Knicks Sign Lamar Odom for Last Game of the Season

Phil Jackson’s first move as a president of the New York Knicks was to ink a familiar, old face. Lamar Odom was signed for the last game of the season, and will have a chance to make the roster for next year. From the press release and the NY Post:

J.R. Smith sang the praises of the Knicks’ new signee, Lamar Odom, the troubled power forward from Queens who was officially signed Wednesday for the final game of the regular season in Phil Jackson’s first personnel move as team president.

The idea is for the Knicks to try out Odom across the next couple of months to see if he’s worth bringing to training camp. Odom will make a pro-rated $8,500 for the one game — 1/170th of the league’s veteran’s minimum.

More importantly, the former Christ The King star signed for a second non-guaranteed year. If the Knicks deem Odom not worth keeping for reasons stemming from his alleged drug issues, that salary figure of $1.3 million for next season can be thrown into a summer trade if need be for salary-cap reasons to make the mathematics work.

“Lamar’s a great player,’’ Smith said after the Knicks finished their season with a 95-92 win over the Raptors at the Garden. “A championship-caliber game, brings so much intangibles to the game. He’s a glue guy to the championship teams. I’m happy to have him.’’

Odom played five seasons for Jackson with the Lakers and won two titles. Arrested for DUI last summer, he didn’t play this season, other than a brief two-game stint in Spain before he was derailed by back issues. In November, he met in November with the Clippers, with whom he played last season, but they passed.