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Knicks Morning News (2025.05.01)

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  • Knicks Make Injury Announcement Amid Jalen Brunson & Josh Hart Game 6 Concerns – Athlon Sports
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  • New York Knicks’ Game 6 Injury Report Once Again Blank – Sports Illustrated
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  • 53 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2025.05.01)”

    Reading that DDV injured both LeBron and Doncic last night made me miss him so much 😭

    “Reading that DDV injured both LeBron and Doncic last night made me miss him so much 😭”. THIS +1,000

    1) Swap Delon into the starting lineup for Hart and have Delon play 20ish min per game

    2) Hart plays low 30s minutes with a mix of 2nd and 1st team

    3) Hart is required to take every open 3 without hesitation. I’m ok if he shots 35pct on those. It’s the hesitation that kills me.

    4) Towns takes more threes, also without hesitation. Even when moderately tightly guarded. Doesn’t need to be 10ft back of the line. But anywhere up to 4ft back.

    Re next year, i’d like to run it back with a different coach. Maybe a small trade around the edges. Thibs was a very good coach for the make up of last year’s team. The composition of this team could not be more different, and requires a different approach.

    Some guy named Pat Spencer helped GS make it sort of interesting late against Houston and then head butted Sengun with 4 minutes to go maybe we can get him for next year

    GoldClub,

    I like your ideas. I do think instead of a full tear down or major overhaul, the best move for next season would be A) a coaching change and B)finding one starter that can push Hart to the bench or finding a reliable veteran scorer/minutes soaker for the bench.

    My third thing would be to trade Mikal if there’s a package out there that makes sense. Obviously we aren’t getting back 5 picks but if there’s a trade that nets us 2 reliable bench pieces to shore up our depth I’d trade for 2 guys who are maybe more limited in their skill set but do the things they do well.

    I’d love to bring back Delon Wright and it’s a little annoying he’s gotten no minutes in these playoffs. I get not starting him. Him and Brunson haven’t played together at all. But he started for us and did a fantastic job and he provides some good playmaking/pg skills and defense for us.

    The other question for the bench is McBride vs. Cam. McBride might have shat the bed these playoffs but he’s still a youngish player on a cheap contract. I think you throw him in a Mikal trade and you might be able to bring back something nice. Or do you let Cam go, stick with McBride and bring back Delon? Then you have Kolek in the wings too. Either way I think we need a SF off the bench. We also are not sure what our big situation is going to be. Does Mitch go out? Do you bring him back and just make him the full time back up C? Do you potentially start him with KAT? Is Huk going to be ready next year?

    Looking forward to a much better performance by the Knicks tonight.

    The Grizzlies beating LA in 5 is as satisfying a non Knicks playoff win as I’ve had in awhile.

    1. Lebron got eliminated in the 1st round with Luka as his running mate.

    2. The people that assumed the Lakers would be better with Luka because he’s a better scorer and playmaker (Lebron himself implied as much) found out that when you already have a weak defense and you trade away an all defensive player that can give you 25 a night for a negative defender that duplicates the offensive skills you already have on your team you are going to be worse.

    3. When the Lakers went small the T-Wolves crushed them inside the way teams used to and the way you are supposed to. It’s comical that they could do it with Gobert, but that shows you just how bad their interior defense was without Davis and how much that matters.

    4. Ultimately, the Lakers will build around Doncic and be better off long term because Davis will wear down and retire earlier, but short term that trade set them back. By the time they rebuild James won’t be there or have little left and even he didn’t understand that.

    5. A lot of people are saying the Lakers were tired from all the minutes. The Laker players won’t admit it, but ex-players know what it’s like and they are the ones saying it. Minutes matter.

    6. I’ve been in a love/hate relationship with Randle, but it was fun to see him play well under playoff pressure without taking dumb shots and making bad TOs. Excellent coaching and maturity on his part.

    The one unsatisfying thing is that we didn’t get to see the Mavs at 100% because of all the injuries. IMO, if Davis, Kyrie and the rest of the team were healthy, the Mavs would still be in it and have at least a shot to beat anyone. Kyrie’s injury is a killer though. He won’t be back until mid season at best next year and who knows at his age if he’ll ever be the same player.

    Starting to think that Strat has been a Nico Harrison burner account this entire time.

    “The Grizzlies beating LA in 5 is as satisfying a non Knicks playoff win as I’ve had in awhile.”

    Doogie must be rolling over in his grave…

    If it wasn’t a billion dollar league Luka would be riding east and across the atlantic right about now…I can see him hating this bush league oh so much. Refs and opponents from the heart.
    Donte has the heart but also is full of dirty gene that Luka lacks desperatly. I as a choleric entery level recreational baller I scream at the tv why doesn’t he get filty down to the competition…knock that sob out and don’t argue with the oficials. Get back to d and tuch up the next guy comming.Do it malicously smart as they do. Trip him up, clobber him going for the ball, push and shove with force into the stands. Quit being nice. Use your big but, big elbows and additional tonnage that you have on them and level them to the groud. Be dirty.
    He’d be floping, but he never goes below the belt or into someones knees, his hard fouls are kindergarten. He want’s to beat you within basketballs universal rule book. He goes by the guild and union rules. He’s got way too much respect for health of his opponents while he takes the beating leagaly and clandenstine dirty bball mob level.
    And reading Strat’s ex chatedra Dončić takes thru the years make me see red Jon Abbey style. While always wrong in his reasoning and argumentation he never mentions one thing which i’m afraid might be true: that Luka is already over the hill phisicaly from the usage/minutes milage(NBA+INT)and the beating he takes. I hope he proves me wrong and takes his body seriously.
    Now about to end my rant, and going to do venting on the people around me:))
    I might get a tad better about bball if Knicks kick some green and later riders but.

    wolves have to figure out a way to get donte inso starting lineup he is obviously not a pg so he cannot replace conley although how much longer is conley going to play i guess they need mcdaniel for defense so i do not see him working his way in he started a few games earlier this season but i cannot remember if that was bc of injury

    I like your ideas. I do think instead of a full tear down or major overhaul, the best move for next season would be A) a coaching change and B)finding one starter that can push Hart to the bench or finding a reliable veteran scorer/minutes soaker for the bench.

    I agree.

    If we aren’t going to do a major overhaul deal (like trade KAT), imo the best idea is to find a coach that will use our offensive weapons properly, add to the bench and find a 3&D player that can rebound to replace Hart in the starting lineup (preferably a PF).

    1. Finding a new coach won’t be a problem if Leon and Dolan are willing to fire Thibs despite the extension.

    2. Improving the bench shouldn’t be a problem because we have a few young players and can add.

    3. Trading for the right starting caliber player to replace Hart and move him to the bench is problematical. You have to give up something to get something and we don’t have any spare parts or excess picks. The only potential assets are Mitch (who is doing a fine job recovering his value) and Deuce. But we need Mitch’s interior defense and trading Deuce sets the bench back. There also aren’t any obvious targets that are the perfect fit like like say OG was.

    That the Lakers were likely to get worse in the short-term was a widely discussed, largely agreed upon idea in the wake of the trade. It wasn’t a controversial idea They Wouldn’t Let You Talk About at all.

    It was only questioned after Luka was so good for the Lakers, the obvious fit issues didn’t rear their heads as prominently as people thought. But they were always going to be vulnerable to a team with functional size like Minnesota.

    Anyway, now the Lakers have to figure out how to build around a newly 26 year-old wing who is a perennial MVP candidate instead of a 32 year-old big who, while excellent when healthy, has averaged 52 games played in the last 5 years. I think they’re at peace with how it played out.

    Starting to think that Strat has been a Nico Harrison burner account this entire time.

    I’ve been saying the same things here about Luka since his first year.

    Charles last night “Can’t guard a chair” “Out of shape”.

    I don’t think Nico made a fair trade, but I do think he made a trade that pre Kyrie injury may have given him a better chance to win a title in Dallas over the next few years. To me, it’s at least arguable.

    The problem of course is that he gave away a player whose market value (as opposed to intrinsic value) far exceeded the return he got and also gave away longer term value. He was supposed to get a lot more (at least squeeze out another 1st rounder). But he had his mind set on a specific player to win now instead of a boatload of picks and a rebuild.

    I don’t think he should not have taken as much heat for it as he did. If he just got the extra pick it would have less of an issue (except maybe among Dallas fans).

    The Lakers made a very good long term deal that probably hurt them short term, but I don’t think they understood that.

    That the Lakers were likely to get worse in the short-term was a widely discussed, largely agreed upon idea in the wake of the trade. It wasn’t a controversial idea They Wouldn’t Let You Talk About at all.

    Nonsense.

    They were huge favorites in this series and their odds to win the title improved sharply in gambling markets right after the trade.

    Virtually every talking head (including James himself) thought they were serious title contenders after the trade.

    It was rare to hear anyone say the Lakers got worse. I’m not sure I heard a single person say that other than someone I converse with (and usually agree with ) on Twitter.

    My feeling is that prime Luka is going to be very similar to prime James Harden. Phenomenal offensive players with glaring flaws, but could be the best player on a championship team so long as the mix around them is appropriate. I would prefer prime Luka to prime Harden, and think that the Mavs were very close to having that mix around Luka that would have resulted in at least one championship. And if that’s the goal of any franchise, the magnitude of Nico’s blunder can’t be overstated.

    However, I don’t see a championship run in the near future for the Lakers even with the heist they pulled off unless something crazy happens, like if LeBron signs for the vet’s minimum, they hit a couple of home runs late in the draft with the shitty picks they had left, and another lopsided trade falls into their lap. And I agree with Strat that building a contender once Luka signs for the super-duper-mega-max willl be a tall order, and that’s assuming that Luka commits to conditioning and injury prevention.

    None of that excuses Nico for making an all-time stupid trade that essentially blew up a legit championship window, but at the end of the day, the Mavs still might be better positioned than the Lakers going forward.

    Wolves were a bad, bad matchup for the Lakers, a team that wound up without any real centers. Easy to play Gobert off the floor when you have KD, Steph and Draymond, not so easy when your ‘big’ is dorian finney smith or rui hatchimura.

    The Lakers made a very good long term deal that probably hurt them short term, but I don’t think they understood that.

    I think they probably did, although they probably did hope to get out of the first round. They definitely knew they needed a center.

    Nonsense.

    They were huge favorites in this series and their odds to win the title improved sharply in gambling markets right after the trade.

    Virtually every talking head (including James himself) thought they were serious title contenders after the trade.

    Took me 10 seconds to find Hollinger’s immediate post-trade take, which was that the Lakers are probably a little worse in the short-term but still absolutely had to make the trade because the long-term value add is a no brainer:

    The only downside, perhaps, is that a Dončić-James tandem is a less-clean fit than a James-Davis tandem. But that only matters if you think the current version of these Lakers were title contenders as constructed. They’re not, but they can reach that point again quicker with Dončić in tow.

    they had a center in Mark williams who they decided was not healthy even though he played the reas of the season after that without incident.

    Now that Lebron has seen upclose what a dishevled slob Luka is it’s time for him to fulfill his destiny (coming to the Knicks for the veteran minimum)

    Now that Lebron has seen upclose what a dishevled slob Luka is it’s time for him to fulfill his destiny (coming to the Knicks for the veteran minimum)

    LOL, I was just thinking is there a world where we can get Lebron for next season while keeping our core? Would they want Mikal?

    Julius Randle, he who was proclaimed to be a guaranteed playoff liability, was only good due to empty arenas, was the “most detrimental player in the NBA” on an albatross extension, was already in physical decline two years ago, just put up a .610 TS% on 25% usage and a 4.5 BPM in helping his team waltz to the second round over a team with LeBron and Luka.

    Meanwhile, the guy we traded him for is so far putting up a .617 TS% on a 21% usage while posting a 4.4 BPM while primarily being guarded by a guy half his size.

    KAT better fucking step up tonight.

    Meanwhile, the guy we traded him for is so far putting up a .617 TS% on a 21% usage while posting a 4.4 BPM while primarily being guarded by a guy half his size.

    These are very good numbers!

    Yeah, not really sure what Z-man’s beef is with KAT. In my eyes KAT is the least of our problems this series.

    “These are very good numbers!”

    Not nearly good enough in my book, considering his salary, what we gave up for him, his role on this team, and who he’s being guarded by.

    i think mikal is part of our core now whether or not he should be is a different conversation that we have already had seveal times

    The only downside, perhaps, is that a Dončić-James tandem is a less-clean fit than a James-Davis tandem. But that only matters if you think the current version of these Lakers were title contenders as constructed. They’re not, but they can reach that point again quicker with Dončić in tow.

    “perhaps” there’s one downside is not nearly the same thing as saying they actually got worse after the trade. He’s suggesting that it’s not the perfect fit, but longer term they have a cornerstone piece in place to rebuild.

    Everyone agrees it was good long term move for the Lakers. I would have made that trade too, but I would have known the team got worse this year and that there are serious issues with Doncic’s game.

    James himself thought they were serious contenders.

    I’ll also add it’s not going to be such an easy rebuild given the lack of defense at so many positions. The offense will be terriifc, but they may have to trade a guy like Reeves to get what they need.

    The odds reflect what people thought.

    Wall St Journal headline today.

    ‘Not Something I Ever Envisioned’: How the LeBron-Luka Experiment Shockingly Collapsed

    ny deserved lebrn 7-10 yrs ago

    I meant that allegorically with a touch of irony.

    what we gave up for him, his role on this team, and who he’s being guarded by.

    KAT isn’t the reason why iHart left and he’s not the reason why Leon sent out 5 first round picks. Randle was/is in a contract year and we had no healthy center on the roster after iHart left. The KAT trade did not hurt us. Do you honestly think we would have won 51 games with Randle starting at center for the entire season, which he would have to do?

    “Yeah, not really sure what Z-man’s beef is with KAT. In my eyes KAT is the least of our problems this series.”

    And I think that we go as KAT goes. And my beef is not with KAT per se, we can debate whether it is on Brunson or Thibs, but our success or failure is tied up in his performance. Again, he’s being guarded by Tobias Harris. If he’s not going off, it’s a problem.

    “perhaps” there’s one downside is not nearly the same thing as saying they actually got worse after the trade.

    You said:

    Virtually every talking head (including James himself) thought they were serious title contenders after the trade.

    In 10 seconds, I found one of the most prominent commentators at perhaps the premier sports journalism publication on the planet saying, flat out, “they’re not [contenders].”

    It was the widespread consensus that the trade was a no-brainer because of what it augured for the future. This opinion was widely disseminated in The Athletic, a publication owned by The New York Times.

    If They Didn’t Want You to Know about it, They did a very sloppy job of covering it up.

    Even in the very unlikely event that we get LeBron and he wins a championship, it’ll be all about LeBron.

    I like Towns as a player and teammate.

    But when you have starters that are worse than average on defense it gets tricky to build a team. Leon and Thibs should have known that the Towns and Brunson combo was going to be a problem on defense. If they thought Mitch could cover it up, fine. Then play them together!

    I’m not sayng I would have done this, but he could have punted on the early part of the season (maybe found some filler C), seen what was going on with Mitch and then looked for a trade that made more sense at the deadline.

    There’s part of me that likes this team a lot, but I simultaneously feel like we are never going to take that next step with the Towns/Brunson combo. The offense we can fix with a different coach. The defense will always be a problem. That’s why I sometimes think Towns has to go.

    but our success or failure is tied up in his performance.

    I mean yes, our success or failure is tied up in how well one of our all-stars plays. We also tend to lose games when Brunson doesn’t play well.

    “i think that would somehow be ok”

    Sure, I’ll be the NBA version of Tom Brady’s Buccaneers.

    I for one am very glad to see Hubie has returned. It’s been lonely being bang-on right about things like:

    -Our peak for the decade was January 2024
    -It’s a decline from there and the only question is how quick it’ll be
    -Leon has done a uniformly terrible job managing assets pretty much since the 2023 offseason, with clear misses to balance out his good moves before that point
    -The Bridges trade is a calamity on the level of the Nets’ package for KG and Pierce, giving up assets that will appreciate extremely rapidly for present assets that don’t even move the needle
    -We are now in a franchise-level zugzwang, very far from true contention without nearly the asset load it would take to get there, but also with our ability to pivot to a rebuild crippled until 2031 with half of our own picks gone
    -The consensus on this board has been pure Pollyanna even though we’ve looked like a play-in team on the court pretty much for all of 2025
    -The best realistic outcome for this playoffs is Thibs’ ouster and even that looks unlikely

    The Greek Chorus will be a few months behind reality as always, but this is a very clear teardown. We’ve lost the 2020’s barring an event like Pacome Dadiet developing into Kawhi Leonard, and things like that don’t happen under Thibs. Leveraging Brunson’s immense trade value on that contract is the only realistic way to avoid losing the 2030s.

    I know I’m an asshole and everything but I’d really like to see us be a true contender again in my lifetime, or at least have a top 5 NBA player.

    #30 pick Jimmy Butler developed under Thibs, I’m guessing that’s a ‘no true Scotsman’ type of situation?

    The consensus on this board has been pure Pollyanna even though we’ve looked like a play-in team on the court pretty much for all of 2025

    Are we reading the same board…?

    I’ll save more detailed long-term thought for the offseason, but:

    -We are not the post-King Nets, because we have a lot of young-ish players with solid-to-high trade value.

    -That said, it’s true the Mikal trade really could short-circuit whatever window we had if he doesn’t stop sucking or we’re not able to effectively repurpose him in a trade.

    -A coaching change took a nearly identical Cavs roster from 48 wins to 64 wins, and I would try that before entertaining a teardown.

    “KAT isn’t the reason why iHart left and he’s not the reason why Leon sent out 5 first round picks. Randle was/is in a contract year and we had no healthy center on the roster after iHart left. The KAT trade did not hurt us. Do you honestly think we would have won 51 games with Randle starting at center for the entire season, which he would have to do?”

    Not disagreeing with anything you say here (never had!). But there was a certain giddiness during the season when KAT was hot and Randle and DDV were not that I felt at the time was greatly overstated. The KAT trade was a value trade because KAT “stores” more value than Randle and DDV,, i.e. we could get more in a future trade for him than for those two.

    But this is a discussion about who we currently are on the court. I have stated for the record that I felt we would have been just as good if we picked up a decent rim protecting starting C (or at least someone to hold the fort until Mitch got back) to fill out a starting lineup of Randle, Brunson, OG and Mikal and a bench with Hart, DDV, Mitch, Deuce, and some vet depth pieces. Nothing that has happened has changed my opinion.

    “Deserves got nothing to do with it.”

    I always wanted to say that.

    I have stated for the record that I felt we would have been just as good if we picked up a decent rim protecting starting C (or at least someone to hold the fort until Mitch got back) to fill out a starting lineup of Randle, Brunson, OG and Mikal and a bench with Hart, DDV, Mitch, Deuce, and some vet depth pieces.

    The problem with this is with the massive “assume a can opener” assumption built into it. We know which centers were available.

    Mark Williams somehow made the Hornets almost 7 points worse per 100 possessions defensively and might have some kind of chronic injury. Clint Capela was injured and bad all year. Knowing Danny Ainge, we wouldn’t have had anything left to trade for Kessler after trading for Bridges.

    Starting caliber centers for teams with playoff aspirations are very hard to find!

    The situation we find ourselves in now is why I have always preferred a youth movement, asset haul, true rebuild model. You simply get a longer window and a higher ceiling. You don’t find yourselves in situations where it makes perverse sense to trade five first round picks for a role player like Mikal Bridges because you’re feeling an impending sense of “win now.” Would I rather be Houston, Detroit, OKC, or Orlando than us right now? Yes indeed I would.

    Maybe that kind of franchise build isn’t possible here because of Guitar Jimmy and all. Leon’s hybrid strategy has worked out okay.

    You’ll never convince me it’s the BEST strategy.

    -A coaching change took a nearly identical Cavs roster from 48 wins to 64 wins, and I would try that before entertaining a teardown.

    You mean a coaching change and:
    -A large developmental leap from Evan Mobley who went from 2.9 BPM to 4.6 BPM and the DPoY. He would now be the best player on our team and has plenty more runway to improve at 23.
    -A bounceback from injury and developmental uptick from Darius Garland, who is now pretty comparable to Jalen Brunson
    -The addition of Ty Jerome practically for free, who puts what DDV did for us last season to shame. His 4.3 BPM would also be the best on our team.
    -The addition of De’Andre Hunter at the deadline, who is better, younger, and cheaper than Mikal Bridges, but was acquired for scraps instead of their franchise’s entire future asset load
    -16 more games of Donovan Mitchell
    -18 more games of Darius Garland

    Which of those factors will we have going for us?

    Which 23 year-old blue chip prospect will make a leap to All-NBA level?

    How likely are we to pick up the 6MoY for $2.5m, especially given we seem to be limited to Leon Rose’s CAA friends and nepo hires?

    We are absolutely nothing like the Cavs. They are light years ahead and still on the upswing. Mobley is the age NBA rookies used to be. He is likely to end up better than any player in the history of our team. We need to be real about this kind of shit.

    If this is as far as this group can go in terms of overall talent and it’s way behind other teams with far better internal upside AND asset capital, it’s a failure and it’s a teardown. The longer we wait to swallow that pill, the longer our time in purgatory will be, and the less fruitful. If we keep running it back until Jalen Brunson is 34, it’ll be another lost decade, and I don’t want to wait until 2040 to maybe have another shot at contending.

    We’ll do a “teardown” right around the time I get my flying car and have that torrid affair with Jennifer Lawrence

    I think you overstate that, TNFH. They were certainly harder to find after we no longer had anything to trade for them. You could easily argue that Deuce, DDV, and Cam were duplicative enough to include Deuce in a trade along with the DET protected pick, or one or more of our 2024 picks. Or consolidated our picks in the draft to move up a bit and acquire someone like Missi to hold the fort. Even Hukporti playing more minutes was an option. More generally, I believe you are on the record as stating that rim-protecting starting C with limited offense is the most fungible starting position in the NBA, is that not true?

    A teardown would have been better but it’s the one thing Dolan clearly wouldn’t allow, before going off to make his Sphere.

    Luka doesn’t play any defense but he is still 6’8 and can rebound, and he shares the ball really well. I will take that from my “scorer.”

    I remember a study way back in the day that just looked at Jason Kidd’s defensive rebounding. The upshot was that when a great ballhandler is the first man to the ball it’s an offensive uplift.

    All to say, anyone who thinks you can’t build a team around Luka of defenders and shooters and junkyard dog types that can win a championship has a somewhat narrow view I think of how to construct a team.

    You could easily argue that Deuce, DDV, and Cam were duplicative enough to include Deuce in a trade along with the DET protected pick, or one or more of our 2024 picks.

    This just brings us back to the question I asked though, for who?

    Or consolidated our picks in the draft to move up a bit and acquire someone like Missi to hold the fort.

    There’s no reason to believe NOP, who was desperate for a center, would’ve taken a mediocre trade up package for Missi. Again, we cannot just assume a can opener.

    Missi also definitely showed potential but was far from good enough to start for a playoff team. NOP had the 29th ranked defense in the league and it was substantially worse with him on the court. A 20 year-old rookie on a 21 win team was not the solution here.

    Even Hukporti playing more minutes was an option.

    Yeah see I think this speaks to my point.

    Luka went to the Finals last year on a team that started PJ Washington, Daniel Gafford, and Derrick Jones Jr.

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