New Year's Hangover

The Knicks lack of defensive urgency is becoming a thing.

Good morning. The Knicks are back at it tonight in MSG at 7:30 against Philly. Joel Embiid is probable, while Kelly Oubre Jr remains out.

Hawks 111, Knicks 99

23-11 Overall (L2); 15-3 at home

During an 82-game season for a 50-ish win team like the Knicks, losses tend to fall into one of four buckets.

Bucket No. 1: Excusable losses. Whether due to injured players, inconvenient scheduling, ice cold shooting, or some combination thereof, these nights aren’t worth getting worked up over.

Bucket No. 2: Heartbreakers. These are games you lose in excruciating fashion. I hate these the most.

Bucket No. 3: Existential crises. Easily the most common type of loss, at least if you watch the average KFS Postgame show (last season, of their 31 losses, I’d say about 30 were of this variety). They force fans to question certain fundamental aspects of the team and/or key players on the roster. We can also call these “Chicken Little Losses.”

Bucket No. 4: Question marks. There are the games that can fall into multiple of the above categories where beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Last night, we got a question mark loss.