The Knicks aren’t close to NBA championship contenders

NEW YORK — The New York Knicks didn’t give up five first-round picks for Mikal Bridges just to be good. They didn’t trade for Karl-Anthony Towns and his $220 million contract just to have a nice-looking roster on paper. New York didn’t acquire OG Anunoby for intriguing young players just because no one else wanted him — every team with a pulse did.

The expectations following the Knicks weren’t pulled out of thin air. They created these expectations. They did so by swinging for the fences with multiple franchise-altering trades that brought back talented players but diminished their asset pool and left them financially strapped. This is their doing.

It’s impossible not to talk about New York without one eye on the prize. Players and coaches can take it day by day — and they should — but the reality is all of this was for nothing if, when the dust settles, the Knicks aren’t in contention for an NBA championship. It might take a year or two or three. It might never happen. At some point, though, that has to be where this thing ends to be deemed a success. Unfair or not, that’s where they put the bar with their roster moves over the calendar year.

As things stand, New York is nowhere close to being in the conversation as a potential NBA champion. On paper, it’s 15-10 and in fourth place in the Eastern Conference, but the gap between first and second and the rest is vast. No other teams in the East should be mentioned in the same sentence as the Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics. New York has the talent to be in that group, but for one reason or another, it’s not working. Not yet, at least.

Look no further than Wednesday night’s 108-100 loss to the Atlanta Hawks. It’s not who the Knicks lost to that’s the problem. It’s the fact that this team struggles to put together any semblance of consistency from one night to the next. This is a team that can beat the Denver Nuggets by 27 one day, then go down to the wire with a depleted Charlotte Hornets team the next and then, two games later, dominate a forceful Orlando Magic team and then, two games after that, lose a game from start to finish against a middling Detroit Pistons team.

The Knicks are the NBA’s top offense, but sometimes they struggle against athletic, physical teams that can switch one through five. Sometimes they cut through those same defenses with ease. Defensively, they’ll put together a tremendous half of basketball, only for the other half to bring proper context as to why they’re closer to the league’s 20th-best defense than 10th.

Players talk about this group needing to find consistency, but how long is that grace period? When is the lack of consistency part of a team’s identity?

“I don’t know how long, but I think as long as you find it, it doesn’t matter when you find it,” Anunoby said.

OG ANUNOBY!!!!! pic.twitter.com/AQfZ3CRpU7

— NEW YORK KNICKS (@nyknicks) December 12, 2024

He might be correct. People anticipated New York being a title contender coming into the season, but it has many months to find what it’s searching for. If the Knicks become a stable group with an identity a month before the end of the regular season, is that all that matters if the goal is a championship? Possibly. However, it’s also unfair to assume New York will figure it out. We can only go off of what we know now.

Even the NBA’s elite offenses miss shots (like the Knicks have). It’s part of the game. The great teams, though, defend at a high level and find other ways to win when the offense isn’t clicking. New York hasn’t done that with regularity this season. The defense, particularly at the point of attack, has been poor. The franchise is without a true rim protector to anchor the back line, as Mitchell Robinson has been out the entire season and isn’t expected to return until January. Maybe Robinson’s presence will help change things for the Knicks, but relying on the oft-injured center to be an answer to some of New York’s problems can’t be assumed as a safe bet.

For as lethal as New York can be offensively, it is without an identity, something to hang its hat on when things get tough. That’s probably the biggest difference between this year’s team and last year’s, which was a physical and scrappy bunch that could win ugly if needed.

The Knicks might be playing with fire if they can’t tap into that again soon.

“Now is the time where we really have to get on top of it because you don’t want to get into what they call ‘the dog days’ of the season and not have an identity and try to force everything in the back end of the season,” Knicks guard Miles McBride said. “I think right now is the time for us to make sure we come together and really be efficient with how we communicate with one another.”

Basketball has never been an exact science. Some teams come together and win immediately. Some take several years. It’s part of the drama that we love. However, going all in the way New York has and not being able to come out on the other end can also set a franchise back a long time. That, too, is part of the theatre that makes this league so entertaining.

Twenty-five games in, there are questions about whether this team can work at the level it needs to for all of this to be worth what it costs. The roster is talented, but are we sure it’s gutsy? Is this group capable of being on a string defensively for more than a game here, a half there?

New York doesn’t have to be where it wants to go yet. I want to reiterate that. However, it would behoove the Knicks to start finding alternative ways to get there, particularly in the rare instances when the offense is faulty.

“Obviously, we just want to be the best we can be,” Towns said. “The Miami Heat, years ago with LeBron, it took a whole year for them before they figured it out and put a banner up. Other teams … it took 75 percent of the season and they figured it out. You don’t know. I don’t have a crystal ball in front of me to tell you how long before things are fully clicking at a consistent level, but I think, for us, we’ve showed spurts of consistency and what we can be when things are clicking at a high level and everything is going smooth. I can’t tell you an exact time, but I can tell you that every day we work on being the best version of ourselves and how we can show that to our fans and the city.”

Until then, New York is a good team, not a championship team.

The difference between the two is significant considering what the Knicks invested.

(Photo of Karl-Anthony Towns surrounded by De’Andre Hunter, left, and Clint Capela: Elsa / Getty Images)