Day one of the NBA Draft is in the books…
…and oh, shocker, there was a trade down completed by the Knickerbockers!
Here’s the latest batch of quotes in what is likely going to become a dying Bulletin, at least throughout the dry summer.
Josh Hart
On the meaning of New York to the NBA and the Knicks’ title:
“No one understands—besides y’all—the weight that that wearing that jersey has sometimes. And, you know, we kind of talk
around it and dance around it, but New York is a special place, but there’s a lot of pressure when you put that jersey on. So we want to thank you and celebrate you (Carmelo Anthony) a little bit, man, for laying the foundation, but also, you know, talking to us during it.”
Jalen Brunson
On announcing his debut children’s book:
“I’m beyond happy to share that JALEN PLAYS IT ALL, written by me and illustrated by the incredible [Neely Daggett], will be released (next year) by Feiwel & Friends. This children’s book is a story about discovering that success doesn’t happen overnight. There are mistakes, setbacks, and moments when giving up may feel easier than pushing forward. And while basketball was always at the center of my journey, every sport I played helped build the habits, character, and work ethic that made me who I am.”
Charles Oakley
On Patrick Ewing:
“Patrick (Ewing) always been like that. He never stood up for nobody. Even when they offered him the D-League job, I said something. And the coldest thing out of this all, I took a case for Patrick on an airplane. Put that out there. I took a case from him. Ask any teammate, Chris Childs, Charles, Allen, John, they might not say nothing, but I took a case to better his self. And this happened to me, he don’t say nothing.”
On Jalen Brunson vs. Patrick Ewing as the Knicks’ GOAT:
“Brunson is a better Knicks than Patrick.”
On Dolan supposedly blocking his appearances on the Roomates Show and elsewhere:
“I was supposed to be on the Roommate podcast. I get a call the day before. They said, ‘We have to cancel you.’ And then three weeks later, guess who was on there? Dolan. Dolan. I was shooting a commercial right across from the Garden and Cafe 31, and something else. We shot for one day, the next day, somebody said we had to shut it down. We had permission and everything. So he bullying me around the city, too.”
Guerschon Yabusele
On prioritizing the NBA over a return to Europe:
“Well, actually, I will never say no. I will never say no. But where, uh, it has to be clarified is that for me today, it is the NBA first. Why? Very simple. Uh, if the NBA, I do not go back there this summer, let’s say, I think it is going to be finished. We all agree. I do not think I would have a second chance to be able to go back.”
On his frustration with his lack of playing time in New York:
“The games go on, the games go on, and well, I still do not play. I still do not play. And sometimes, zero minutes, sometimes… And me, there, actually, it hit me, where I say to myself, ‘Ah, but I feel like I am in Boston, actually.’ When I look at Boston, we are in 2026, and it was ten years ago. It hit me. I said to myself, ‘Damn, ten years. A ton of things have happened, you know, since then, and I am still getting zero minutes. It is not possible.’ The frustration was there. I would go home, I did not know what to do anymore. I said to myself, ‘But it is not possible. I am not going to go back into that for the whole season.’ And I signed there for two years. And I say to myself, ‘He signed for three years or four years, the coach. I am not going to not play for two years.’”
Becky Hammon
On publicly admitting being wrong about Jalen Brunson:
“I was wrong. I was wrong. My opinion was wrong.”
On Jalen Brunson proving history wrong:
“Jalen, all he did was prove history wrong. He proves he’s an outlier, so you can put his name next to Steph Curry and Isiah Thomas, and I thought he played brilliantly, especially down the stretch. I mean, he was that 1A dude.”
On initially refusing to apologize for her wrong opinion:
“But apologize… I’m never gonna apologize for having an opinion. That’s what ESPN pays me for.”
On Brunson’s place in Knicks history:
“Let me just piss off Knicks fans again and say, I think he’s the greatest Knick ever. Give them something else to talk about… I’ve always been a Jalen Brunson fan. I was a fan of his at Villanova, in Dallas and why this comment went off the rails, I have no idea, because it was clearly a historical and analytical take.”
Adam Silver
On the NBA’s anti-tanking system:
“We’ll never go back to where we were. We ended up in a situation where fans of teams were actually rooting for their teams to be bad. It was particularly bad this year, I think, because of the perceived depth of (the 2026 NBA) Draft.”
On why the league changed course:
“It just caught up with us over the years. It was a practice by a very few teams over time where they could genuinely say they were rebuilding. Every team in all sports is focused on analytics, and everyone — sort of the guardrails went off — and said there’s an advantage if you’re not really good, to be really bad, and it doesn’t work to be in the middle. So once roughly a third of our teams were acting under those incentives, everyone came together, and I would say it was agreement across the league from every constituent group, but most importantly, our fans.”
On evaluating the new system before making further changes:
“Part of the agreement with the teams was that this system would be in place for three years. In essence, it’s grandfathered in. We all agree that would give us an opportunity to assess how this is working, and also look at some other approaches, which we thought, in fairness, the teams needed to be built in over time. But most importantly, we will not be returning to a system where there is an incentive to be bad.”
On NBA expansion:
“If we were to expand, most likely in the 2028-29 season, I bet that’s when they would come into the league, but no decisions have been made yet. What we’ve made clear to our teams, we’ve at least specifically said it’s Las Vegas and Seattle. We’re looking at some other great cities that are interested in having franchises. We’re focused on those two right now. We could decide ultimately to go to new cities. One or two bids are being solicited at this time. The groups are coming together, talking to bankers, talking to the league office, and I think what we’ve said, in fairness to everyone, let’s make a decision by the end of this calendar year, at the latest.”
On the timeline for expansion:
“If we expand, at least, we’re thinking ’28-29 season. The only two cities, at the moment, we’re looking at are Las Vegas and Seattle. We haven’t had a vote on it, it’s not a foregone conclusion, but we’re in the process of talking to groups that are interested in getting an expansion team in those two cities.”
On the possibility of adding one, two, or no teams:
“We’re currently looking at two teams, but what we’ve said is it’s possible we won’t expand at all, and we could expand to just one market. But we’re officially looking at both those markets right now.”
On conference realignment after the expansion:
“We’ll want to likely even out the conferences, so there will be some movement then.”
Ben Stiller
On Mohamed Diawara’s extension:
“Let’s go MO.”
Zohran Mamdani
On the rappers attending the Knicks parade:
“It feels like a homecoming. It’s a chance for us to appreciate people who have written the soundtrack to the city. I’m just so happy to see many of them getting their due; you cannot disentangle those songs from our own stories and memories as New Yorkers.”
