Abe Beame is in the market for a mint condition pair of Adidas EQTs.
Last Thursday, the Knicks did something radical. A tectonic plate shifting aboutface for the franchise as it’s been operated over the course of the last two decades. The Knicks had a high lottery pick after doing the sensible thing with their inexperienced roster and tanking properly last season. They kept that lottery pick. When it was their turn to draft a player, they responding by drafting the highly touted player that they have been linked to for weeks, that openly declared his desire to play for them, and who most experts had pegged as the third best player in this particular draft, which was their exact draft slot. And with that, they just may have entered a new age in which the Knicks don’t spend every off-season stepping on rakes and getting hit in the face with the handles over and over and over again (The Horror).
A not so brief recap: Over the last two decades the Knicks strategy to team building, to the extent they have ever had one, is tossing around draft picks like greenlights for disposable rom-coms at Netflix, in exchange for expensive, over the hill former stars. This is how the franchise has landed big fish like Eddie Curry, Steve Francis, Jalen Rose, Quentin Richardson, Al Harrington, Dikembe Mutumbo, Antonio McDyess, Stephon Marbury and the great Andrea Bargnani, years too late assuming any of them were ever good.
Occasionally, over the past twenty years they’ve kept drafted players, to surprisingly solid results……. In order to develop and immediately flip them for the same shit returns. Remember when Donnie Walsh was forced to trade the entire team for Carmelo Anthony? (Seriously, everyone killing the Lakers right now for giving up too much for a legit superstar in his prime, hold James Dolan’s fucking beer) But I’m not here JUST to rehash the horror of the last twenty years of watching basketball, that’s what bars are for. This is an exercise in wishful thinking.
June 28th, 2017 was the day Phil Jackson died. His brief, absentee tenure as President of the Knicks ended unceremoniously with James Dolan firing him, leaving him with 24 million in paid vacation on the remaining two years of his 60 million dollar contract. The ultimate decision was due to his complete mismanagement of what had been a toxic situation with Carmelo Anthony (which he was actually probably right about but handled terribly) and ironically, his attempts to trade Kristaps Porzingis, whose trade value was at an all time high (and he was probably right about but handled terribly).
The new regime got off to an auspicious start with Steve Mills, a longtime Dolan crony, taking the reins as President, along with Scott Perry, a guy with the Pistons, Magic and Kings on his resume, taking over as GM. After signing Tim Hardaway Jr. to an insane contract it appeared like business as usual for the Knicks, but something strange has been happening at the Garden the last year or so. While still fucked by God, theoretically because James Dolan once banned an old Gypsy from the stadium and she put a curse on him, the Knicks have been making the decisions a semi competent organization might make.
So I’d like to go over the most unlikely list I’ve ever compiled for this site: Here is some dumb shit the Knicks HAVEN’T done in the last few months.
- When the Knicks blessedly fired asshole with arms and legs Jeff Hornaceck, it created potential for a classic Knicks fuck up. We’ve had a murderer’s row of shitty or ill fitting coaches for our team over the past 20 years. There were plenty of bad choices out there last offseason. Inexperienced but flashy big media presence Kenny Smith? Another roll in the hay with insert coach here Mike Woodson? DAVID BLATT? The Knicks did fuck up their best possible opportunity with miracle worker Mike Budenholzer who would’ve instituted his Spurs East system and theoretically given us an offensive strategy beyond Alonzo Trier dribbling for 20 seconds, but in the end hiring Coach Fizdale might end up looking like a good move. He strikes me as a guy like Mark Jackson, a coach who works well with young talent, but one we may have to eventually move away from as the player’s mature and we attract a legit superstar, which is something that is obviously eventually going to happen, right?
- Let’s go back to last year’s draft. The last truly fucking stupid thing the Knicks did was win two of the last five games of the 2017-2018 season when they were tanking (Fuck you very much Jeff Hornaceck!) to end up with the ninth pick. There’s a decent chance that Kevin Knox will not end up being a great player, or even a particularly good one, but it was the first time in a long time the Knicks exhibited good PROCESS (except for the inexplicable Summer Phil Jackson loaded us up with smart, reasonably priced free agents then unceremoniously shipped them off to Chicago the next year for washed Derrick Rose).
The ninth pick was a tough hang for the NBA Draft last year, some future role players you’d have to reach a little for, some tantalizing guys with big question marks. Knox seemed like a good compromise. A very young, big-swing prospect whose physical attributes gave him a projected high floor. It hasn’t paid off yet, but even if it never does it was evidence of sober, grown-up decision making with the right amount of risk assessment.
- In the middle of this season, as the Knicks finally leaned into a tank, once anointed superstar Kristaps Porzingis expressed his displeasure with the Knicks yet again. In retrospect, Zinger had generally been an entitled pain in the ass since he got to New York. Melo had served as his frenemy mentor so no telling where he picked that up from. But unbeknownst to the public at the time he was undergoing a rape investigation which alleged he used very loaded racial language, stemming from the night he suffered a catastophic career threatening injury which could result in serious league discipline (Seriously, Google it. Pretty stomach turning).
The Knicks decided to bail, sending Porzinis and Tim Hardaway Jr.’s aforementioned Steve Mills flex to Dallas (with some schmutz) for Dennis Smith Jr. and two future first round draft picks (and more schmutz, sorry Deandre). The Knicks did this primarily for the cap clear in the halcyon days of this Winter when Kevin Durant had two functioning achilles tendons, an office in Manhattan and the future was incredibly bright. But here are a few by-products of that deck clearing decision:
Dennis Smith Jr. may be the reincarnation of Steve Francis but he could wind up being more. He’s taken to New York and so far New York has taken to him. If nothing else he’ll make blowout losses in Minnesota this Winter more entertaining then they have any right to be. Beyond entertainment and raw potential, he also could be playing alongside Frank Ntilikina if we don’t trade Franky for magic beans (I hope we don’t), and David Fizdale decides to see the wisdom in actually playing a cheap young piece of draft capital whose value we may want to try raising if he does want out. Having a ball dominant point like DSJ could take some pressure off Franky and allow him to flourish off ball.
But that’s a bunch of classic Knicks self delusion. Really this is about the picks. Right now the world loves Luka Doncic, for good reason, but who knows? The Mavs don’t have the strongest team around their young stars assuming Porzingis can recapture his former level of play and stay healthy (and even healthy the guy had trouble playing at peak form for full games over the course of an entire season). With the new cap flattened odds, New Orleans just jumped to the number one pick from the 11th spot. (Also, who knows when the infamous double draft will actually happen, is it so crazy to think it could end up pushed back to 2023?) Suddenly, even if it is surely not to be expected, late lottery draft picks before the balls come up are a lot more valuable, either to hold or trade.
Good things seem to happen to teams who make good decisions. Some of the happy residue of the Porzingis deal was inadvertent, but it is buttressing a war chest that has been barren since the Clinton administration.
- When Steve Kerr displayed criminal malpractice in Game 5 of the NBA Finals by continuing to play Kevin Durant when it was so fucking obvious he wasn’t right– When Kevin Durant ruptured his Achilies in a tragedy no one could have possibly preditcted or prevented, the Knicks plans for next season turned to ash. It was a major disappointment. It was also a perfect opportunity for some classic Knicks panic moves. Leading up to the draft, rumors were swirling. An all-in bid for an Anthony Davis flier in the last year of his contract? A cap destroying salary dump courtesy of the Houston Rockets so the Knicks could have the pleasure of paying Chris Paul approximately half a billion dollars for his injury riddled decline years? Should they go full Moneyball and trade down with the Hawks to take a shot at a few hit or miss prospects right in the range they always seem to draft at with picks 8 and 10?
The Knicks shocked the world by doing nothing. They held onto their young players, presumably in the hope they either capitalize on the team’s investment or as pieces in the RIGHT future deal, and held onto all their picks. When it came time for to draft, the Knicks took RJ Barret, the player any rational organization would’ve taken in the same slot.
Writing a piece like this, that dares to hope for smart decision making on behalf of the Knicks front office before free agency begins, is nothing short of dumb-brave, courageous, heroic, awe inspiring insanity. There are a lot of names on the market to overpay for this offseason and very little reason to believe the Knicks won’t blow their load on DeMias ButWalker Boogie Buckets, ensuring a foreseeable future of mediocrity and cap paralysis. My personal dream is to land Durant for as much money as they can pay him, plus a multimillion dollar makework gig playing Robert Randolph’s pedal steel guitar for a newly christened KD & the Straight Shot. Then sit pat for (God willing) one last tank year while the Knicks see what they have with the core pieces, net another valuable lottery pick and head into 2021 loaded up with playable or flippable talent, a max slot, a trove of draft picks and Kevin fucking Durant. Or, you know, they can step on a rake, hit themselves in the face with the handle and start from scratch, who’s to say which is a more likely outcome?
