Mitchell Robinson made time to stop by the Knicks’ locker room before Friday night’s game, but there was no awkwardness hanging over the visit. The former New York center, now with the Celtics, said he understood why his run with the Knicks ended the way it did and didn’t sound burned by the move at all.
Robinson was the team’s longest-tenured player and a well-liked presence in the room during last season’s championship run. He also gave the Knicks valuable minutes as one of the league’s better backup centers.
Still, New York didn’t have a path to keep him without pushing into second-apron territory, something owner James Dolan described as “suicidal.” The Knicks never made Robinson an offer before Boston entered the picture in free agency.
“They didn’t want me?” he said.
“Yeah. That’s what it felt like.
… I was like, cool. There wasn’t bad blood behind it.
Man, fresh start.”
Robinson said he had already spent enough time hearing his name in trade talk over the years to know his career might not stay in New York forever. Boston gave him the starting job, and the Celtics are happy to have an elite rebounder and rim protector anchoring the middle.
They plan to manage his workload, but Fred Katz of The Athletic reported that they do not believe his minutes need to be restricted as heavily as they were a season ago. The team’s medical staff is aiming to have him around 25 minutes per game by the playoffs.
“The only thing that was kind of different was going to the rivals,” Robinson added about coming to Boston. “But you know me, man.
I like to troll. Nobody was happy with that move.
But I was.”
Elsewhere around the Knicks, coach Mike Brown said his team has been too easy to move through in the first two games of the season, according to Stefan Bondy of The New York Post. Brown singled out the defense after Friday’s game, saying the Knicks weren’t doing enough to fight through screens.
“It was a physical ballgame and [the Celtics] had the advantage out there with the physicality,” he said.
Brown also wants Mikal Bridges to keep firing. Bridges has opened the season in a rough shooting stretch, going 2-of-16 from the field and missing all seven of his three-point tries. Kristian Winfield of the New York Daily News reported that Brown is urging him not to pass up clean looks.
“I mean, he had three or four wide-open threes, and obviously we want him to make half of them if they’re open,” Brown said. “But he’s got to keep shooting and hopefully they’ll eventually go in sooner than later.”
The Knicks also released two statements Friday about the championship ring phishing email sent to MSG employees. In those statements, the team said it would hand out “more than 275 rings and jewelry” to people in the organization.
In Other News...
Knicks Face A Tough McBride Decision They May Not Avoid
The Knicks are staring at one of those roster choices that can shape the rest of their season, and it starts with the squeeze they feel at center. New York has needs there, and with the financial picture tightening, the front office may have to get creative if it wants to bolster the big-man rotation without upsetting the rest of the roster balance.
Miles McBride is the name that keeps coming up because he stands out as the only trade-eligible non-starter with real standalone value. That makes him the most obvious piece to move in a deal for a backup center, but it also forces the Knicks to weigh what they would be giving up against the need to make the roster stronger where it is most vulnerable. [Read more 🡒]
Knicks Face Early Karl-Anthony Towns Pressure For One Big Reason
Karl-Anthony Towns and the Knicks have hit pause on extension talks for now, choosing to table the conversation until later in the season so it does not become a distraction around the team. Towns has made it clear he wants to stay in New York, and the basic framework of his next deal is already out there, with reports putting his ask in the range of a four-year extension worth between $225 million and $240 million.
The issue for the Knicks is simple enough: they have not yet put forward an official offer that matches that price point, and the gap leaves the sides without a resolution for the moment. So while the relationship appears headed in the right direction, the real test is still ahead, when the season settles in and the front office has to decide how far it is willing to go to keep Towns in place long term. [Read more 🡒]
Dalton Knecht May Be Chasing The Wrong Knicks Role
Dalton Knecht brings the kind of shot-making profile that usually gets a coachs attention right away. At 6-foot-6, he has the size of a modern wing and the offensive instincts to fit around better players, with his three-point touch hovering around 40 percent across college and professional play. For a Knicks team that wants as much spacing as it can get, that part of his game makes him an easy name to circle.
The harder part is everything around it. Knechts defensive limitations and modest playmaking make the path to steady minutes less straightforward on a roster with deeper options and younger players already more comfortable in the system under Mike Brown. On a team trying to think like a contender, he may need more than shooting to climb the depth chart. [Read more 🡒]