New York Knicks · 2026–27 Salary Cap Tracker

• No Bi-Annual Exception (BAE) — not available to taxpaying teams.
• No Non-Taxpayer MLE — must use the smaller Taxpayer MLE instead.
• Trade matching: can receive up to 125% + $100K of outgoing salary.

• No salary aggregation in trades — cannot combine multiple players' salaries to match a higher-salaried player.
• Tighter trade matching: max incoming = 110% of outgoing (not 125% + $100K).
• Cannot receive via sign-and-trade.
• Bird Rights re-signings still allowed regardless of apron status.
• TMLE still available as long as the signing stays under the second apron.

All first apron restrictions, plus:

• No Taxpayer MLE — no mid-level exception of any kind.
• No cash in trades.
• No buyout signings after the Feb. 1 trade deadline.
• First-round picks frozen: picks 7+ years out may only be traded to a restricted set of teams and cannot be packaged.
• Repeat offender: 3 of 5 seasons over the second apron → first-round pick moves to the end of round one.

• Full Bird Rights (3+ seasons, no trade out of team): re-sign for up to max salary, 4–5 year deal, 8% annual raises. Team can exceed the salary cap.
• Early Bird Rights (2 complete seasons): max 175% of league minimum or 105% of prior salary, whichever is greater. Max 3 years, 5% raises.
• Non-Bird Rights (<2 seasons): limited to cap space available, or 120% of last salary as a restricted exception.
• Landry Shamet's 4yr/$24M uses Bird Rights — yr1 ≈ $5,357,143 with ~8% annual raises.
• RFA: tendering a Qualifying Offer (QO) retains matching rights. Not tendering (as with Hukporti on June 29) makes the player an unrestricted free agent; the cap hold remains until formally renounced.

• Amount: ≈ $6,066,000 in year 1 (2026–27 estimate).
• Max length: 2 years · Annual raises: up to 5%.
• One-time use per offseason. Cannot be used if the signing would push the team over the second apron.
• Knicks status: TMLE has not yet been used this offseason.

• Arise when a team sends out more salary than it receives. Usable within one year to absorb incoming trade salary without matching.
• Dalen Terry TPE: $899,118 — expires Feb 5, 2027.
• Guerschon Yabusele TPE: $100,882 — expires Feb 5, 2027.
• Cannot be combined with other salary.

Cap holds count against the team's salary cap until:

• The player signs — hold replaced by actual salary.
• The team renounces rights — hold removed, player becomes unrestricted UFA with no Knicks matching rights.
• For RFAs, not tendering a QO (as with Hukporti) immediately removes the restriction but the cap hold persists until formally renounced.