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Knicks Were Right to Ditch Playoff Foe Donovan Mitchell, Win or Lose
It's not often that one can view the collapse of a trade for a four-time All-Star as a basketball godsend, a bullet dodged, a path best left untrodden.
But the New York Knicks of the new century have been anything but ordinary ... why start now?
Eccentricity has defined the Knicks' modern affairs, leading to the mental creation of a metaphorical Knicks tax. Such a tariff turns common basketball follies into guaranteed laughs for amateur and professional basketball comedians alike. Stories of good performances by opponents at Madison Square Garden are retold in hushed tones.
All that and more is part of a sullied reputation that isn't exactly unearned: one doesn't miss the NBA Playoffs eight times in a decade by accident. A welcome outlier, however, begins on Saturday when the Knicks face the Cleveland Cavaliers for the opener of a best-of-seven set at Rocket Mortage FieldHouse (6 p.m. ET, ESPN). It's a series packed to the brim with drama and storylines, none more intriguing than Donovan Mitchell partaking in his first playoff series in wine and gold.
Once again, the warming weather across the city unites the Knicks and Mitchell. Countless rumors linked him and the Knicks last summer before the Cavs swooped in to steal New York's solo. This time, Mitchell is guaranteed to play games at MSG ... though he'll dwell in the visitors' locker room and he likely won't be warmly welcomed if he opts to take in another playoff game involving the Knicks' icy co-tenant.
Perhaps nothing personified the so-called Knicks tax better than the aftermath of the Mitchell deal. An Empire State native, Mitchell previously left his mark on the city through the Riverside Hawks (a long-tenured AAU team based in Manhattan) and MLB's New York Mets (where his father Donovan Sr. has long held a front office role).
Once it was clear that Mitchell was bound for The Land rather than the city, the barbs were relentless. An NBA source told Bleacher Report that the Knicks "whiffed on a softball." Longtime Knicks fan/critic Stephen A. Smith was rendered "sick" by the deal. Mitchell himself unintentionally added insult to injury, downright dumbfounded that he was introducing himself to Cleveland rather than getting reacquainted with New York as tip-off loomed.
The ironic part of the whole affair was that, had the Knicks accepted anything similar to what Cleveland sacrificed to obtain Mitchell's services (which included three first-round choices and potential future Most Improved Player Lauri Markkanen), inevitable complaints and torts would've been logged about the team sacrificing a good part of their future for something that wouldn't be able to challenge the conference elites like Milwaukee and Boston. Even hints of Utah president Danny Ainge wanting to "rob" his old enemies couldn't create a rational conversation.
To that end, Mitchell did allow the Cavs (51-31) to make the leap from Play-In fodder to the East's fourth seed. While such a clinch was an event long awaited in Cleveland (set to embark on its first LeBron James-free playoff run since 1998), they still find themselves with access to the Eastern penthouse occupied by the aforementioned Bucks and Celtics, with the Philadelphia 76ers beating them to the elevator. That's a tad disappointing for a team that won 44 games sans Mitchell and was headlined by young but raw talents like Jarrett Allen, Darius Garland, and Evan Mobley, all of whom were spared from Utah's bartering.
In contrast, the Knicks, while unguarded from the relentless court of public opinion that casts a harsher eye on metropolitan affairs, enter with relatively breezy stakes and almost nothing to lose this postseason.
A town defined by extravagance, New York seemed tailor-made for Mitchell's arrival. While many were intrigued by the $104 million deal bestowed to Jalen Brunson, many saw that move as a throat-clearing gesture before some bigger. While the Knicks indeed wound up writing a big check ... a $120 million extension for RJ Barrett ... the Brunson deal was, at the time, a questionable headliner to an offseason peppered with dreams of Mitchell donning blue and orange.
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The fruitless exercise of wondering what might've been will be a common theme in the coming series, no matter how long it lasts. But the Knicks won't have to exercise their imaginations too far: the answer lies on the visitors' sideline.
The Cavaliers' relative failure to break into the Eastern luxury suites came despite having the aforementioned younger talents working with Mitchell. Sure, the Knicks had their own brand of talent both young and established. Both sides of that spectrum, however, had to prove their worthiness of sticking with the New York cause.
Julius Randle was coming off a disappointing follow-up to his first All-Star appearance. Immanuel Quickley was a common entry in Trade Machine fare. Fellow first-round choice Quentin Grimes was a de facto 12th man at the start of the year.
Seven months later, the Knicks have something brilliant brewing thanks to efforts that are part of either a next generation of New York basketball or brilliant trade pieces to truly kickstart ideas of contention. Randle returned to the mid-winter classic, Quickley is a legitimate Sixth Man of the Year candidate, and Grimes is a starting five staple and potential future 3-Point Contest entrant.
All of them made leaps and bounds during the run to the fifth seed thanks at least in part to Brunson's arrival. The improvements came despite some of the Knicks' younger reps failing to fully fulfill the faith the Knicks silently bestowed in them by keeping them out of Utah's ransom notes trade requests. Barrett struggled to create any sort of offensive consistency and only a late Randle injury gave Obi Toppin a prime spot in the rotation.
By not trading for Mitchell, the Knicks were able to work in perhaps the most relaxed settings Manhattan could offer. Such peace was obtained by not hitting fast-forward in a legitimately hopeful stanza of the seemingly eternal New York rebuild. A fifth-place finish under a budding Brunson and a resurgent Randle is more valuable at this point in time than one spot above with the established talents of Mitchell and elite youth in tow.
Many love to quote Frank Sinatra's sung theory that if one "can make it" in New York, they'll do so anywhere. Taylor Swift countered that decades later by claiming that New York "like any true love ... drives you crazy," even if you wouldn't "change anything" about it. Too many metropolitan hardwood saviors have fallen into the latter category, but the lights haven't blinded Brunson, who has provided proof of a sustainable foundation that could attract fellow newcomers to the fold.
It wouldn't have taken much for Mitchell to become king of the hill, top of the heap in New York ... albeit on an individual level. But by standing their ground, the Knicks have created an opportunity for greater affairs from a team perspective.
One series isn't going to change that.
Geoff Magliocchetti is on Twitter @GeoffJMags
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