The Knicks have lost two straight games to drop to 2-2 on the season, which isn’t ideal, but it’s still relatively acceptable. Right? I mean, it’s very, very early in the season, the team is dealing with injuries, and they are adjusting to a coach who has introduced an offense unlike the last coach’s. Well, according to a surprisingly large portion of the fanbase, the answer is no. Check X, Instagram, YouTube, and just about any other platform where fans can voice their opinions, and you’ll find
that there are many within the Knicks fanbase who have collectively decided that the sky is falling. Karl-Anthony Towns can’t be the second-best player on a contending team. Josh Hart needs to be traded. OG Anunoby is overpaid. The bench sucks. Mike Brown needs to be fired. You’ll find many opinions like this, and more, floating around the internet.
Now, some concerns are valid. But they should be treated as such: concerns and red flags, nothing more. Towns does look lost offensively. Hart, for the second season in a row, has struggled to be a consistent positive on the offensive end. Anunoby does need to be more effective offensively. The bench duo of Jordan Clarkson and Guerschon Yabusele has been incredibly underwhelming. And Brown has made some questionable decisions. But it is just silly to make such bold declarations and statements this early in the season.
I’d like to remind fans once again that we are four games into a season in which the team has implemented a new coach, had three different starting lineups, and is dealing with the absence of multiple key players due to injuries or personal reasons. I’m not here to claim that this team will win it all, or that the aforementioned red flags will be fixed by the time the postseason rolls around. There is absolutely a world in which year one of Brown’s tenure as Knicks coach ends as a failure due to Towns, Hart, the bench, and/or the coach himself not performing up to the requisite level. But to make a judgment after just 192 minutes is excessive at best.
The Bulls are 4-0, so does that make them the favorite to come out of the East? The Trail Blazers are 3-1, the Jazz are 2-2, and the Hornets are 2-2. Does that mean all of those teams are going to make the playoffs? Tyrese Maxey is averaging 37.5 PPG, Nikola Jokić is averaging 15.3 PPG, Zion Williamson is averaging 4 SPG, and Mikal Bridges is shooting 47.4% from three. Are those players going to continue at their current paces? The answer to all of those questions is “very unlikely.” Were it 40, 30, or even 20 games into the season, it would at least be worth a discussion. But with so little basketball being played so far, the sample size is too small to make definitive statements. And I would’ve said the same exact thing if the Knicks were 4-0 and fans were already talking about a parade.
Injuries, new systems, roster changes, strength of schedule, off nights, good nights from opposing teams and players, and much more can play a big part in how players and teams look early in the season. This was always going to be a work in progress. And progress isn’t always linear. As Brown, Brunson, and others have pointed out, there will inevitably be nights when the team looks off. The play will leave you wanting more from a team looking to compete for a championship, and they will lose games against teams you’d think they could beat handily. But such is life for a team dealing with the multi-dimensional changes that the Knicks are going through.
Maybe the sky does end up falling, and you guys can all call me out for being overly hopeful or a naive optimist. But I urge fans to just give this team a bit more time. Tom Thibodeau was afforded five seasons. So was Julius Randle. They, like this current team and its players, were imperfect. But they, with time and patience, also provided the Knicks and their fans with a lot of success and some of the best memories the fans have had in the last two and a half decades. Let’s at least try to be composed enough to give them time to get healthy (or at least healthier) and not only learn Brown’s system but perfect it. And if the team still has the same concerns with little to no improvement in a few weeks, we can revisit this conversation. But look at recent history: this team was 6-6 to start last season, and they ended up having a decent season. The Kings, in their first year under Brown, started 0-4, while Domantas Sabonis—one of the league’s premier big men—averaged 13.5 PPG, 9.8 RPG, and 6.3 APG. And that team went on to win 10 of their next 12 games, finish third in a very strong Western Conference, and saw Sabonis have an incredible year.
