Now Randle is getting surgery according to Begley.

Where did he say that?

Brian, it’s hard not to give a shot. None of us can watch the Knicks play and not care about losing. But for what’s it’s worth, I’m more upset about losing to the Spurs, but I don’t like either loss.

Oh, sure, it sucks in the moment, but in the grand scheme of things, it really doesn’t mean anything.

What does matter is OG’s elbow. That could sink this season. And even there, hey, there will be more seasons with him and Brunson!

This team also specifically has Leon hoarding first round picks to acquire another star. So I don’t think it tracks at all that this would be their peak.

Also, with that in mind, a close loss to a really good OKC team playing without OG? Come on, how can we even give a shit about that? It sucks, but it doesn’t mean anything really.

You might say, “Well, OG might not play in the playoffs,” and, okay, that’d suck, too, but, again, this is not a team built just for this season. The East is wider open now than it likely will be next season, that’s fair (except the Celtics are extremely good, so it’s more like “The #2-8 seeds are wide open this season”), but a full season of this team with OG and whoever Leon finally uses those picks for? This will be a very good team for a few more years still. Hell, they might still win 50 games this season!

Nobody’s window is 1 year

And I’m not sure which team is going to offer I- Hart this monster contact. OKC likes to play 5 out and other teams have a center

Lots of teams have had 1-year windows, they just tend not to know it in real time. Our last good team, the Melo/Chandler/Kidd group that won 54, was a perfect example. We didn’t all realize we’d fall off a cliff the next season — we traded draft equity for Bargnani as a win-now move!

We have a capped out team with no internal improvement upside, mediocre draft assets, and multiple key players who rarely play more than half a season. We have no way to fill the hole left by IQ and predictably fall off a cliff every time Brunson sits. When we lose iHart, we’ll have no way to fill that hole either — expect to see a lot more Precious and Sims, likely playing together when Randle misses a chunk of next season to shoulder surgery and Mitch/OG have their annual 35+ game absences.

Because we will lose iHart. Many teams have a role for a durable 3 BPM all-Defense caliber big who can pass, rebound, and finish consistently. The market value of that package is simply more than we can possibly pay. If it isn’t OKC it’ll be someone else — players like this just don’t slip through the cracks.

https://twitter.com/NBA_NewYork/status/1774613943446811110 clear foul on Dort

Who cares? This happens over and over again, so it’s pretty clear the league does not want Brunson getting calls like SGA, Luka, and other designated superstars.

At this point, we need to just bake it in to our expectations that Brunson’s efficiency will be capped around league average because it’s basically legal to foul him in high leverage situations.