The contract is understood to reflect Honda's concerns about the future of the teamin the context of the possibility of a global tobacco advertising ban being introduced within the next couple of years.
D'Antoni remains positive that the offense will hum when the Knicks are at full health, and he stressed that he didn't even realize Lin scored 38 against the Lakers because "he got 38 points in the context of team basketball, " which seems to indicate Lin could play well with anyone.
"When you put a new team together, as we have, in the context of a rugby or soccer season, we are only six or seven games into the season and you need five to bed down, " the 61-year-old former Bath and Ireland coach explained.