Everything’s pretty good with the Knicks. That’s no good
Nothing is rubbing the wrong way & that itches like you wouldn’t believe
Sunday I wrote almost 2,000 words about the Knicks. Yesterday I deleted them all. For the second time in my life I am at a loss for words with this team (the first being the end of the Isiah Thomas era, when I was speechless for other reasons entirely). This time I don’t know what to say because what’s obvious isn’t something I’m comfortable saying. So I'm writing to you with a question.
In five years with Leon Rose and Tom Thibodeau, three different Knicks combined for five All-NBA selections. The 20 years prior, the franchise had four. The team’s gone from a laughingstock to one of the league’s best. Once upon a time, Kevin Durant wouldn't come here because the Knicks weren't cool. Five years later Jalen Brunson took a discount to captain the ship and nobody blinked, not unless they were trying not to get all misty-eyed. The Knicks are good. Gooder than they’ve been in a while.
Two torn Achilles in Manhattan in May and Oklahoma City in June forced the last two teams to win the East to take a gap year next season. The Knicks won 10 playoff games a year ago; the Lights Too Bright-era Cavs have won 11 the past three postseasons combined. The defending champs loom large and terrifying, and the Rockets won’t be any fun to face the 60ish games Durant plays — nor the 20ish he doesn’t — but as of now, the Knicks have their clearest shot at a championship since 1994.
Look how close they came last year. Now they have all that continuity under their belt? The motivation of having come so close, having seen and heard how the Garden sounds when they’re that close? The addition of Jordan Clarkson, a 16-points-a-game microwaveable one-man offense, to a bench that didn’t score 16 as a group most nights? And someday the hiring of a head coach who maybe won’t spend five months defying all data, shooting his team in the foot while insisting the cure for what ails them is running longer, running harder? Finally, there is joy in Mudville.
That worries me.
It’s my nature. When things are at their best, anything going wrong creates the longest drop. That’s physics: when you’re high, you never, never wanna come down. In the blink of an eye the idyllic rots, sick, toxic. Things are looking pretty good for the Knicks – as of now. Thus, I’m bugging. Thus, the question I want to ask: What about you?
How do you feel about the Knickerbockers? What’s the biggest issue in your mind? Do the coaching names being bandied about – Mike Brown; Taylor Jenkins; James Borrego; Dawn Staley – do anything for you? Either to fire you up or have you longing for Thibs’ percussive barks?
Do I understate the rest of the East when I call the Knicks the favorites to win it? Maybe you see something in Cleveland I should look at more closely. I don’t think Detroit or Orlando can jump from “haven’t won a series in forever” to “ECF” in a single season, but throw Damian Lillard’s playoff Achilles tear on top of Jayson Tatum’s and Tyrese Haliburton’s and suddenly a whole lotta Manny Riberas get to thinking they’re Tony Montana. “The World Is Yours.”
1 The unprecedented is now inevitable: four teams are gonna win a playoff series in the East; the Knicks and Cavs being seeming locks for two means the other two will be teams that kinda came out of nowhere. The Magic (added Desmond Bane and Tyus Jones), the Hawks (added Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Kristaps Porziņģis to become overnight a deep, long-limbed defensive nightmare factory out of Lovecraft, a 10-man octopus with the face of Trae Young), the Pistons (adding a healthy Jaden Ivey) and the 76ers (snort) are all angling for a moment in the sun — not to mention the Pacers and Celtics, franchises whose winning DNA makes them more likely to modify their weaponry next season than tank.
Does not having a coach as the offseason unfolds hurt the Knicks’ position recruiting? Didn’t seem to with Clarkson. And the Knicks are so limited in what they can offer — their biggest available salary slot is a midlevel exception a shade under $6 million — any player considering them knows there’s no point in haggling, the Knicks literally have that one exception and then veteran’s minimums, period. Perhaps the brutality of the latest CBA and its Orwellian aprons (CHEAPNESS IS LUXURY! PARITY IS LEGENDARY!) renders care for little things like the human touch of a having an actual, human head coach in place obsolete, though it seems more reasonable from a buy-out recipient free to sign for the same veteran’s minimum wherever he went. In choosing New York, Clarkson deepened one of the league’s best septets into a top octet.
Clarkson’s job description is the same no matter the coach: rain buckets and dimes down, on and all over a bench thirsting for both; last year’s Knick reserves were one of the league’s least-productive (and yes it’s true Thibs gave them less opportunity than any other bench, but we’re not talking Lou Gehrig backing up Wally Pipp here, more Patrick Eddie backing up Patrick Ewing). Clarkson’s CV is the same, too: sixth-man scoring savant, whether Mike Brown’s coaching, Mike D’Antoni or Mike Fratello. Man didn’t need to be sweet-talked. Man’s a pro.
Do you want to see more of what last year’s team can do? Or if the white whale is now the Thunder, who bested the depth and full-court voodoo of the bugaboo Pacers, should the Knicks trade some of their top-heaviness for a greater breadth of talent? If the game today is less about having the best player and more about having the strongest weakest link, lengthening the rotation from seven to nine might be the new Dave DeBusschere, the finishing move that gets the championship gears going in perfect clockwork motion.
The Nuggets took a stab at this, trading Michael Porter Jr. to the Nets for Cam Johnson and in doing so creating enough apron room to bring back Bruce Brown, a key piece of their 2023 title-winning team, while making available the $14 million non-taxpayer midlevel exception. MPJ makes nearly double what Johnson and Brown do combined because he can do things neither can, but Denver valued that less than the depth and flexibility moving him created. Add Brown and a Guerschon Yabusele or Chris Boucher to Johnson and the deal seems a home run as far as the Nuggets’ return. Could the Knicks do something similar with one of their starters? If so, whom?
(If Russell Westbrook signs here, I’m gonna need a whole-ass article to process. Maybe a running series.)
Share your thoughts in the comments, and any ideas or questions you’d like to see elaborated. Maybe I’ll turn them into a mailbag. At the very least, they’ll give your fellow fans the chance to get out of their heads and enjoy the view from someone else’s. The world can seem like it’s shrinking, but as it fragments there are more perspectives to try on than ever. How about yours?
