Knicks’ Stance on Potential Mikal Bridges Trade Just Became Clear

One of the major questions heading into this season was if winning the title would allow Mikal Bridges to play more freely and confidently. Unfortunately for the Knicks, that has been answered with a resounding and capital N-O.

This has prompted trade speculation, with Bridges' shockingly low 24.4 minutes per game appearing to hint that New York feels pretty good without Bridges on the court, which is a problem for such a highly paid player.

However, Mike Brown provided notable comments on the wing after Wednesday's loss that don't position Bridges as someone the team is actively trying to trade.

Mike Brown talked about the balance of minutes between Mikal Bridges, Landry Shamet & Deuce McBride

"It's going to be hard to find minutes at time for Mikal, and maybe at times for Josh [Hart]" pic.twitter.com/TNkgtLJCQ4
— SNY Knicks (@sny_knicks) November 12, 2026

Brown admitted that minutes will be hard to come by for Bridges with his current play, but that negative prognosis should be viewed as a good thing. If New York really wanted to get rid of Bridges, the message and strategy would be that he needs all the minutes he can get, which would serve a hidden agenda of trying to boost his stocks again after they've fallen.

Instead, Brown is giving his starter some tough love, in public, and mentioning bench players who may steal some of his minutes. That's something an organization would do if it's committed to helping the player get out of their funk and wanting them to snap out of it—rather than plotting to reroute them elsewhere, as it'd only diminish their potential trade return by being that honest about a player's current shortcomings.

Knicks seem to be set on helping Mikal Bridges during struggles, rather than trading him

At face value, this is a clear admission that Brown and his coaching staff are well aware of Bridges' lackluster play. But at the same time, it's also an admission that they are going to continue playing Bridges and will continue to stick by him.

He may see his role and minutes continue to be limited until he works through whatever he is currently going through. But they aren't completely benching him and they don't even seem to be thinking about taking him out of the starting lineup. And moreover, the notion of trading Bridges seems completely out of the equation right now.

Not only were trade scenarios not addressed, the Knicks would likely have hid him more often and earlier on had they planned on jumping ship and trading Bridges away. With every subpar game, his trade value continues to decline. And the Knicks have seemingly not cared about that aspect whatsoever. They haven't even thrown him in at the end of their blowout wins to pad his stats or make him look a bit better.

I wouldn't label Bridges as untouchable. And this isn't to say that there's absolutely zero chance that he gets dealt. But Brown's recent comment seem to hint that even if finding minutes for the struggling veteran may be difficult, they are still trying to do so and are willing to see it through with him.

Mikal Bridges has obvious areas to work on for Knicks to ignore any trade itch

After the Knicks' Wednesday night loss to the Cavaliers, Bridges is now averaging just 5.9 ppg while shooting just 32.9% from the floor and 26.5% from three, all the lowest of his career. Bridges has not only failed to improve on the last two seasons, but he's somehow gotten worse and more importantly, less aggressive.

Bridges still does a lot of things that don't show up on the box score. He is routinely tasked with taking on some of the most difficult defensive matchups. He cuts hard. And he continues to run the floor even though he is rarely the one rewarded with the ball and a basket. That being said, the struggles are very apparent and said struggles have seen him play a significantly lesser role this season.

Now, if Bridges' struggles were self-contained, it wouldn't matter as much. Say his shot was off but his defense was still elite and the team was looking good regardless. Then maybe his minutes may not have seen such a drastic decline so quickly.

But his lack of aggression, paired with his inefficiency when he does look to score, has proven to be detrimental to the team. This season, the Knicks' net rating is 22.6 points higher when comparing the minutes that Bridges is off the court vs. when he is on the court. And with more than 259 minutes of both instances, it's no longer a small sample size.

Simply said, the team is currently noticeably better without him than they are with him. But they seem committed to righting this ship instead of jumping off of it; now it's on Bridges to reward them for that trust during another ugly stretch from him.

Get Knicks On SI straight to your inbox: sign up for our free newsletter here.

Add us as a preferred source on Google