When Sir Barton won the first Triple Crown, people weren’t even calling it the Triple Crown yet. The significance of winning all three came later. Yet they still remember him.

That’s my point about the Cup. This will become meaningful over time, even if it doesn’t carry that full weight right now. Dismissing it as meaningless by refusing to hang the banner would be disrespectful to the players who earned it. Because it certainly wasn’t meaningless to them.

I would hope Dolan doesn’t do that over some petty feud with Silver. He should be helping create the legend of this historic feat, not dismissing it.

wouldn’t water down the ceremony for the championship banner with the virtually meaningless IST banner. I don’t see anything “historic” about the IST, which has only been around for 3 years and might not be around 10 years from now. Doing it in the context of the actual IST makes a lot more sense to me.

I take your point that the IST is still new and hasn’t yet earned the full weight of history. But part of how something becomes meaningful is by treating it as meaningful.

I’m immensely proud that we won both. The Cup meant a lot to me at the time, and I think celebrating them together adds to the championship rather than watering it down.

The Cup is modeled on soccer, where doing the double is a massive distinction among champions. Teams that win the double are set apart from teams that win only the title. And the first team to win the double — Preston North End in 1889 — is still remembered for doing so.

It may seem less meaningful now because the tournament is new, but the double will gain significance over time. To me, the only thing that would diminish what this team accomplished is dismissing the Cup part of it as meaningless.

Great post and great thread.

My question would be about KAT. Starting about two months ago, he just seemed to morph into a different player and maybe person. His statistical impact was a little muted compared to his high water marks but he went on a run of 18 straight games with a positive differential in the playoffs, which I think was a record, and which ironically ended in the clincher. He only had four threes in five Finals games, including three games where he didn’t hit one at all. Not sure what the question is other than, what the hell happened with this guy?

And I also second the injection of Breen’s outro video into all our veins. Clyde and the verbal majesty of Breen have been the one consistent thing through the last 40 years and I honestly think Breen is the best to ever do it in basketball. Clyde, who does richly deserve this, has been the epitome of cool and somehow still sounds better to me than every Richard Jefferson they fill that seat with on the national stage.

Tyler and Monica had a great radio call too….

Also, two more bits of movie magic…

https://x.com/JustFreshKicks/status/2066209803735802125/video/1?s=46

https://x.com/IQfor3/status/2066222147454799881/video/1?s=46

Also, for those that need a hatewatch, clips of people doubting Jalen

https://x.com/fasho2k/status/2066155697830568074/video/1?s=46

made a comment about how sad things were with the roster, front office, medical staff, scouting staff, ownership, coaching, probably forgetting something…

and that and we were just all rooting for laundry…and clyde…hard truths hurt…

And absolutely fuck Steve Mills

Wouldn’t trade a single moment of any of it.

okay cs, just how much bad knick basketball did you watch, exactly…

and why, why did you watch any games featuring a poorly run entertainment organization incredibly underperforming, in numerous, too many to name, ways…

it wasn’t just bad, it was embarrassing, and often sad, livin’ that knick fan life…depending on the age of the people you met, usually mention early 70’s teams, patrick ewing, and or the dumpster fire for most of this millennium…

you know who I don’t want to get a ring: steve mills, no ring for you…

he’s wearing the same coat…

all those tix cost were a sweep of the san antonio spurs…

oh well, not sure if he’s wearing the same pants and shirt…I bet HAL knows…

I have to be totally honest and say that I’m not sure how I feel about what we, the rank-and-file diehard Knicks fan, have had to endure on the way to this moment.

On one hand, if we were to have won a championship earlier, it would have been with a far less rootable team. I mean, I loved me some Bernard, some Ewing, some Carmelo…and I loved some of the guys we could have drafted or traded for that might have gotten us there sooner.

But on the other hand, many Knicks fans like us sadly did not make it to this glorious day. Like a poster named Dude…or the amazing older couple that sat behind us when we had season tickets during the Ewing era…or Willis Reed and Dave DeBusschere and Dick Barnett. I can imagine that a few diehards left us even up yesterday.

And for me, at least, the suffering was very real. I know it’s only sports, but there’s been a lot of painful moments and destitute seasons. All the while taking shit from those who couldn’t understand the ordeal that has been Knicks fandom the last half-century.

I guess the reality is that we can’t trade a single moment, whether we would want to or not.

So what I will say is that I have always gladly accepted the “burden” of being a diehard Knicks fan, from the time I was a little kid to this day, 60+ years later. My loyalty has never wavered, not for a second, and it never would have had they come up short this year, and all the years I have left. And knowing that nothing was promised to me or any fan, I feel fortunate to be on the other side of that long wait.