It may have cost them the potential of Iman Shumpert, but the New York Knicks have possibly laid the foundation for a new and healthier culture to be established within their organization.
Over the past decade, the Knicks have struggled mightily. They've suffered through poor coaching, poor player production, impatient management, and been through a whirlpool of media attention for all the wrong reasons. The Knicks have acted desperately far too often, most recently overpaying drastically for Andrea Bargnani, who so far has played 1,279 ineffective minutes for the franchise. During Isiah Thomas's reign of terror, the Knicks acquired players such as Eddy Curry, Quentin Richardson, Steve Francis, Zach Randolph and Jamal Crawford, who at the time were known for egotistical play as well as lousy defenders. Randolph and Crawford proved afterwards they just needed better circumstances to flourish, but at the time neither were willing to buy into team concepts, which was well known throughout the league.
After Thomas was fired, the organization laid in ruins. The intense and defensive-minded culture created in the 90's had all but vanished, and to this very day has yet to return. The reason for that is very simple. Culture change takes time, and dedication. The Knicks have had plenty of time, but consistently lacked the personnel necessary to force change.
Some players come onto new teams and dictate their new surroundings immediately in a positive way. Steve Nash in Phoenix and Kevin Garnett in Boston are two primary examples of players coming onto new teams and setting not only examples, but sharing their expectations from teammates to work as hard as they do. The Knicks have not had a player fitting of that description since Patrick Ewing roamed the Garden.
Carmelo Anthony, even considering his lofty salary, isn't the type of franchise player who forces change upon an organization. He’s not one who’ll oppose change either, as evident when Chauncey Billups was traded to Denver back in the day and gave the Nuggets and Anthony a leader the team could get behind. Anthony never opposed Billups’s leadership, as the Nuggets made the Western Conference Finals that same year. So there’s logic to keeping Anthony around, even if he won’t be the engine who makes it all go.
Locating a player with the level of influence on an organization as Billups, however, is far from easy. The Knicks are reportedly interested in going after Marc Gasol this summer, a player who would fit that description, but it’s unlikely Gasol leaves Memphis. Gasol is the blueprint of what the Knicks need, so if he can’t be acquired New York will have to locate players with a similar professionalism and organizational impact, even if said player’s talent might not be as a high as Gasol’s.
LeBron James might hit the market this summer, but as with Gasol, it’s unlikely he leaves Cleveland. The PR nightmare would know no ends. Chicago’s Jimmy Butler would fit beautifully as a new building block for the Knicks, but his restricted free agency status allows the Bulls to match any offer.
Kevin Love would be a terrific talent acquisition but like Anthony, Love is a follower who needs someone in front of him to act as the voice of the team. That’s not to say New York should pass on Love, if they’re given the opportunity to sign him, but it wouldn’t help them re-design their foundation. The same logic can be applied to LaMarcus Aldridge, though Aldridge has a good thing going on with Portland he’s unlikely to bolt from.
Rajon Rondo would have been the one player after Gasol who would have made the most sense in acquiring. Only, Rondo’s Dallas tenure projects as being highly successful, begging the question why Rondo would leave that situation and go play for the Knicks, after openly sulking for years in Boston due to their rebuilding process.
Big names then, might not be realistic. That doesn’t change the fact that the Knicks need new blood, better blood, to shape their future. As unattractive as this might seem to one of the largest fan bases in the United States, the first step in New York’s culture change would be locating grizzled veterans like Elton Brand and Andre Miller, while signing lesser free agents coming from successful institutions. Aaron Brooks has played himself into a future contract the Bulls can’t afford, as could be the case with Robin Lopez given that Portland is looking to re-up Aldridge and Wesley Matthews for big money this very summer.
Neither Brooks nor Lopez will be stars on the Knicks, nor will their on-court production necessarily increase in New York, but that’s not the point. The point is acquiring players who have been on winning squads, who can relay some of that formula and help the organization take steps forward in their evolution.
A summer spent on gathering the likes of Brooks, Lopez, Brand and Andre Miller is hardly interesting. Hell, it might be downright anticlimactic. But these are the necessary steps the Knicks have avoided to take in years. The philosophy in New York has been throwing money at problems to make them go away, or sacrificing the future on a whim (see Francis, Steve and Bargnani, Andrea). The sooner the Knicks realize that change takes time and needs examples, the better. That’s when they can flip the page and start a new one with their young players getting a proper NBA education, which has eluded Knicks rookies for a long time.
This is not to say the Knicks shouldn’t go for making a splash, however. They should absolutely go for it, as long as they keep some money available for the teachers and the available players coming from successful squads.
Could anyone think of anything more depressing than seeing the Knicks get the first pick this May, and draft Jahlil Okafor into a situation in which his progress and development is hindered severely, just because the right, and cheap, veterans weren’t around?
It’s time for the Knicks to do this right, and sending off J.R. Smith is the beginning of that.