From James L. Edwards III and Fred Katz:
New York Knicks center Mitchell Robinson broke his right pinky finger earlier this week, and there is no timetable for his return, league sources told The Athletic.
It is unclear how Robinson suffered the injury.
The news comes on the heels of New York reaching the NBA Finals for the first time since 1999 after sweeping the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference finals. It’ll be a huge blow for the Knicks if Robinson misses games, whether their Finals opponent is the Oklahoma City Thunder or San Antonio Spurs. The Spurs have two 7-footers in Victor Wembanyama and Luke Kornet, while the Thunder have Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein.
Simply put, “no timetable” TYPICALLY means “it’s going to be a while,” but in this specific instance, with only one series left, it COULD mean “we don’t know if he’ll miss the NBA Finals.”
Here’s to hoping he plays!
Also, as much as I love Mitch, if you’re going to have to lose a rotation piece, Mitch is OBVIOUSLY the guy you would pick. So hopefully it isn’t that big of a deal. KAT can just play Thibs-era minutes.
57 replies on “The Athletic: Knicks’ Mitchell Robinson suffers broken pinky finger, NBA Finals status unclear: Sources”
Knicks fans are not allowed to be happy
It does remind you of how LJ got hurt right before the 1999 Finals, right?
This is why we can’t have nice things
It worries me that they haven’t said how….
what the actual fuck
I’m still happy. Mangled fingers have been good luck for us this year.
There’s no way he’s missing the finals with a broken pinky.
????
Just put a dagger in my heart
Probably fixing his truck …. How do you get injured not playing before the finals smfh
These playoffs were at the level too good to be true , not anymore.
I blame Embiid. Fuck that dude.
You damn well know it was doing something stupid too.
Maybe it will fix his free throw percentage though.
a fire extinguisher casing seems unlikely but i wouldn’t rule out a gumball machine
https://x.com/shwinnypooh/status/2060141893413998768/mediaViewer?mode=profile¤tTweet=2060141893413998768¤tTweetUser=shwinnypooh
He should tough it out. Can he still grab rebounds ? , he will still be able to move his feet on defense . His free throw shooting doesn’t change . Tough it out
Josh played the whole season with a mangled middle finger.
Begley thinks this happened in the 2nd qtr of Game 4 vs Cleveland and he stayed in the game so…
Now that the injury has happened, and we can’t change anything, yes, I will admit that I am just hoping it happened in a game and not from Mitch being a moron in his private time.
if we don’t have Mitch, which i clearly doubt it (it’s only a pinky, for God sake), you know the OKC Floppers will hunt KAT relentlessly
i am happy that google translate immediately translated OKC Floppers to OKC Thunder 😀
The Spurs either hit their 3s or miss by a mile – there is no middle ground.
Spurs should be up 20.
Fox make a shot challenge
SGA on pace for a zero free throw half
Regular foul
Much better officiated game than the previous one.
I don’t think I can think of a player who needs his pinky less than Mitchell Robinson
This is what Begley says, followed by what I see:
After putting that 2Q play, and aftermath, on slow speed. I don’t see it the way Begley describes. Mitch did allow himself to be pulled off the floor by a Knicks’ assistant grabbing Mitch’s right hand. Once Mitch is on his feet, he grabs his left hand/wrist in apparent pain and shakes it.
He seems to be using both hands normally in the 3Q and the brief time on court in 4Q.
I don’t doubt the Knicks have the x-ray of the break, but Mitch’s reaction on that play doesn’t match up with Begley’s account, to me.
In my experience broken bones hurt a lot more a few hours after than in the moment. It’s not surprising at all that Mitch played through it.
Loving this shit right now!
Yeah. Spurs are game tonight. Kind of surprised
Shai is a different player when he doesn’t get the whistle.
I need the fake comeback here…
This playoffs is all about making me happy, so this result is expected. Now I just need San Antonio to win Game 7, as well (the best part is that I don’t even REALLY care. An OKC win in seven is fine, too).
When the Thunder bench isn’t going bonkers….
Yeah, Brian. I know they get some rest, but this series has to take a toll on the winner, right?
Assuming this continues, the Knicks get an opponent that played a Game 7 in every round of the playoffs. Has that happened before?
JDub looks significantly worse than OG did on his return.
SGA has 3 free throws… maybe the noise had an impact, finally… and 15 points on 18 shots.
Bruno game 7 is ahead in OKC. Plenty of time to get those free throws back.
You gotta be a stupid motherfucker to get fired on your day off….
https://www.tiktok.com/@stereotyp8s/video/7555286295120055574
We obviously can’t know what will happen going forward, but I can’t imagine being more happy with the way things have gone in both conferences. I can’t imagine us being in better position than we are right now.
“I can’t imagine us being in better position than we are right now.”
Mitch being 100 percent healthy would be a much better position. 🙁
Wemby’s personality is starting to grate on me a bit. The way he cut off that interview, after being warned about not talking to the media after Game 5, is off-putting.
“Mitch being 100 percent healthy would be a much better position. 🙁”
If you told me going into the season that our only injury going into the finals would be Mitch having a broken pinky, I would be fucking thrilled.
And we know the back to back MVP will need his steady supply to have an impact on the game.
I really hope Mitch gets to play in the finals because it would be very nice to have a physical big to throw at those two teams for 15-20 minutes a game. Also, the longest tenured Knick who’s been through some shit deserves to see the floor in the finals.
Damn, Bruno, your hate boner for SGA is really something.
I mean, I’m sorry, I just hate his game, but it’s way more that he exposes the frustrations I have with the NBA as a league than anything personal towards him. How the hell do we go from a game 5 with 70 free throws to a game 6 with 38 free throws? Why is every ref crew allowed to just decide to call a game one way or another, in a conference finals??
The Thunder are a smart team that understands this inconsistent shit and abuses it and they’re not wrong, it’s the same thing I’ve always said about tanking, if the league encourages this, fuck it, do it. But I can’t stand watching it and I’d rather play the Spurs regardless of our chances simply because it would be way more watchable.
I don’t mean to diminish the impact of a broken pinky but there’s no way in hell you can’t play with it. Even if it makes him 50% of the player he normally is, that’s still a million times better than Ariel Hukporti.
Mitch is not missing the finals.
Bruno’s hate boner for FTA is a micropenis next to mine. What a fucking fraudulent MVP.
Hope he tears an ACL on his next flop attempt
Btw I thought Jamal Crawford was good again tonight. I like that he doesn’t say a lot, and consistently adds neat little insights when he does speak.
I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I love SGA’s talent and can see past his foul-baiting because he is one of the very best pure scorers I have ever seen.
I think OKC plays a very strong brand of basketball overall. Ironically, they were 17th in both total FTAs and FTr this year. The Knicks were 24/25, so there’s that, but it doesn’t make sense to me that some seem to be implying that OKC is grifting its way to a championship run via SGA’s flailing. Again, SGA had a .597 eFG% this year. No player at his position at anywhere near his usage came anywhere close to that. He had almost Jokic’s eFG% at a higher usage. Shai was also only 3rd in FTA per 36, behind Luka and Deni, yet he has a much higher eFG% than either of those two.
I get that folks are not a fan of his game, but it seems pretty over the top to me to not recognize how great he is, or to dismissively compare him to foul grifter extraordinaire James Harden. In Harden’s MVP season he was 43rd in eFG% at .541. and lead the NBA in FTA by a country mile.
Shai averaged 9.8 FTAs per 36 this year, again 3rd behing Luka and Deni That is comparable with Durant, LeBron, and Wade in their peak years, and yet with a much higher eFG%. Do those guys get a pass because they were either 6 inches taller than SGA (Durant) or had 60 Lbs more muscle (LeBron)?
None of the guys from the past 20 years who drew fouls at a high rate put up SGA’s eFG%, not Dwight Howard! Or Shaq! Or Duncan! Or Amar’e!
The only guard who has been consistently better than SGA in terms of shot-making at high volume without drawing tons of fouls is Steph Curry. I will gladly concede that Curry was better than SGA, both as a shotmaker and aesthetically. But beyond that, there’s really no one at the combo guard position who had done what SGA is doing without the fouls.
Z-man, have you tried watching the games?
Everyone knows what the numbers say. He is a great player. Being great doesn’t make it ok that he constantly tries to cheat. Just because Harden constantly tries to cheat while being less great doesn’t make it okay.
He lives on the mid range and constantly goes for the foul instead of trying to make the shot. Constantly. It works all the time. In this series OKC wins when his cheating works and loses when it doesn’t. It fucking sucks.
His efg% is great because he is great AND because shooting fouls don’t count as FGA. He’s bad for the game and makes it unwatchable. It’s frustrating because he could just be great without cheating.
Here’s to hoping! But “there is no timetable for his return” isn’t the sort of thing reporters say about a guy who is not going to miss any time.
But, again, this is a weird point in time when the only games left are the Finals, so let’s hope that “there is no timetable for his return” doesn’t mean what it normally means.
They know what I wanted, and they’re just doing it.
Avoiding the #1 and #2 seeds, getting home court throughout the Eastern Conference playoffs as a #3 seed, and now having the two best teams in the Western Conference beat the shit out of each other for seven games before playing the Knicks….it’s all happening!!!
Mitch could play with one hand and still turn the ball over less than Hukporti.
Honestly, we’re probably in for a large amount of OG at center if Mitch misses time
It would be fabulously ironic if Mitch ups his FT% to 75% using the one-handed method we saw in a recent video.
“Z-man, have you tried watching the games?”
Why don’t we assume that we all watch the games?
“He lives on the mid range and constantly goes for the foul instead of trying to make the shot. Constantly. It works all the time.”
This is not true and if you actually watched the games you would know that.
“AND because shooting fouls don’t count as FGA.”
Really??? Thanks for pointing that out! PS SGA has fewer shooting fouls than Paolo, Luka and Deni, and slightly more than Brown. None of those guys make shots in the rage of SGA.
“Hope he tears an ACL on his next flop attempt”
Really? Shame on you.
It’s clear that you watch very little of this guy, at least with objectivity. In my opinion, he’s way easier on the eyes than many players in the MVP class. He’s a truly exquisite shot-maker. He easily draws fouls mainly because not fouling him is extremely likely to result in a made bucket, derived from one of the best bags in NBA history. The vast majority of his points are scored on made buckets. The vast majority of his fouls calls are legit fouls. Nearly all the great players embellish. He’s better at it than most because there’s no way to defend him without either fouling or sending multiple guys at him.
Re: peak James Harden, his bag was much more limited and imho much harder on the eyes. He would hold the ball at the 3pt line, jab-step and dribble for much/most of the clock, and either step-back or straight-line drive while dragging his arms through defenders arms and flail like one of those gas station things. And he would miss way more shots than he made! He was the ultimate ball hog, even with the high assist numbers. He also was at best an indifferent defender. He’s not all that likable off the court.
SGA goes into his moves quickly and efficiently. He passes not as a last resort but in the flow of the game. He plays D and is good at it. By all accounts, he’s a model citizen.
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