News & Blogs
Knicks’ Kevin McCullar: Lands two-way contract with New York – CBS Sports
Knicks’ Jalen Brunson to host 52nd season premiere of ‘Saturday Night Live’ – SNY
Knicks Mailbag: How can NY address lack of frontcourt depth? – SNY
5 questions facing the Knicks as training camp begins – Newsday
Knicks Bulletin: ‘I’m a little disappointed’ – Posting & Toasting
Tyler Nickel and Kevin McCullar Jr. sign two-way contracts – Posting & Toasting
Knicks Media Day | CIsse Watch! – Knick of Time
Biggest Takeaways from 2026 Knicks Media Day | Knicks Film School – Knicks Film School
Mitchell Robinson On How Jalen Brunson SPARKED The Greatest Comeback In NBA History – Knicks Fan TV
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90 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2026.09.29)”
I think my favorite bit about the Kool Mo D bit is the faint whiff of irony. Mostly it’s just a fun play on words, and who knows maybe he IS totally cool, but he’s such an awkward young man with slightly flailing appendages that it’s also a tinge ironic.
Here’s hoping he grows into it.
We don’t really know Mo’s personality. Think its pretty cool that he’s breaking bread with the NYC mayor and goofing around making fun of himself with his boys.
https://x.com/NBA_NewYork/status/2006431553904132394
Where’s Alec Burks when you need him?
This year, the role of Allen Burns will be played by John Conch Shell.
Konchar is absolutely the wrong position in terms of position of need, but I love his defense and his Josh Hart-ness. I would say a “younger Josh Hart,” but turns out he’s only about exactly one year younger. Josh definitely shoots a better 3, though, and that’s kind of a problem in terms of minutes for Konchar.
If Juan Con Carne can capably play backup PF that’s a need filled, too. We have Diawara penciled in there now but he’s really more of a wing.
What a weird roster. Unless Wiseman or Eubanks make the cut, we’ve only got two players over 6’10”. Diawara is 6’9″ but can’t play center. Our third-string center as of now is OG, who really shouldn’t play more than spot minutes at the position. And we’ve got a shit-ton of guys who are 6’5″ and under.
Can’t argue with the results, obviously, and guys like Hart and OG play much bigger than their height. I do wonder if maybe “small guys who can play up a position” is a market inefficiency that our FO has found, given the recent league emphasis on positional length. Or if shorter guys are just what’s been available to us for the back end of the roster.
Dadiet ideally was supposed to give us more length, but that hasn’t worked out so far. I’d trust McCullar to play emergency minutes more.
“Unless Wiseman or Eubanks make the cut, we’ve only got two players over 6’10”. ”
When 2 of those players are KAT and Drummond, I don’t think that is all that weird at all. It’s also pretty likely that a 3rd will be added (one of Eubanks or Wiseman?) and Robbins is an emergency 3rd big. Dante might be back in a couple of months. The key will be for both KAT and Drummond to stay healthy and for Brown to mix in both small lineups and cameo stints for the emergency bigs, especially if they are legit NBA situational bigs like Eubanks or Wiseman.
If all else fails, come January, all of the newly signed guys become trade-eligible…including Shamet, Alvarado, Diawara, and Drummond. If Leon needs to aggregate one of those guys with Deuce and/or Dadiet and some seconds (or even the 2033 first?) for a better option prior to the deadline, it’s at least a possibility.
Right now, the opening day roster looks better to me than last year’s. We lost Mitch, Yabu, and Huk but gained Alvarado, Drummond, better versions of KAT and Clarkson, and more experienced versions of Diawara and Kolek. My guess is that our 14th guy is going to be a big that can eat minutes without costing wins.
So many bigs these days are just shooting. It really doesn’t hurt to give up 3 inches to Julian Champagnie, you know?
But the wrong team will kill you for it. We’ve never been able to handle Pascal Siakim, for example. And LeBron’s not going to be idle if we try to cover him with Josh Hart.
KAT will be nicked up, Z-Man. So will Drummond. I just don’t want to go into games where Brown is forced to play small ball lineups because he has only one healthy center-sized player — or, if one guy is out and the other guy is in foul trouble, no center-sized players. Better for him to have options.
Which is why I assume one of Wiseman and Eubanks makes the team, and then we only get one from the Konchar/Brown/Ochai group if Leon consents to attach a pick or picks to unload Dadiet.
“If Juan Con Carne can capably play backup PF that’s a need filled, too. We have Diawara penciled in there now but he’s really more of a wing.”
Not going to happen, Hubert, even less so than the chance of Julius playing center. Konchar has played exactly 2 percent of his regular-season minutes over the course of his career at PF. (By comparison, Josh has played that position 9 percent of the time.)
“Which is why I assume one of Wiseman and Eubanks makes the team, and then we only get one from the Konchar/Brown/Ochai group if Leon consents to attach a pick or picks to unload Dadiet.”
Agreed, at least to start the season, and barring a Deuce trade.
Love the Dylan Harper quote
“We lost to f@&$ing four best friends”
lol who does he think the starting lineup doesn’t like?
I am really interested in seeing how San Antonio comes out of the gate. One would think that Wemby is still climbing towards his ceiling and word is he works his ass off. Harper and Castle too, but for me, it’s all about Wemby. He apparently worked out with Provence’s rugby team to work on his lower body strength and mobility. If he ever gets to the point where he can hold his ground and develops a go-to signature shot, that is gonna be a problem.
Konchar played 9% of his minutes last year at PF. He gives you rebounding and shot blocking, which is something the Knicks could use at backup 4.
Player he spent the most defensive minutes covering last season? Nikola Jokic.
He also covered Jalen Johnson for 3.5 min in a game. Johnson went 0-3 against him.
I don’t think it’s crazy to have Konchar as a backup 4.
I’m very pro Konchar.
We can grab a C with our last 2-way spot. After ~2.5 months we can sign a 3rd big to the NBA roster at the minimum if someone goes down longterm.
That gives us 3 centers.
Yeah and I think that’s more important than those position %’s, Doogie. They’re very team dependent, and Memphis has traditionally been huge. They’ve had Edey and Lockdale and Jay Huff at center, and Steven Adams before Edey. But also JJJ, Santi Aldama, LaRavia, and Brandon Clarke at the 4. Never really a need to play him up one like there is here.
I think he’s a real find.
I think Eubanks should just be the guy. He’s good enough at standing around and being tall to be the third center, gives some decent effort and can occasionally sink a midrange jumper. He should be a perfectly reasonable stopgap third C until they find somebody better. He’s not a hugely fun or sexy option but he’s not gonna kill you if he plays 600-700 minutes.
I’d guess he ends up making the team and playing a little bit.
Eubanks has another trait that I like: he is a very good screener. I’m a sucker for a good screener.
Konchar is probably the better overall player, but we’re pretty well stocked at that position.
I was curious how a guy like Konchar was even available at this price, so I looked up his journey…
Memphis wanted to clear salary and field the worst possible team they could last year for tanking purposes, so they dumped him and Jock Landale on Utah in the JJJ trade.
Minnesota decided they want Kuminga so they had to dump Josh Green and his $14M, who they just got from Charlotte with LaMelo.
Green’s 6-6, 25 years old, plays good D, shot 42% last year. That’s a better player than Konchar, so Utah sends Minnesota Konchar and former #10 pick Cody Williams (~$6M each), who they’ve given up on.
Minnesota has to waive and stretch one of those guys to sign Kuminga. No one else on their roster makes enough money to get the job done (except Donte, but that would’ve been dumb). They chose the former lottery pick with upside (Williams) over the reliable vet (Konchar).
Point is the guy is overqualified to have been available. It wasn’t like anyone ever waived him because he wasn’t good enough to make a roster. It was only a series of 1v1 decisions pitting him vs younger players with upside that led to his availability.
I didn’t mean to make it sound as if I was down on Konchar as a pick-up for us. It was actually a really good one! We just need to use him properly, and I trust Mike Brown to figure out how to do just that.
I’m with JK on everything he said about Eubanks. I’d be cool with him being our third center. As usual, I don’t get the nuances of contracts like many of you do:
Is it a choice between Konchar or Eubanks, meaning that we can’t have both? Can we have Konchar, Eubanks, and Nickel? I like McCullar, but would leave him off the roster to keep the other three.
Someone please clarify the Konchar/Eubanks/Nickel rostering situation for me, if you would. It doesn’t need to be at a detailed level.
Nickel & McCullar are on 2-ways. Nothing we do with them will allow us to sign a player with 4 or more years of service. This includes Konchar, Eubanks, and Wiseman.
Without further moves or going over the apron, we can only sign 1 of Konchar, Eubanks, Wiseman, Ochai, and Bruce Brown.
I got that, Doogie 🙂
And fwiw I keep forgetting that we have to choose between Conch Harbor and a veteran third C if we can’t dump Dadiet. So once again he’s is in a weird 1v1 battle that might lead to him being a find for someone else.
I think I’m ready to swim off Dadiet island now.
It would be nice to add 2 more players. 1 that plays center and another PF. I think we are short in both areas. I am hoping Mo develops and can play some PF, but he sort of plays more like a SF. If OG and KAT miss some games (like they sometimes do) we will be short in those areas. KAT played a little PF last year with Mitch at Center. I don’t think we can do that with Drummond, or could we? Well, with at least in the height areas.
I do realize we can make trades, etc., later in the season to fill whatever “holes” we have.
The only way I go with Konchar is if is it in addition to one of the bigs, meaning that someone is traded, preferably Dadiet. We have a ton of seconds, so someone out there should be willing to eat his salary with sweetener. But if it is just one guy, imo it has to be a big.
It’s not that big of a deal for me, since ultimately we’re talking about an end of the bench spare part. If Leon wants to go with Konchar and kick the 3rd big problem down the road, whatever. He’s clearly better than your typical minimum salary guy. I just think he’s very redundant.
And I’m not buying that he can be a backup PF. The guy is 6’5″ and out of his 6,388 career minutes, has played less than 200 of them at PF. Last year he played around 100 out of his more than 1000 minutes there on two tanking teams that won 25 and 22 games. The reason he got minutes against Jokic is because he played against Denver 5 times, twice with MEM and 3X with UTA. His team lost all 5 games.
He’s waaaaaaay more of a big, tough 2 than a small-ball 4. The very last reason I would pick him would be to a backup 4. If anything, it would be to give me size at the 2. But obviously if Brown can make the PF thing work, not a big worry, since we already have OG, MO, Hart, and even KAT who can slot in there if it doesn’t work. Konchar is still a good player.
I agree with literally everything that Z-man just said. Bottom line: Love Konchar, but we need a center much, much more.
I really like Konchar and would absolutely look into getting rid of Dadiet, even attaching 2nds. Dadiet is not good at almost every area of the game. Doesn’t show much improvement or urgency either. Konchar is a skilled-hustle type player who will fit in very well. Does a bunch of stuff well, and can fill in when guys are injured, whether that be SF, SG and sometimes PF, depending upon the matchup. He players taller than he is, but also appears to be a strong player too.
And OAKAAK JR Smith just got arrested on family violence charges.
Konchar is a switchable 1-3 defender, and is very good in that role. We have managed to turn Jordan Clarkson into a pretty similar player, but Konchar is probably better at it.
If you could move Dadiet and bring in both Konchar and Eubanks, that would be some excellent depth at the back of the roster:
Starting Five: Brunson, Hart, Bridges, Anunoby, Towns
Key Reserves: Alvarado, McBride, Shamet, Diawara, Clarkson, Drummond
Back of rotation: Kolek, Konchar, Eubanks
That’s a pretty nasty top 14.
Do we even like Konchar more than Bruce Brown? I’m genuinely asking.
Bruce Brown ain’t what he used to be, but he’s still cromulent. It might be closer than he’s being given credit for. There is also Ochai Agbaji, who slots in maybe just a little bit below in the same genre of player. I might put Agbaji ahead of Brown because he’s younger.
I guess that’s what training camp and preseason are for. One or two of them will probably stand out in some way, and those will be the guys. Heck, it’s even possible that Dadiet found something in the last 2 months! But if I had to bet, it would be in the following order:
1. Eubanks/Wiseman (whoever plays better)
2. Konchar/Brown (whoever plays better)
Dadiet and Agbaji are probably gone by opening day. The 14 days of having only 13 guys might also be a thing.
I also would not be surprised if the decision includes thinking about who might be the most valuable minimum salary in a trade package.
Somehow I just can’t get in into my head that Wiseman could work out, and even if he played “better” than Eubanks during training camp and pre-season and “earned” the job I think it would be a disappointment to have signed him once the regular season starts, in short order. Hoping that MB is just bringing him in for a look-see as a personal favor due to their previous relationship, but unless he *really* lights it up (can’t imagine it) is not really considering giving him a roster spot.
Not 100 percent sure why I’m so biased against him.
My guess is he had the GQ story about the Nova Knicks — written before the KAT trade, published after — in his head and forgot that DDV isn’t on the team anymore.
Wiseman at least has some theoretical upside. His career has been a disaster for a #2 overall pick, but he’s also been injured much of the time and either getting too many minutes on bad teams or in roles he was ill-suited for on good teams. But I agree that the odds based on all the available evidence are stacked against him, beyond Mike Brown (foolishly?) thinking he can “make him right.” It’s pretty telling that Rick Carlisle gave up on him in short order, given that Indy wasn’t exactly stacked at the C spot when it happened.
But if he does show out, he’s way more exciting than Eubanks.
Yeah, I guess. I just can’t imagine him showing out anymore than I can imagine it from Ben Simmons. They’re both kind of in the same bucket for me. Certainly willing to keep an open mind and let it play out.
“We lost to f@&$ing four best friends”
ha owen, when i first read this on the thread, i thought dylan was clowning jalen’s and the other knicks’ appearrance, and saying they looked liked characters from the movie Sing…
which they kind of do…
he is right about the continuity/cohesion/synergy thing though…big reason why they lost that series…
Konchar only played 4 games against Denver, and only matched up with Jokic in 3 of them. Jokic scored 6pts on 7 shots. He covered Jokic for twice as many minutes as the next highest Nugget.
Konchar wasn’t lining up against the best offensive player in the world by random chance. It was a conscious decision to use him there.
3rd highest is Derik Queen (another C). He played 7 games against him.
5th is Julian Reese, a big for Washington. He played 2 games against.
11th is PF/C in PJ Washington. They matched up in 2 games.
14th is PF Jabari Smith. He covered him across 3 games.
On a per game basis, the 1st (Jalen Johnson), 4th (Oduro), 5th (Okani), 6th (Reese), and 10th (Jaquez) players he matched against by most minutes predominantly played PF last season. Jokic is 12th.
IDK, kinda seems like teams have been fine with Konchar lining up against PFs.
Begley:
I like the sound of all of this.
I like Eubanks and agree, a good screen setter is important, especially with Brunson being our main guy.
Dare I say I think Eubanks is better than Drummond and the move might be to get Eubanks and then move Drummond and Deuce before hte deadline to upgrade at center again.
I also like Konchbar and hope we can move Dadiet to bring in him and Eubanks . And Konchbar becomes far more valuable if we do move Deuce eventually.
Dolan accepted a White House visit for our team a while back. Mike Brown and Jalen Brunson now saying basically, “Not so fast.”
We’re probably looking at two camp battles:
1. Wiseman vs Eubanks vs anyone who is two-way eligible for 3rd C
2. Konchar vs Brown vs Agbaji vs Dadiet for 14th man, with the caveat that you have to beat Dadiet by a sufficient margin to justify the cost of dumping him.
Should be fun!
The PF/SF distinction is meaningless. We don’t need someone whose B-Ref page says he played PF minutes. We need someone who can rebound and defend secondary bigs. It’s fine if b-ref calls him a SF.
Likewise you can call Diawara the backup PF (like b-ref does), but that doesn’t mean he’s gonna bang down low with the bigs and grab boards.
Tyler Nickel’s two-way contract is for two years.
https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/tyler-nickels-two-way-contract-162358282.html
I’m not that high on Bruce Brown. Other than his first stint with Denver he’s not really done anything of note.
He has a -3.3 EPM. Konchar is -1.7.
Brown has had a negative on-off every season since 2021.
Big news might be an overstatement, but this is good. 2 years gives us early bird rights, which should sidestep any Diawara situation. If we convert him to an NBA deal, then it would be a 2-year deal at the minimum instead of a 1-year deal. 2 years is the most you can sign a two-way for.
EB, my mistake on the 4 vs. 5 games, but I think you are coming to a highly dubious conclusion based on a small, noisy sample. First, Konchar had a negative +/- in all 4 games and was a -12.8 while on the court in 91 minutes. Jokic (who does a couple of other things besides score) was positive in each game. I don’t know how many of those 91 minutes Konchar played at PF or against Jokic, but he certainly didn’t help his team’s cause. Not to mention that Utah was a tiny team except for Kyle Filipowski and Ace Bailey, not exactly stout defenders. We also don’t really know if there were screens and switches involved.
At the end of the day, the numbers are pretty meaningless, especially when the tanking factor is considered.
Damn, I didn’t know that there was any such thing as a 2-year deal for a 2-way player. Is that one way per year?
…and was a -12.8 per 100 possessions while on the court in 91 minutes.
Man, that was a terrible first pitch to Riley…
I am shocked. SHOCKED!!! That training camp invitee John Konchar didn’t singlehandedly make the last place Utah Jazz better than the title-contending Denver Nuggets.
Is Konchar better than Nikola Jokic? I’ll let you puzzle that out. I don’t need him to be. I am saying that John Konchar might be a better backup 4 than rookie Tyler Nickel, Pacome Dadiet, and sophomore 51st pick Diawara.
Numbers are meaningless for role players when they play for shitty teams. A guy who plays a ton of minutes and even starts sometimes for a shitty team is probably going to have horrible numbers. Very different than being a back up bench player on a contender. Who you play with, who you play against, and how big your role is all can skew numbers wildly into the negative when you play for a team that is losing most of its games.
I shouldn’t say meaningless. But they can get skewed into the negative very quickly if you play a lot of minutes on a bad team.
Sure, he might be, but we have near zero statistical evidence for that, certainly not the flimsy evidence you’re citing. The reason to sign him would be that he might be a better player than those guys regardless of position, not simply a better backup power forward. And I agree that that’s a possibility.
Swifty, I don’t agree with you because it’s often the case that players compile good numbers on shitty teams, and it doesn’t carry over to good teams. But I think Konchar is a pretty good utility player, especially at the vets minimum.
“Numbers are meaningless for role players when they play for shitty teams. A guy who plays a ton of minutes and even starts sometimes for a shitty team is probably going to have horrible numbers. Very different than being a back up bench player on a contender. Who you play with, who you play against, and how big your role is all can skew numbers wildly into the negative when you play for a team that is losing most of its games.”
See: Clarkson, Jordan
Donnie Baseball’s gonna take a lot of heat for his dubious handling of his bullpen.
It’s not as dangerous as Brunson and Towns on the eve of the 2026 NBA playoffs, and baseball isn’t basketball — but Schlittler, Fried, Cole, with Rodon at 4, is a nice group to take into the postseason.
That only reinforces my point, though. Shitty players can compile counting stats and look better than they are while useful role players get dinged because they’re playing a larger role than they should on shitty teams or they just aren’t being used “correctly.”
That’s true, Swift, but Memphis hasn’t always been shitty. They were the 2 seed in the West in both the ’22 & ’23 playoffs, and those were his best seasons. He actually produced more VORP in those two seasons (2.1) than Deuce has in his whole career (2.0)!
He’s a solid player. I get the need for a 3rd C, though. I hope we can make room for both.
(Now watch him go out and stink in training camp!)
So the thread starts with someone asking whether Konchar can play the 4, which is a reasonable question. A poster points out that Konchar has played very little 4 in his career, which is a solid objection. After all if he could play the 4, why hasn’t a team let him play there more often?
My premise is that despite not being listed as a 4, perhaps he still defended 4s. A positional listing isn’t always an accurate reflection of how a player is used.
If I look through his match-up list and see players who play 1-3, then it’s reasonable to assume the team doesn’t trust him to guard bigger players. However, if I look and see that the team does have him defend 4s, then it’s evidence that he can play the position but doesn’t get listed there due to his size.
So I am countering the claim that Konchar can’t play the 4 based on how other teams used him. Because according to the data, his teams did use him that way despite what the positional data says.
Oh man, i remember too well the 00s and part of the 10s when we weren’t even confident about the 5 starters… now we’re discussing if some guys deserve the 14th spot or not. This is basketball heaven. 🙂
100% agre. Winner of this match up will decide the series. Hart will have to literally run that old man off the court.
Did the playoffs already start and we’re playing the Sixers again? Must have fallen asleep a li’l bit.
— Rumpledoogskin
The irony is we don’t even have a starting PF. We start three wings and B-Ref just calls the tallest one a PF. But OG’s just as likely to be guarding a PG (like he did throughout the finals) as a big.
I think you mean Rip Van Doogle, unless you’ve really been spinning straw into gold.
Oh, yeah. Got my stories messed up. Long day. Thanks. 🙂
Rumpledoogskin sounded just plain awful, anyway.
yanks about to kick off their post season…
optimistic for this first series…
no aaron judge, but – we got giancarlo back…maybe…
was really hoping this would be the year giancarlo would stay healthy and help the team…
oh well…
very much looking forward to cam leading the way…
Is that name already taken?
All can be forgiven in October. Austin Wells 1 for his last 1.
ditto on that thought noble…
Wells did have an .800 OPS over his last 60 games.
There is way too much talking in this booth. Let the game breathe guys.
hubie…it’s like they can’t control themselves…or someone told them all more is better…
ugh…
you can challenge strike 3 now!?
wow I missed a lot this time.
2nd call the yanks had to challenge to get overturned…
Spike got kind of an ovation before the game when he impromptu held up five fingers back to the nearby sections.
EB the only point I’m trying to make is that Konchar’s ability to defend bigs should be pretty low on the list of reasons to sign him. If you need a guy to be a backup 4, sign a backup 4, not a guy who is really a big 2 or smallish 3. However, if you want to sign the best player available regardless of positional need, and he’s your guy, consider his extremely limited to play up a modest bonus, since the hard evidence that he is able to do so in anything but a cameo roll on a shitty team doesn’t really exist.
nice to have you back E 😊
Cam is such a fucking demon. Truly one of my all-time favorite players right now.
Oh, and remember when Boone didn’t start Ben Rice in game 1 last year?
Winter is coming Geo 😊.
Hard to believe Schlittler topped out at 90 when he was drafted. Does not compute.
Girardi is the only one with a little tact. The other guys are a mess.
Why didn’t Jazz pinch hit for Volpe with a RHP on the mound….
Maybe it’s just the Cam effect but the Yanks seem a lot better than last year and the Sox considerably worse.
cam, spencer jones, ben rice, another potential good young shortstop – the vibes are currently excellent…
just feels so much more hopeful when growth and improvement come from within…
hitting on a good young starting pitcher feels like winning the lottery…
Because they were looking to sacrifice and who could depend on whackadoodle Jazz to do that?
Didn’t see the game, but was glad to see the Youth Group get the win. Rice, Schlittler, Wells, Jones, Volpe all playing well, nice. And soon they’ll be out from under Stanton’s contract, and their pitching is insane. Only problem is Judge getting old. And no third baseman still.
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