Who is the Perfect Star For The New York Knicks?

For my entire life as a New York Knicks fan, this team has been trash. I was too young to have any real memories of Michael Jordan dog walking John Starks and them.

My first real memory as an active, cognisant fan was the 2004-05 season when they traded for Jamal Crawford and put him and Stephon Marbury in a starting backcourt together. Actually, I think Allan Houston was the starting guard and Jamal Crawford came off the bench with Penny Hardaway.

They won 33 games that year.

The following year, they won 23 and finished dead last in the East.

All I know is losing.

So excluding the recent Leon Rose years, the Knicks made the playoffs 3 times out of 16 years since I started watching in 2004.

But I intentionally separate the Leon Rose years because since taking over as Team President at the end of the 19-20 season, the team has made the postseason 2 of his 3 years in charge and they only missed the one year because Julius Randle had yet to discover meditation or whatever pseudoscience stops him from strangling referees.

I understand Knicks fans being frustrated about never feeling close to NBA Championships and believing the way to reach the top of the mountain is to go out there and acquire a superstar but I think that impatience could potentially destroy all of the positive momentum this team currently has.

We’re a long way from winning 17 games and coach David Fizdale smiling ear-to-ear as the Bucks beat the plasma out of the team.

My man was smiling like the edibles just kicked in.

And I can’t even blame Knicks fans for their desire for star power since the NBA media constantly plays this game where they report on this inside info they claim to have about alllllllllll these players wanting to play for New York and when they inevitably don’t end up here, no one is held accountable for the faux-reports and instead, they mock Knicks fans for getting their hopes up.

In 2019, guys like Bill Simmons and Nick Wright told us on a daily basis that Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving would be Knicks and then immediately laughed at Knicks fans for believing what THEY TOLD US WAS DEFINITELY HAPPENING.

Stephen A. Smith—who pretends to be a Knicks fan whenever it’s convenient or he thinks it gives him some level of credibility or, most important to him, he gets to make an NBA story about himself—constantly yells about the Knicks desperately needing a superstar.

This perpetual narrative has done nothing but trick this organization into making terrible decisions like the 2011 Carmelo Anthony trade where the Knicks sent away Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and a 2014 first-round draft pick (Dario Saric) for a guy who would be a free agent in a few months and could’ve just been signed without losing 3 starters.

They had Carmelo out there playing with Andrea Bargnani and Maria Sharapova’s ex.

This current Knicks team built around Julius Randle, Jalen Brunson and all of Brunson’s college roommates can consistently make the playoffs and if they hold steady, injuries and random bullshit could shake in their favor the way it does for the Miami Heat who keep sneaking their way into the Finals with Jimmy Butler and 4 TSA agents from Miami International Airport.

But you know what? Let’s indulge this idea that the Knicks need a star to win.

Let’s go through some of the players who are available and see which ones could actually lead them to a title but first, I want to talk about what types of players win titles.

Let’s list off who the best players on championship teams have been since that faithful 04-05 season when I started paying attention to the league:

Tim Duncan
Kobe Bryant
Kevin Garnett
LeBron James
Kawhi Leonard
Steph Curry
Kevin Durant
Giannis Antetokounmpo
Nikola Jokic

That’s literally a list of some of the greatest players to ever dribble a basketball. It’s why I hesitate making a move for anyone less than the very cream of the crop.

You cannot win a title without a historically great player on the roster.

These are once-in-a-generation talents, most of whom were drafted by the teams they won championships with and the guys like LeBron in Miami or Durant in Golden State, joined those ball clubs because those organizations spent years building the infrastructure, state-of-the-art facilities and ready-made rosters full of competent co-stars and key role players.

I believe Leon Rose has been creating this exact environment but patience is crucial. The entire house of cards crumbles if they pull the trigger on the wrong guy. For example, trading half the team away for someone like DeMar DeRozan would be bad. If anyone in the Knicks front office is reading this, hang up the phone.

So who are the available stars for the New York Knicks?

Karl-Anthony Towns: Today, it was rumored that the New York Knicks were “keeping tabs” on KAT. I want this man nowhere near my favorite team. We’re talking about championships now so Towns’s regular season stat-padding doesn’t move me.

Last time we saw Towns in a playoff series, the man who claims he is the best big man shooter in NBA history, shot 29% from 3 and was run off the floor by Nikola Jokic. Minnesota lost to Denver in 5 games and KAT fouled out in Games 4 and 5.

Mitchell Robinson is the perfect modern-day center. He protects the rim and he catches lobs.

Karl-Athony Towns is a center that does neither of those two things.

He fouls too much on defense and he’s a 7-footer that doesn’t protect the rim and would rather hang at the 3-point line than at the rim.

And he’s just weird, man. No thanks.

Like, you ever work with someone who’s strange and makes you uncomfortable when left alone with them? One time I worked with a guy who used to rap J Cole lyrics to himself all day. And I’m talking J Cole from a decade ago where he only rapped about like, college and girls not liking him. All day long.

KAT kills the locker room vibes instantly.

Donovan Mitchell: In the 2020 bubble, the Lakers made Russell Westbrook look like he’s never played basketball before.

Lakers were literally guarding Westbrook like this during the playoffs and now they think he’s the answer? 😂😂😂😂 pic.twitter.com/72XZhAIvNI

— BGN Hoops (@BGNHoops) July 30, 2021

Then they traded for him and seemed shocked he sucked even though they literally begged him to shoot and left him wide ass open just 18 months earlier.

I don’t care how many times I see Donovan Mitchell wearing a New York Mets hat. I watched him down 2-1 in a must-win Game 4, score exactly 11 points in Madison Square Garden on 27% shooting.

Donovan Mitchell most likely won’t sign an extension in Cleveland because ya know, Ohio, but the Knicks shouldn’t give up a single asset for the guy who just pissed down his leg in a playoff game in MSG.

Paul George: This feels like the final year of the Paul George/Kawhi Leonard experiment in Los Angeles and a bad start to the season could see some Paul George trade whispers. There were already rumors in the offseason saying New York wanted PG.

Problem is, he hasn’t played more than 60 games since he was in Oklahoma City which was a lifetime ago.

And honestly, at this point in his career, I don’t think he’s capable of being the best player on a championship team. He’s certainly better than RJ Barrett if anyone’s interested in a one-for-one trade.

Kawhi Leonard: Kawhi has been the best player on a championship team. Maybe twice.

Somehow, he’s only 32 years old but it feels like he’s 39 at the end of his career. His legs are so damaged from accumulating injuries, it would be such a massive risk to give away assets for a guy who’d be watching more Knicks games from the sidelines than Ben Stiller or that one guy from The Sopranos who appears to live at MSG.

I feel like Kawhi most likely wants to spend the rest of his career in Los Angeles and with a brand new arena—finally out of the Lakers shadow and out of Crypto Scam Stadium or whatever— I could see Kawhi having a lifetime contract with the Clippers as long as he wants to play there.

James Harden: I truly believe James Harden would be an NBA champion if it weren’t for Steph Curry. But that was then and this is now and last time we saw Harden in a Game 7 with everything on the line against the Boston Celtics, Harden scored 9 points.

At this point in his career, James Harden is mentally broken. All of his past failures weigh on him causing more and more failures to the point where he doesn’t even want to take shots. He stopped participating in a GAME 7.

Score 9 points in a Game 7 in a Knicks jersey and I’m jumping into Gowanus canal with cinderblocks tied to my ankles.

Joel Embiid: Joel Embiid is the next big star that everyone and their mothers are guaranteeing will be on the Knicks which means he’s never coming and Knicks fans will be made fun of for believing what they told us to believe.

He’s won an MVP trophy thanks to Kendrick Perkins and Clinton-level politicking to any media member with a vote but I’m not totally sold that he’s capable of being the best player on a championship team.

You’d think someone as great as Embiid would have more postseason success but the second round appears to be his ceiling. He scored 15 points in that same Game 7 against the Celtics. He looked like he needed an oxygen tank by the 4th quarter. Embiid playing 40 minutes a night under coach Thibs might send him to the emergency room like Luol Deng in 2013.

I don’t want that blood on my hands.

Giannis Antetokounmpo: The only player on that list of champions who is still in their prime and might actually be available soon is Giannis—who still hasn’t signed a contract extension despite the Bucks acquiring Damian Lillard.

Unfortunately, I think Giannis and Dame are a perfect pairing and could sleepwalk their way to a championship this year. Unless someone gets in Giannis’s ear and lies to him about how playing in New York can improve his brand or any of the other lazy cliches people use to pretend like playing in New York matters in a league where the biggest star ever played in Cleveland half his career—I don’t see Giannis ever leaving Milwaukee.

What star should the Knicks trade for?

Kyrie Irving choosing Brooklyn over New York was the greatest thing that could’ve happened for the Knicks.

See, Kyrie and Durant took over the Nets organization, destroyed all the vibes and ran the team to the ground. Kyrie refused to take a vaccine that had zero negative side effects because ~~he’s afraid of needles~~, I mean because ~~he believed secret societies were plotting to connect black people to a master computer for a plan of satan~~, I mean ~~because he believed vaccine mandates were human rights violations,~~ I mean because he’s a contrarian dork with no real ideology and just likes being different because it makes him feel special.

This directly led to Brooklyn not extending his contract and trading him to Dallas.

At the time of the trade, Dallas was 3 games above .500 and tied for the 5th seed in the West. 27 games later and the Mavs finished 38-44 and couldn’t even make the play-in.

I think this Luka/Kyrie backcourt is going to be a disaster this season. Personally, I don’t think Grant Williams and Maxi Kleper are going to have much of an answer for Jokic or Anthony Davis or honestly even Steven Adams. While Luke and Kyrie give zero defensive resistance on the perimeter. Playing the Mavs will be layup lines for opposing teams.

Which means Luka Doncic is going to do what star players do and that’s leak how upset he is before outright demanding a trade and I suspect New York will be on his list of desired locations.

The last time Luka had success on a basketball court was playing alongside Jalen Brunson. We’ve seen proof of concept.

And I truly believe he is the same caliber talent as those guys who were the best players on a championship team. He has an MVP in his future and on this Knicks roster, a Finals MVP would be in arm’s length.

Wow, that Luka Doncic/Quentin Grimes duo is going to be a PROBLEM.