Can Phil Jackson and the Knicks win a Porzingis trade?

— -- How much is Kristaps Porzingis worth in a trade?

That's the question the New York Knicks and other teams appear to be asking this week, with Knicks president Phil Jackson saying in an interview on the MSG Network on Wednesday night that he's listening to offers for Porzingis and will do "what's good for our club."

So, could New York realistically find a Porzingis deal that makes the team better?

Valuing Porzingis

From a statistical standpoint, Porzingis presents an interesting case. For all the hype he's generated, he hasn't yet performed at an elite level in terms of box score stats. His true shooting percentage last season (.546, up from .518 as a rookie) was slightly worse than league average (.552), meaning Porzingis is basically a volume scorer at this stage of his career.

He also regressed to below average for a power forward in terms of defensive rebounding, one reason the Knicks had the league's worst defensive rebound percentage.

As a result, Porzingis rated just barely better than league average last season in Basketball-Reference.com's box plus-minus (plus-0.2 points per 100 possessions) as well as player win percentage (.535), the per-minute component of my wins above replacement player metric.

At the same time, ESPN's real plus-minus?was much more positive on Porzingis' value, rating him 1.6 points per 100 possessions better than league average. Despite his shortcomings as a rebounder, Porzingis rated as a strong defender by RPM. That matches up with his excellent rim-protection numbers. According to SportVU tracking on NBA.com/stats, the 44.6 percent opponents shot against Porzingis within 5 feet of the hoop was the league's sixth-lowest mark among players who faced at least 150 attempts.

My future projections essentially split the difference, using both RPM and WARP with adjustments for how the player is likely to age based on the development of similar players via my SCHOENE projection system. They show Porzingis producing at around a nine-win level the next two seasons, just shy of what is typically All-Star level.

Based on my current estimate of a win costing about $3.2 million more than the minimum in free agency, that makes Porzingis' production worth about $30 million the remaining two years of his rookie contract, during which he'll be paid $4.5 million (2017-18) and $5.7 million (2018-19, assuming the Knicks pick up his rookie contract, which even they probably wouldn't screw up).

Looking solely at the remainder of players' current contracts, the $50 million surplus value Porzingis will provide ranks 11th in the league. That will make it difficult for New York to get equal value in return. Is it possible?

Finding a Porzingis package

According to ESPN sources, the Knicks' discussions so far have centered on the top five teams in the lottery, as they target drafting Kansas forward Josh Jackson.

David Aldridge of TNT noted on Twitter that New York values Porzingis like the No. 1 pick this year or next year, which would suggest the Knicks expect at least as much in return as the Boston Celtics got from the Philadelphia 76ers for this year's top pick -- the No. 3 pick in this year's draft, plus a future pick from either the? Los Angeles Lakers?in 2018 or the Sixers or Sacramento Kings in 2019.

Based on my projections, Porzingis is in fact substantially more valuable than the No. 1 overall pick, which typically has a surplus value of about $36 million over the player's rookie contract.

That's true for a couple of reasons. Porzingis brings considerable immediate surplus value, while it will typically take at least a year for a top pick to be worth more than his higher salary ($7.0 million this season, $8.3 million in 2018-19). And because of the uncertainty about even the best prospects, the typical No. 1 pick isn't as productive by the end of his rookie contract as Porzingis projects to be.

If anything, looking just at rookie contracts probably undersells Porzingis' advantage over the No. 1 pick because he's much more certain to be the kind of star worth more than the maximum value on his second contract in the league. That typically requires 10-win production, and my long-term projections have Porzingis producing more than 11 wins in 2019-20, the first year of a new contract. By that point, Porzingis will be 24 and still short of his prime.

As a result, any fair offer for Porzingis would probably have to include players under contract with high surplus value in addition to a top-five pick. Because Philadelphia seems distinctly unlikely to move the No. 1 pick days after trading for it, and the Lakers and Kings don't have the necessary value on their current rosters, that leaves two reasonable contenders: the Celtics and the Phoenix Suns.

Discussions with the Suns have centered on Marquese Chriss and Dragan Bender, according to ESPN sources. Chriss ($24 million in projected surplus value) makes sense as part of a Porzingis package. Bender ($5 million surplus value) does less to move the needle after playing sparingly as a rookie. Bender's timeline for developing into a quality starter is probably toward the end of his rookie contract (if he gets there at all), meaning he'll be fairly paid soon thereafter.

However, a package of Chriss, point guard Eric Bledsoe ($22 million surplus value) and the No. 4 pick ($22 million for a typical No. 4 prospect) would be a winning one for the Knicks in terms of surplus value. That would potentially give New York three starters in return for Porzingis.

A Boston package might center on small forward Jae Crowder, who actually has more surplus value (a projected $57 million) than Porzingis on his current contract because he has an additional year at the bargain rate of $7.8 million in 2019-20 -- less than the new value of the non-taxpayer midlevel exception. Unlike Porzingis, Crowder won't likely have surplus value on his next contract, so an offer of him and the No. 3 pick ($24 million) seems fair. If the Knicks can get additional players and/or draft picks, all the better.

At the same time, Crowder and Jackson both play primarily small forward -- like Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony?--?so such a deal would really make sense only if New York had a trade lined up to move Anthony (or Crowder) for players who could help at other positions.

Finding a trade that works for both sides might prove impossible for the Knicks. Still, I don't think they're crazy to explore the market for a Porzingis trade. From a coolly rational perspective, a team should trade a player any time their trade value exceeds their surplus value.

There are human costs to that kind of thinking, of course, but in this case it's unclear how much worse Porzingis' relationship with the New York front office can get. So the Knicks aren't necessarily making a mistake as long as they're valuing Porzingis appropriately in any trades they consider.