My Own Worst Enemy

With 16 games remaining in the regular season, the Knicks are still searching for answers to some familiar questions.

Good morning, and Happy St. Patty’s Day. We enjoyed our corned beef and cabbage last night, and I hope everyone out there has a great (and responsible) celebration today.

The Knicks are back home, albeit briefly, for a matchup with the Miami Heat, losers of seven straight. Jalen Brunson remains out, and according to Shams will aim to return sometime in late March or early April. The Heat will be without Alec Burks and Nikola Jovic, while Andrew Wiggins is questionable. Tip off is at 7:30 and the game will be on ESPN. Come say hi at halftime.

Game 66: Warriors 97, Knicks 94

Reflecting back on Saturday’s 97-94 loss at the hands of the surging Golden State Warriors and thinking about how I was going to open today’s newsletter, I wanted very much to walk a path that did not involve either of the viral clips that came out of night’s events.

After all, there’s so much other stuff to dig into from this game and from the team’s recent stretch of play without Jalen Brunson that warrants attention.

For starters, the defense looks the best it has all season, giving up just 106.6 points per 100 possessions in the last four games. On Saturday, they became the first team to hold the Warriors under 100 points in nearly two months, long before Golden State acquired Jimmy Butler. Most impressively (and importantly, Karl-Anthony Towns is defending at an adequate level, give or take a few brain farts at the wrong time against the wrong guy.

On the flip side, New York’s offense is scoring just 110.1 points per 100 possessions in that same stretch, barely staying above the bottom five teams league-wide¹.

The commonality in both numbers is that Jalen Brunson is missing. Gone is the second target for opposing offenses to feast on, but so is the engine that makes the offense go. New York doesn’t have a replacement initiator who can consistently cave a defense, and as a result, they’ve attempted just 22.8 percent of their shots in the restricted area since Brunson went out. That’s the second lowest mark in the league after ranking fourth best in the 62 games before Jalen was sidelined. The byproduct of that drop has been further corrosion of an existing weakness, as the team that already didn’t shoot enough threes has plummeted even further. At least with Brunson, they were eighth in frequency of looks from the corner. With him out, they’re 29th.

And yet, they’ve found a way to get to 2-2 in his absence. What, exactly, do we make of that record? Glass half empty, they’re a a Mikal Bridges miracle away from being 1-3. Glass half full, they’re an ice cold closing stretch against the Warriors from being 3-1.

The truth, as it so often does, lies somewhere in between, and while they deserve a ton of credit for getting thisclose to a winning West coast swing largely without their Captain, a few segments of that Warriors loss - including the closing one - deserve closer attention.

Amidst the 1-for-7 stretch from the field in the relevant closing portion of the game, there were also two turnovers, the first by Mikal Bridges…

…and the second by Karl-Anthony Towns:

If Jalen Brunson is in, it’s hard to imagine either turnover happens, first because he’d have the ball, and second because those other players wouldn’t feel as much pressure to create something from nothing.

But there was also another play in the final minutes that might not have been all that different even if the Knicks had been at full strength:

I just wrote an entire newsletter on something I dubbed “The Josh Hart Conundrum,” but this clip sums up that quagmire better than I ever could.

On one hand, Hart’s presence - or lack thereof, at least as far as the Warriors were concerned, - allows Steph Curry to cheat on defense and wall of the Bridges drive, forcing a difficult long two that misses.

On the other hand, Hart - who tried to exploit Golden State’s coverage by relocating to the dunker’s spot at the last second, initially to no avail - ends up getting the offensive rebound which led to a good look from Towns for the lead.

The play in totality shows why the Josh Hart Conundrum is a conundrum at all: this is still a player who impacts winning during the biggest moments. The question is whether he impacts it enough to consistently warrant getting 40 minutes a night, even with Brunson missing.

That question was posed as loudly as ever on Saturday, when Hart scored as many points as you and me. Speaking of loud…

…I couldn’t help it.

I know this spat has been debunked by the beat reporters as nothing more than a lover’s quarrel, and I don’t doubt that for a second. For all their differences, Tom Thibodeau and Josh Hart are the same person in many ways, perhaps none more so than how much they each care about the ultimate goal.

But watching them go at it on the sideline, I couldn’t help but wonder if each man was as mad at themselves as they were the other member of the Odd Couple - Hart because of his poor play, and Thibs for sticking with his guy maybe longer than he should have.

Even if this back and forth amounted to a whole lot of nothing, it was a clear reminder that the Knicks remain in search of the level of cohesion a title team during this time of year. Maybe that’s a good thing. The alternative - giving up - is not something this group knows the meaning of which is as much a reason for optimism as anything.

If this were the only issue, we’d all be feeling pretty confident for the home stretch that’s on deck. But the Knicks also have the misfortune of playing in a league where 28 other teams (I’m not counting Philly) are trying to beat them. As such, the quest for zen is never easy, and on Saturday, their roadblock came in the form of a loudmouthed irritant who doesn’t know when to shut his face.

(And there it is. I’m 0-for-2.)

Watching Draymond perform his usual antics, I was reminded of the old adage that children should be seen and not heard. I know this phrase has gone the way of the flip phone, but Green’s tomfoolery gives me second thoughts on whether we should bring it back.

The NBA’s Dennis the Menace may have won the war, thus allowing him to spin his narrative as only he can, but this game only reinforced the notion that he is as classless as he is crass. I’m just happy that Towns let Green know - both with his play and with his words - that his act doesn’t have any actual impact once the game begins.

Would I have liked KAT’s teammates to take a slightly harder line stance than they did? Ideally yes, although as Jeremy noted on last night’s pod, this probably isn’t worth losing sleep over.

What is worth a second thought is what this game left me pondering most of all: who is the Knicks’ biggest enemy right now - themselves, or the rest of the league?

That’s probably a silly question with Jalen Brunson sidelined and with New York playing the best defense it has all season, but this still feels like a group that’s fighting against itself, even if everyone’s intentions are pure². Again, maybe the adversity is good. As a wise man once said, if you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball. With the Knicks still in comfortable playoff position and a more pleasant portion of the schedule coming up, these trials are probably for the best.

But for a team poised to compete for a title before the year began, there’s been quite a bit more turmoil than many expected.

For the best?

That remains to be seen.

💫 Stars of the Game 💫

⭐️ Deuce McBride

⭐️ ⭐️ OG Anunoby

Really feel bad giving Mikal the shit end of the stick here, if only because there were four Knicks who showed up to play basketball on Saturday night, and Bridges was one of them.

But I’m giving a slight edge to two of his teammates in the starting five, mostly because their defense popped a little bit more and because Bridges had five of New York’s 13 turnovers, including one in the final minute that was mistakenly credited to Deuce.

(Special shout out, by the by, to Precious Achiuwa, who achieved a rare “F” in Benjy’s gradebook. There have been more than few games this season when I texted Mr. Ritholtz and asked him how so-and-so only received a D or a D-, and he reminded me each time that F’s are reserved for truly atrocious performances. So congrats to you, Precious, for clearing that high bar in your 10 first half minutes of action.)

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ Karl Anthony Towns: I hate, hate, hate that the bad sticks out more than the good. Picking up his third foul early, dropping too low on the two Steph threes, the late turnover, the two final missed threes, and then being unable to stay with Draymond on the bucket that put the nail in the coffin…it’s all unpleasant, frankly.

But for the vast majority of this game, Karl-Anthony Towns was everything the Knicks needed him to be and then some. You wanna talk about tough buckets? Towns did the sort of dirty work we’ve been calling for all year long.

If they get this version of the big guy once the playoffs begin, I’ll take my chances against any opponent, Boston included.

Final Thought

Get well soon, JB.

🏀

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

1. Two of the teams below them are the Kings and Blazers, who happen to be two of their last last four opponents. This takes a little bit of the shine off their achievements on defense, but considering the depths New York is coming from, their recent play is still noteworthy.

2. Although I will admit, when Thibs stuck with the Precious, Mitch & Hart trio for a grueling three minutes and 30 seconds, I briefly questioned this assumption.