks are hoping patience pays off, and in a league always hunting mismatches, Pate’s rare build makes him worth the experiment.
!function(){var g=window;g.googletag=g.googletag||{},g.googletag.cmd=g.googletag.cmd||[],g.googletag.cmd.push(function(){g.googletag.pubads().setTargeting(“has-featured-video”,”true”)})}();