OG Anunoby Health Adds Extra Boost to Knicks Season

The New York Knicks are less than two weeks away from the start of the regular season, and they are currently healthy in the middle of training camp.

Someone who struggled to stay healthy last season was OG Anunoby, who played in just 50 games for the Toronto Raptors and Knicks last year.

Anunoby was traded in late December, forcing him to learn on the fly with the Knicks. But now that he has a full training camp with the Knicks, star point guard Jalen Brunson believes he will be better than where he was before.

“It’s great, first to see him healthy again and just to start the year off with him,” Brunson said.“It’s a lot easier when you have the whole team and go through training camp, [making] sure you’ve got your basics down. … In-season trades are always tough for an individual learning an offensive scheme and defensive scheme. It’s just easier when you’re in training camp to learn all that stuff.”

Now that Anunoby is healthy and in camp, he’ll have the ability to learn the schemes alongside his teammates rather than pick up enough things on the fly. While in-season trades are important for teams to improve where they need to, the last five champions have stood pat at the deadline. Their familiarity with one another throughout the whole season likely helped their chances at winning it all.

That’s why the Knicks made their Karl-Anthony Towns trade when they did rather than make a deal later down the line. With Towns, Anunoby and Mikal Bridges all with the team in training camp, the Knicks have made their biggest deals and can go into the season full speed ahead as they hope to make an even deeper run in the Eastern Conference playoffs.

Make sure you bookmark New York Knicks On SI for the latest news, exclusive interviews, film breakdowns and so much more!