Phoenix traded point guard Negele Knight to San Antonio on November 8, 1993 for the Spurs' 1994 second-round pick, which became No. 29 Antonio Lang. Knight immediately gave San Antonio 64 games, 18 starts, 9.3 points and 3.1 assists per game before the Spurs released him the following July. Phoenix used the pick on Lang, but he appeared in only 12 Suns games as a rookie and averaged 0.9 points. The one-season Knight return clearly outweighed Phoenix's brief Lang stint.
Basketball-Reference's Phoenix and San Antonio transaction logs agree on the November 8, 1993 structure: the Suns sent Negele Knight to the Spurs for San Antonio's 1994 second-round choice. The pick landed at No. 29 and Phoenix used it on Duke forward Antonio Lang. That clean one-player-for-one-pick structure makes the hindsight comparison unusually direct because both teams realized the acquired asset themselves rather than routing it through another trade first.
Knight stepped into a real rotation role immediately. He played 64 regular-season games for San Antonio in 1993-94 and started 18 of them, averaging 22.3 minutes, 9.3 points and 3.1 assists while shooting 47.6 percent from the field. That was substantially more responsibility than a typical end-of-roster acquisition. The value did not last beyond the season: San Antonio released Knight on July 6, 1994, and he never played another game for the Spurs. Still, one productive 64-game season with 18 starts is meaningful direct return for a future second-round pick.
The Suns converted the pick into Antonio Lang at No. 29 in the 1994 draft. Lang made the 1994-95 Phoenix roster, but his role was extremely small. He appeared in 12 games, did not start, averaged 4.4 minutes and 0.9 points, and totaled only 53 minutes for the Suns. Lang later played additional NBA seasons with Cleveland, Miami, Toronto and Philadelphia, but those later games cannot be credited to Phoenix because the Suns no longer controlled his career. The trade's realized Phoenix value is therefore the 12-game rookie stint, not Lang's six-year NBA résumé.
The old Even Trade framing understated the difference. Knight was not a star and San Antonio did not retain him past one season, so this is not an A-level win. But the Spurs received a functioning backup point guard who played nearly 1,500 minutes and started 18 times. Phoenix's draft return produced 53 minutes and 11 points in 12 games. When the acquired assets are credited only for the teams that actually received their production, the gap is substantial.
San Antonio Spurs Win, B to D+. Knight supplied one solid season of rotation and spot-starting value. Phoenix correctly converted the second-round pick into an NBA player, but Lang's Suns tenure was too brief and too small to balance the exchange.