Briefing: April 11
The season is over, Initial thoughts, Happy Birthday Sugar Ray, and more!
Good Morning,
The season is finally over!
On fan appreciation night, the Knicks were blown out by Detroit 115-89. Detroit needed the win to clinch a playoff berth. The Knicks were literally playing out the string, so the result should come as no surprise.
Here’s hoping this is the last meaningless Knicks game we have to watch for a long time!
David Fizdale plans to bring Knicks players to playoff games. As reported by Marc Berman, Fizdale wants to build on what he did last year with several young players and expose them to playoff atmospheres:
“We’re going to take multiple guys to all over. This year I’m going to have the assistants doing it. Some of the assistants take a guy here, I’ll take a guy there. We’re going to cover a lot of series with these guys.”
What surprised Fizdale most about this season? Mitchell Robinson: “I think we can all agree if we had to restructure the draft right now, I don’t think he’ll go 36. I think he’d be in the top-10 pretty easily.” [Stefan Bondy]
Exit Interviews: Players and coaches are usually ready to get out dodge at the end of the season, so Fizdale staged his exit meetings with over the past 10 days, according to Marc Berman. The players will meet with Steve Mills and Scott Perry over the next two days.
Summer League: Fizdale said that Kevin Knox, Mitchell Robinson, and Allonzo Trier will appear in Vegas, which is interesting considering the Knicks still have to decide on Allonzo Trier’s club option, which could impact their cap space for two max free agents.
Knicks rookies found their cars filled with popcorn after the season finale. Check out the video here.
Appearing on The Michael Kay Show, Adrian Wojnarowski cautions counting on free agents too early. Woj says a lot can happen between now and July 1, so no matter how confident the Knicks might feel about their chances at a player like Durant, nobody really knows what he is going to do. Woj notes there are still a lot of hurdles to clear.
Happy Birthday, Michael “Sugar Ray” Richardson! The 4x All-Star turns 64 today.
Miss this season? Are you nuts? Yeah…a little bit.
Jonathan Macri gives his end of season thoughts…
Prior to walking into the Garden for the final game of the season on Wednesday, if you’d asked me what my prevailing emotion of the night would end up being when I left, the best guess would have been relief.
It’s the only logical response in the season we just experienced, one where I’d visit NBA.com/stats on a near daily basis, scrolling through different categories, filtering by various date ranges, mining for data, any data, that would indicate things were trending in the right direction. During the month of February when the team was bordering on a top ten defense, it felt like they’d won a damn playoff series. Seeing them never fall to the very bottom of the barrel in net rating was an actual, honest-to-goodness source of pride for me on more than one occasion.
It’s been that kind of a year.
Oddly enough though, as the last game devolved into a blowout and the finish line drew closer, relief was the last thing I was feeling. I wasn’t thankful the year was ending. I wasn’t happy about the fact that (knocks head on wood) it would only get better from here.
Instead, I was, ever so slightly, unfathomably, inconceivably…
Sad.
No, it doesn’t make any sense. The purpose of being a fan is to root for a team that wins games. It’s kind of the point.
I’m sure that, for this very reason, there’s a healthy segment of the city that hasn’t tuned in much this year, or for that matter, most of the last several years. I think about these people sometimes and there’s a small part of me that admires them. They probably spend their winter nights doing all kinds of cool shit. Like going out to dinner, playing Risk or having orgies. Do people still have orgies? I wouldn’t know because I’m busy watching Emmanuel Mudiay shoot mid range fadeaway jumpers by the dozen.
Whose loss is that, really?
No, I don’t have that choice because I long ago crossed that threshold of fandom where I was all the way in. The Knicks were so exciting for so long during so many of my formative years that I never stood a chance at being anything other than what I am. That’s probably the case with you, if you’re reading this, the day after the end of the season that any sane person would have wanted to leave in the past the second it concluded, or started for that matter.
Not me. Despite the fact that I’d strongly consider giving an appendage (or at least a toe) for the Knicks to be competitive again, there is another part of me that will miss this year.
It’s simple, really. Since Patrick Ewing’s last game as a Knick, this was as rudderless an organization as existed in the sport. Even before I became an attorney, I was always great at selling myself on bullshit when it helped me get through the day, but even I couldn’t convince myself that there was anything much to look forward to. It’s what made those years so hard; it wasn’t just losing – it was pointless losing.
This year felt different.
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Remember when…
April 11, 2015: Knicks win 80-79 at Orlando, holding the Magic to seven points in the second quarter, which ties the all-time post-clock low for a quarter by an opponent. The teams also set an NBA record with a combined 15 points in the second quarter. The win dropped the Knicks to second in the lottery chase.
April 11, 1995: Knicks record 50th win of the season with a 112-99 triumph over Miami at Madison Square Garden. It marks the Knicks fourth consecutive season with 40-plus wins.
April 11, 1972: Knicks advance to the Eastern Conference Finals, defeating Baltimore 106-82 in Game Six of the Eastern Conference Semifinals at the Garden.
April 11, 1970: Knicks win Game One of the Eastern Division Finals over Milwaukee 110-102 at the Garden. Willis Reed leads the way with 24 points. Prior to tip-off, the Knicks hold a Moment of Silence to honor three-time NBA All-Star and future Basketball Hall-of-Famer Maurice Stokes, who had died five days earlier.
NBA Buzz
Dwyane Wade gave his final jersey to Carmelo Anthony. (Read more)
The playoffs are set. Everything you need to know via ESPN
That does it for today, talk to you tomorrow!