Post Mortem #28 - New York Knicks

[Froob]

i’d be selling high on Mitchell Robinson before the next season, his value will never be higher.

I’d try to get Austin Reaves for him. Reaves is a good trade asset, or you extend him, or play it out see how he fits with Brunson and maybe deal him before the deadline much better asset than Mitchell Robinson.

Think you'd have to give up more to get Reaves. And I know New York could use an extra ball handler and playmaker, but you really think you can have a good enough D with KAT as the only quality big in the rotation?

Doesn’t have to be the final move, I definitely don’t want to pay Mitchell Robinson next summer when he’s a FA. who knows if lakers would do it, dumber trades have happened and they are desperate. Reaves is a good asset if nothing else

[California Gold]

It may be a coincidence but the last 3 years in the Eastern Conference, the ECF runner up team has gone to the finals the following season. For that reason alone I think the Knicks don't need to do too much. Add some depth perhaps and run it back.

[Doctor MJ]

Another good year for the Knicks. I'd expect to run it back and hope the team can use the off season to improve in little ways.

[sp6r=underrated]

The brutal truth about the NBA is that building a true championship level roster is extremely hard because the sport has a low luck component.

The most common championship roster is (i) a top 5 level player on their roster with this player being closer to MVP than number five; (ii) a player in the seven to fifteen range and (iii) solid depth. This decade the Lakers, Bucks, Warriors and Celtics followed this formula. The Nuggets really didn't have (ii) but for two months Jamal Murray played over his head.

The champions with a different makeup usually have a player or two who just past their MVP level years or are just before their serious MVP level years. The 2014 Spurs are an example of this club. Duncan was a serious MVP contender and Kawhi would become one later. And these clubs have massive depth.

Win another ‘’we won second round ‘’ banner next year

I hate the "rings or you're a loser" attitude so much. The Knicks shouldn't hang up a banner for this season but they should be proud of it.

As I explain above most teams aren't going to be able to be serious contenders. So unless you want every fanbase to be miserable all year outside of three to four teams you need to find a way to make building good teams acceptable.

Sadly your attitude is becoming the dominant one which is why the NBA's culture is so joyless.

[MrBigShot]

Fantastic year for the knicks. Keep the core of Brunson/Bridges/KAT/OG/Hart together, make some improvements to the bench and run it back.

[JXL]

It may be a coincidence but the last 3 years in the Eastern Conference, the ECF runner up team has gone to the finals the following season. For that reason alone I think the Knicks don't need to do too much. Add some depth perhaps and run it back.

That's a big reason to not make significant changes to the roster. Basically tweak the bench for better depth that the coach can use, and see them in the 2026 NBA Finals.

[xxSnEaKyPxx]

Knicks have a lot to be proud of this year. I think they got close enough that you have to run it back.

Figure out what went wrong in this series and work on improving your weak spots for another run next season.

The Knicks are still very much a contender. Would be a mistake blowing things up this early.

[Chuck Everett]

Hukporti, Kolek, McCullars, Dadiet need a lot of bench minutes next year. No more PJ Tucker's wasting roster spots. If you need a vet, get one that can still play this game like a Batum.

[KnicksGadfly]

Hukporti, Kolek, McCullars, Dadiet need a lot of bench minutes next year. No more PJ Tucker's wasting roster spots. If you need a vet, get one that can still play this game like a Batum.

It turns out PJ was pretty useful because apparently we had to call multiple team meetings during the postseason...which honestly is damning on Thibs cause the coach needs to call shyt out if that's happening.

[sikma42]

Fantastic year for the knicks. Keep the core of Brunson/Bridges/KAT/OG/Hart together, make some improvements to the bench and run it back.

It’s tough bc I don’t think the bench is the issue. But agree you have to retool


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[Mamba81p]

The current CBA is bad and this has nothing to do with the Knicks.

Historically, the NBA is most popular when the end of the playoffs features the same few teams meeting over and over again relative to high parity eras. Low parity eras turn off some fans who find a certain matchup boring. I found Warriors-Cavs a snore. But for everyone of us you lose you attract more casuals who prefer the repeat matchup with both teams bringing back the marquees players.

The current CBA encourages breaking up good teams and discourages elite players form pairing together. That's the opposite of what fans want.

Even worse the CBA's extreme penalties encourages tanking since having enough rookies on your roster ensures that you aren't at risk of the cap penalties.

The CBA blows.

I hate this CBA too.
They want a hard cap but without having actually a hard cap. A lot of thing don’t make sense in this CBA. I personally hate when hockey teams have to break teams up. I wanted to see what Tampa and Colorado would do. I wanted to see teams internally evolve for better or worse, defending champs losing on the court like the Celtics did, not just because they have to get rid of their players.

It makes it very hard to get out of an apron. I understand that you don’t allow to combine salaries to get a better player, but what if you want to dump contracts in bulk? Nope can’t do that unless the trade being a you below the second apron. You can’t sign and trade if you are above first apron, but the same issue , what if you want to trade your highest paid player(suns) and sign another player that makes less, but not enough to bring you back below the apron. I don’t even know if these are unintended consequences, or they want to scare teams to no even dare going into aprons. You have to dismantle teams to get out of it, not just trade a player.
They might as well put a hard cap and teams can have more clarity.

I am not sure how nbpa agreed to this. It is a mess.

[kaansunman]

Knicks build the team to beat especially Celtics in the last off season. Mikal and OG to match Tatum and Brown and it worked out. Since Tatum's injury, the rivals to the top in East will be be between: Pacers, Cavs, Pistons, Magic. These are all tough teams with solid frontcourts. We need a better matchup for Siakam defensively for sure. Jerami Grant used to be a player that I like but he is not playing serious basketball for too long now.

I think Thibs showed that he can use depth if needed in Pacers series. He will hopefully continue that in 25-26. We can protect the core and surround them with players with their original positions meaning SG and PF (we have three original SFs (Hart-OG-Mikal) and five PGs (Brunson-Shamet-Payne-McBride-Wright)).

[Drakeem]

Keep, Change, As expected, Treadmill

Nobody should have had higher expectations for a team with a 6'1" high usage chucker that plays no defense and Thibs as coach. Treadmill because there's really no path to improve. They aren't going to move any of their core. They'll run it back, likely with Thibs, for another year and then blow it up

Being as close as they were to making the Finals is not a "treadmill" team.

[HotelVitale]

The current CBA is bad and this has nothing to do with the Knicks.

Historically, the NBA is most popular when the end of the playoffs features the same few teams meeting over and over again relative to high parity eras. Low parity eras turn off some fans who find a certain matchup boring. I found Warriors-Cavs a snore. But for everyone of us you lose you attract more casuals who prefer the repeat matchup with both teams bringing back the marquees players.

The current CBA encourages breaking up good teams and discourages elite players form pairing together. That's the opposite of what fans want.

Even worse the CBA's extreme penalties encourages tanking since having enough rookies on your roster ensures that you aren't at risk of the cap penalties.

The CBA blows.

I hate this CBA too.
They want a hard cap but without having actually a hard cap. A lot of thing don’t make sense in this CBA. I personally hate when hockey teams have to break teams up. I wanted to see what Tampa and Colorado would do. I wanted to see teams internally evolve for better or worse, defending champs losing on the court like the Celtics did, not just because they have to get rid of their players.

It makes it very hard to get out of an apron. I understand that you don’t allow to combine salaries to get a better player, but what if you want to dump contracts in bulk? Nope can’t do that unless the trade being a you below the second apron. You can’t sign and trade if you are above first apron, but the same issue , what if you want to trade your highest paid player(suns) and sign another player that makes less, but not enough to bring you back below the apron. I don’t even know if these are unintended consequences, or they want to scare teams to no even dare going into aprons. You have to dismantle teams to get out of it, not just trade a player.
They might as well put a hard cap and teams can have more clarity.

I am not sure how nbpa agreed to this. It is a mess.

I agree with most of this but the thing you're talking about doesnt seem that crucial. It's true a team over the aprons can't take back more money in a trade than they give out, but that's never been a super key way of cutting salary--in the past teams still had to match contracts within 25% anyway, and even expiring deals at the deadline didn't bring immediate salary relief. So under the rules of now and the past, if the Suns decided they wanted to deal KD to cut costs this summer, they'd still have to trade him for contracts that make about the same amount of $, and they would have to wait a year at minimum before those contracts expired.

It's sort of inconvenient and makes everything a little harder but I don't think that change is kneecapping teams from cutting salary.

[Celts17Pride]

The Knicks in my opinion are close to their max level. They are a B+ team. That can change but right now their best player is 6'1" and dominates the scoring and the ball. Two of the Knicks starters are among the worse defenders in the league (Brunson & Towns) and two players (Bridges & OG) are extremely inconsistent. If the Knicks get hot they can beat you but changes have to be made to get over the hump and I'm not talking coaching changes. That's a different subject. I think the Knicks are a few moves away.

Knicks fans can get mad but I'm just trying to keep it real. Knicks had a great year.

[Capn'O]

The more I think about it the more I think we'll just run it back and try to iron out some of the issues with a full offseason/preseason of study. Among their issues was that Brunson and KAT didn't play well off of one another and, at least on offense, there seem to be some pragmatic things they can work on to fix that. Brunson's not an elite passer but if he studies KAT's spots and how to feed him I think that will improve.

The defense is more of a challenge but familiarity could help it some, especially integrating Mitch and likely Hukporti into the schemes for a full season.

If we were to change the coach I like Jenkins better than the other recently fired coaches out there and would love to give Sam Cassell a shot.

The brutal truth about the NBA is that building a true championship level roster is extremely hard because the sport has a low luck component.

The most common championship roster is (i) a top 5 level player on their roster with this player being closer to MVP than number five; (ii) a player in the seven to fifteen range and (iii) solid depth. This decade the Lakers, Bucks, Warriors and Celtics followed this formula. The Nuggets really didn't have (ii) but for two months Jamal Murray played over his head.

The champions with a different makeup usually have a player or two who just past their MVP level years or are just before their serious MVP level years. The 2014 Spurs are an example of this club. Duncan was a serious MVP contender and Kawhi would become one later. And these clubs have massive depth.

Win another ‘’we won second round ‘’ banner next year

I hate the "rings or you're a loser" attitude so much. The Knicks shouldn't hang up a banner for this season but they should be proud of it.

As I explain above most teams aren't going to be able to be serious contenders. So unless you want every fanbase to be miserable all year outside of three to four teams you need to find a way to make building good teams acceptable.

Sadly your attitude is becoming the dominant one which is why the NBA's culture is so joyless.

In Arky's defense, he specifically hates us and probably wouldn't do that for other teams Poor Arky might have a decent team to root _for_ by 2035 if we fall off a bit.

[celtxman]

The current CBA is bad and this has nothing to do with the Knicks.

Historically, the NBA is most popular when the end of the playoffs features the same few teams meeting over and over again relative to high parity eras. Low parity eras turn off some fans who find a certain matchup boring. I found Warriors-Cavs a snore. But for everyone of us you lose you attract more casuals who prefer the repeat matchup with both teams bringing back the marquees players.

The current CBA encourages breaking up good teams and discourages elite players form pairing together. That's the opposite of what fans want.

Even worse the CBA's extreme penalties encourages tanking since having enough rookies on your roster ensures that you aren't at risk of the cap penalties.

The CBA blows.

I've been talking about this exact subject for a while now. The CBA encourages tanking. Philadelphia failed at tanking, but OKC perfected it. This formula will be studied and attempted to be replicated and the blueprint will be saved in every NBA front office. In the Celtics case they had two homegrown stars, who became poster children for the NBA'S ballyhooed plan to keep teams together with the supermax. Except now you have over $100 million tied up with a salary cap of $154 cap with 12 more roster spots to fill. So you start with luxury tax, then 1st and 2nd aprons to punish every dollar you spend to try to compell you to choose saving money over trying to win championships,.
The Knicks are coming closer to where the Celtics are. Quietly the Cavaliers traded Caris Lavert's expiring salary and picked up extra years getting DeAndre Hunter's extra guaranteed years. It was celebrated by Cavs fans. Now? The Cavs have $218M on the books next season with 3 roster spots to fill. Hunter did not play well against Indiana. In this CBA I'll bet they wish that they kept Lavert.
The irony is so thick with this CBA. The alleged idea was to promote parity. But you already will have 7 different champions in 7 seasons and finally the Celtics will finally succumb to this CBA. They were cutting salary with or without a ring. Where the irony is, with the perfect tank job, OKC now has a nice runway that will likely be lengthened and therefore squash parity. Hilarious

[dakomish23]

My guess has been that they try to trade McBride + filler to bring back DDV somehow.

Brunson
DDV
Mikal
OG
KAT

PG (I hope they go after Tyus Jones)
Shamet (who I think will be back)
Hart
Mitch

[kenwood3333]

Giannis would be a good fit on this team, over KAT. He can carry the offensive load during the regular season and first 3 quarter of po, then let Brunson take over during critical times.

KAT+OG for Giannis

[JulesWinnfield]

Giannis would be a good fit on this team, over KAT. He can carry the offensive load during the regular season and first 3 quarter of po, then let Brunson take over during critical times.

KAT+OG for Giannis

Giannis would fit anywhere and he’s obviously way better than Towns. He’s the second best player in the world. If I’m Milwaukee and I’m dealing Giannis I’m just starting over. I want picks and young players. After the Knicks emptied the clip on Bridges last offseason we really don’t have either to offer.