Knicks Morning News (2025.05.14)

88 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2025.05.14)”

With the way things are set up, it’s finals or bust. Beating Boston and losing to Indiana would not be a good look for this team.

Still can’t believe the shot Jokic hit last night. To lose after that must be quite bitter.

I am going to make sure we close out Boston before worrying about losing to the Pacers, who looked really good last night.

Indiana is really good. And the two times we’ve run up against an excellent coach in the playoffs we’ve lost with the better team. (That’s why I think next series, not this one, will be the determining one for Thibs.)

I hate to say it but I actually think the fuckers are a good bet at +700 to win the title.

Still can’t believe the shot Jokic hit last night. To lose after that must be quite bitter.

That was a HORSE shot. Insane.

The Thunder seem like they are growing with adversity. SGA’s teammates finally came through for him last night (Holmgren had some big buckets, and Williams’ 3 to put the Thunder up 6 was the biggest shot of the game).

I am irked that they did not present the MVP award in this series. It’s typically done in the second round. I suppose they are trying to avoid a humiliating event like when they gave it to David Robinson and Hakeem proceeded to eviscerate him. But that’s one of the most memorable NBA moments and I really wanted another one.

At the beginning of the season I never thought our challenge would be keeping up with the Pacers.

I thought Denver was really unlucky, they shot so poorly down the stretch and OKC made some ridiculous shots too. It’s a shame.

I think Minnesota has a good chance against OKC. Denver managed to slow down SGA with their personnel, Minny can really make him work.

The non-Jokic Nuggets shot 32% from the floor and 20% from 3.

If they can just get poor shooting instead of terrible shooting, they might still win.

Horrible time for Denver to revert back to “Jokic has a near flawless game but his teammates let him down”, they had a very real chance to set fire to the series.

I am going to make sure we close out Boston before worrying about losing to the Pacers, who looked really good last night.

If we don’t close out Boston, with a 3:1 lead and all their injuries, then it’s clearly bust.

Tonight’s game is so different from the rest of the series. Tatum’s absence changes so much on both sides of the ball. Who will be the primary ballhandler? Does Boston play the two bigs or more Pritchard (and if the latter, who guards KAT)?

Pritchard has been a really tough cover for the Knicks in this series, and in some ways I fear him more than Brown (given his shooting). I assume OG still guards Brown, but there’s a case to be made to put Hart on Brown, OG on White and Mikal on Pritchard if that’s the lineup.

The Celtics are quite thin if Hauser is not good to go, so I’d be curious who else they might play.

It’ll be interesting.

dogie howser is probable which usually means that he will be on the court tonite

Please, Thibs, tell me this is not going to be the Payton Pritchard game.

it would be the second payton prichard game we already had one in game 3 23 points

This is hilarious to me

https://x.com/NBA_NewYork/status/1922138588646461717?s=19

Pritchard scored 18 points/36 on .633 TS%. He’s pretty good. I don’t know why people still think of him as a scrub.

I don’t think Pritchard is a scrub at all. Rather, I think he is the likeliest person to “go off” in a career night and be the story of the game by compensating for Tatum’s missing points.

I want us to stop that from happening.

Got it – I didn’t mean you, but there are a lot of people out there in the world who think of Pritchard as “random Celtics white dude who can shoot 3s”, but he’s much more than that.

This is hilarious to me

https://x.com/NBA_NewYork/status/1922138588646461717?s=19

Great share!

I’ll be curious to see if Boston curls up and sucks their collective thumbs in despair or comes out hyper-psyched to win one for the Tatum. If that latter, we’re going to have to show some real resilience, they could have another 60% game from three with their annoying jitterbugs.

he’s much more than that.

Totally agree. I would prolly love Pritchard on our team. In green? Not so much 😉

Funny that I was slowly typing out “annoying jitterbugs” while everyone else discussed how Pritchard is a real ball player. I still stand by my description…

The Celtics can make up Tatum’s points but they’re going to really feel his absence on defense tonight. If they do the wing on Hart thing then Pritchard has to guard Mikal or OG and I would hope either of them can make him pay. If we can force them to put him on Hart that opens up KAT.

I expect hot shooting and a good start from Boston but like the Pacers last night (the two series have been mirrors) I think we’ll wear them down and prevail. (And I hope we do because I kinda want the money I laid out for a game 6 ticket back!)

Not so scared of Pritchard. Without Tatum, and with KP playing on fumes and Horford apparently aging, they’re smallish and we should destroy them down low and on the boards. Unless they have a career night from a bench big.

This won’t be just the little green men fighting for their little suburb of NYC. This will also be a very young and driven under the gun head coach fighting for his career. Expecting the game to be a hellstorm. Not expecting to win. That team is stacked and and throwing Pritchard into the starting lineup is gonna cause us all sorts of problems. Their sphincters will have released as the weight of expectation is firmly on the Knicks now.

The Celtics can make up Tatum’s points but they’re going to really feel his absence on defense tonight.

Defense and rebounding. He’s their best defensive rebounder by a mile. I don’t think Brown can make up the difference.

On defense, it’ll be imperative for the Knicks not to double team. Give up whatever Brown or White can get one on one.

Not so scared of Pritchard. Without Tatum, and with KP playing on fumes and Horford apparently aging, they’re smallish and we should destroy them down low and on the boards. Unless they have a career night from a bench big.

Ruh, roh. Poking the gods.

the weight of expectation is firmly on the Knicks now.

Yes. How will our guys perform when they are *supposed to win? And not clawing back from 20 down against the World Champions.

Katz with an awesome article on Mitch:

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6354812/2025/05/14/mitchell-robinson-knicks-playoffs-rebounding-fouls-celtics

So which of these 3 teams will have the biggest * if they go on and win the title?

Knicks- because they played a sorta hobbled Celtics squad and no Tatum after game 4
Wolves – because they beat the Warriors without Steph
Pacers – because they beat the Cavs who were missing a ton of guys early in the series

i do not think that many people think of prichard as a scrub anymore but they probably did up until this season he was sixth man of the year so if that does not mean anythig then one is not paying attention expect boston to stay with us until midway thru the 3rd qtr and then fade and lose

Well, people talked all last spring about how the Celtics had a relative cakewalk to the title, given injuries faced by their various opponents. But banners hang forever, and they don’t have asterisks on them.

On defense, it’ll be imperative for the Knicks not to double team. Give up whatever Brown or White can get one on one.

God help me if we are still giving up too many open 3PAs tonight.

It’s not the bubble. It counts 😉

A lot more would need to happen for any team to be given an *, not just a one round mishap.

Also, the Knicks did get lucky the first couple games against Boston, but that was also in large part due to a strategic flaw. Don’t let Boston fans off the hook, they chose to shoot that many 3s and lost that gamble.

Haters will say the West team that wins beat a scrubby team that came out of the east because the good teams got hurt

but maybe one of those scrubby east teams wins there would be no askerik

I am very scared that Pritchard will go off, a lot of analysts seem to think Mazulla’s biggest mistake was not playing him more instead of sick Porzingis, and now he’ll be forced to do it.

But the caveat is that we can turn that into an advantage by relentlessly targeting him on defense, because their lineup finally has a clear weak link defensively (two, if you count how much success Brunson seems to have against Derrick White). So I’m optimistic, yet cautious after 30 years of Knicks watching and I’ll only unclench when we actually reach the ECF.

again do not forget that we will also have to conend with howser who has not previously played against us in this series

The Celtics are still formidable–probably a low 50s win team without Tatum–but between the psychological impact of knowing Tatum is gone for good (might as well get to Cancun sooner) and what is now, I think, our decided talent advantage, there’s no reason we can’t close out tonight if we play smart.

Without Tatum the extent to which helping off of guys like Pritchard and Hauser is necessary should be greatly mitigated. Honestly, there’s no one remaining on the Celtics roster I wouldn’t play straight up. Just stick to their shooters like glue.

Katz with an awesome article on Mitch:

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6354812/2025/05/14/mitchell-robinson-knicks-playoffs-rebounding-fouls-celtics

That is, indeed, awesome. Highly recommend.

The Katz article is great, and thank god we didn’t trade Mitch for an utter mediocrity like Capela. We’d probably be eliminated already.

So which of these 3 teams will have the biggest * if they go on and win the title?

No asterisks. The league has parity, it was always going to come down to who was healthy and who wasn’t. (i.e. the Pacers’s banner will be clean of all special characters when it is hoisted up to the rafters in November)

The Celtics have so much talent on offense they have a few players that are underutilzed when they are at 100%. Any of those guys can step up and score more than their season average while remaining efficient. The problem for them right now is that KP is battling long Covid (or something similar) and Holiday/Brown are also less than 100%. So you really have to wonder whether they are capable of doing that tonight.

No matter what, we better close this out tonight. If they win tonight they are going to come back to MSG feeling like they are capable of winning and all the pressure will be on us to avoid a game 7 in Boston against a team that beat us twice in row.

We just beat the Celtics with Tatum as an absolute rocket launcher from 3. With all due respect to Pritchard, I don’t think he’s going to have a game like that, certainly he won’t replicate Tatum on the defensive side of the ball.

Don’t get me wrong, we could absolutely lose to a Pritchard outburst, but we’ve also shown we can hang with Boston and beat them despite a player having what playoff might’ve been considered an all-time great playoff performance if Boston had pulled it out.

I just want OG and Mikal to hit their own shots. The game is so much easier for us when they do.

We just beat the Celtics with Tatum as an absolute rocket launcher from 3. With all due respect to Pritchard, I don’t think he’s going to have a game like that, certainly he won’t replicate Tatum on the defensive side of the ball.

They also barely beat Boston during two awful Tatum games. I think the point some of us are trying to make is that a Pritchard-Jrue-White-Brown-Horford/KP starting lineup is still very potent. It doesn’t mean the Knicks can’t or shouldn’t beat it, but it’s not a walk in the park either.

Pritchard has a baby face, a prep school name, and a JROTC buzz cut. Easy to underestimate based on looks. Also I used to mix up him and Sam Hauser, who sucks, all the time.

Horrible time for Denver to revert back to “Jokic has a near flawless game but his teammates let him down”, they had a very real chance to set fire to the series.

Denver is showing that OKC is very good, but not historically good or unbeatable.

If you ask me, Denver might have won this series if Michael Porter wasn’t playing through an injury that normally would have him sitting out several weeks. He’s clearly limited by pain.

The NBA playoffs are becoming less about having the most talent and best designed offense and defense. They are becoming more of a survivor show. Who can make through the playoffs without serious enough injuries to keep a key player or more out or so severely limited it impacts the team.

Cleveland, Boston, Golden State, Denver, Detroit, and Dallas all had key injuries and for all I know I’m missing a few.

It really is crazy how quickly fortunes can change. Two weeks ago the Celtics were the odds-on favorite to repeat as NBA champions. Now their outlook is very much up in the air. I’m sure they’ll find a way to offload salary, but that’s easier said than done.

Porzingis is great when he’s healthy but that’s quite the caveat for a team thinking about trading assets for a year of him.

Jaylen Brown might have negative trade value–paying exorbitantly for a great secondary shot creator makes a lot of sense when you already have a great primary shot creator, much less so in other circumstances.

Not sure who’s champing at the bit to give 34 year-old Jrue Holiday $100M+ through 2028.

White is definitely a great trade asset, but at that point you’re looking at a pretty mediocre remaining team without Tatum.

Honestly, in their position I’d go the one-year tank route and see what you can cobble together while Tatum is out. Then see if he’s still worth building around when he returns.

The NBA playoffs are becoming less about having the most talent and best designed offense and defense. They are becoming more of a survivor show

But most of these teams bought players knowing their injury history. Cleveland maybe not, but KP, MPJr, Kyrie, and Curry all have extensive injury histories and nobody is forcing them to keep those players. They made strategic decisions to gamble on these players and it didn’t pay off.

Also, MPJr is more of a role player than a star and Denver chose to be tightfisted instead of paying for a solid backup.

They are becoming more of a survivor show. Who can make through the playoffs without serious enough injuries to keep a key player or more out or so severely limited it impacts the team.

I’m not a doctor but I’m quite comfortable saying the 82 games + playoffs schedule was designed for a game that would simply be unrecognizable today. Eventually the owners and players are gonna have to get together and decide a short-to-medium term revenue hit is a worthwhile gamble on higher quality play resulting from fewer games, such that those coffers will eventually be refilled.

I don’t actually know if that’s true, but the status quo is starting to feel untenable.

The league is in a tough spot because 82 games are here to stay, there’s no way the majority of players and owners ever agree to cut games out of the regular season, but at the same time the league keeps pushing against load management. Meanwhile the top seeds are struggling in this playoffs which shows seeding is not as meaningful as it once was, so teams have even less incentive to take the season super seriously.

I have no idea how to solve this, 82 games are certainly not necessary and is having a bad impact on injuries, but how is it even possible to cut games in this arrangement?

howser is no prichard but also does not suk he had 2 games over 30 points this season altho against horrible jazz and wizards but point is he can sometimes light it up when given the gren light

horford and porz slated to both start tonite that is their countermove for tatum

I’m nervous about tonight’s game. The Last time we had both momentum and pressure, we got walloped. I want to close them out tonight if for no other reason than to not give Carlisle more time to prep for this version of the Knicks.

Rather than cut games, the solution may be to hold expansion for a while. There will be more and more good players in the future, and basketball substitions may end up more like hockey, swapping lines that play together, with a subtle reduction in minutes for the biggest superstars.

But I’m a minutes-policeman, so …. 😉

Denver is showing that OKC is very good, but not historically good or unbeatable.

They absolutely are historically good and close to unbeatable, it’s just that Denver has the best player in the world and increasing his minutes workload to what it is now enables them to punch far above their weight.

Our championship hopes probably hinge on OKC either breaking down between now and the finals or falling to a pair of immortal Jokic performances in G6/7. G5 was a golden opportunity for that so the chances went down significantly.

Not sure who’s champing at the bit to give 34 year-old Jrue Holiday $100M+ through 2028.

I think Jrue would still have real value around the league. He’d fit really well in LAL, GSW, Minnesota (if they were willing to pay his contract), and here.

wolves do not need another age out pg they already have conley 4 that

Just popped in to tip my fedora at TNFH using the word “champing” and not “chomping”. Even though both are accepted nowadays, the correct word is champing. Thank you for elevating the discourse here.

What in the Doogie 2 Electric Boogaloo is this

Must be his cousin or girlfriend

Ban NahNahNah!!

Pritchard looks like the second to last illustration in those evolution of man diagrams.

There, I said it, now he’s gonna drop 40 on us.

The 2nd apron will make it tricky for a true contender to add a player like Holiday. We, for example, can’t take on salary without dumping someone. The NBA has created a situation where there is almost a hard cap now. The result will be more parity as teams get stuck with aging vets. This will give other teams the opportunity to acquire talent. Guys like Aller will be very valuable.

Ban NahNahNah!!

Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah … hey, he-ey … goo-ood bye!

Can’t wait, loving seeing our chompionship odds this high

nice ebw

Denver played OKC really well in the regular season (2 wins and a 2 point loss), they might just matchup well against them. I think OKC would likely steamroll whoever comes out of the East

at the same time the league keeps pushing against load management. Meanwhile the top seeds are struggling in this playoffs

The top seeds did load manage. Mobley and Garland both averaged less mpg than Kawhi this year. And Lillard got ample time off. And Curry wasn’t in the top-50 in mpg.

Tatum played his normal amount of high minutes, but had a week off before the playoffs and the Celtics had time off before the 2nd round too.

We are 3-0 this series when I do this and 0-1 when I don’t so…

**Official Pagliacci Predictions**
-Jaylen Brown career game, 40+ pts
-BOS 25+ 3pm
-Pritchard & Hauser 10+ 3pm combined
-KP 5+ blocks
-Knicks 20+ TO
-20 point loss

brown would have to reach 51 points before it would be a career game for him if you mean playoffs yes 41 would do it

brown would have to reach 51 points before it would be a career game for him if you mean playoffs yes 41 would do it

Nice try Doogie but 40+ does in fact include all numbers above it including 51

You can also have a career game that is not your highest scoring game

If I ever get banned, my new name will be namnehkg.

howser off injury report

Dribkcalbgibasinevar.

Damn guys, don’t ever ban me.

Are we going to get a game thread?

Finish them!!!

Hate when all the games start at 7:30 then they spring a 7pm on you

Double big lineup for Boston. Interesting.

Ugh Reggie Miller… gross.

Let’s Do it!

Will post one

Still not guarding White in the corner…

Knicks and Knickerblogger discombobulated to start.

Boston definitely not laying down.

Game over, Doc Rivers-esque collapse starting here

Have we made some sort of deal to spot Derrick White 10+ points every first quarter?

Is it because he has the eyes of a 6 month old baby?

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