I think he can. I would never pick the knicks to win it all but I think they have a shot. If I had to divide the playoff teams up into 3 tiers of "they can win", "probably not", and "definitely not", I'd have the knicks in the "probably not" group.
The Knicks are contenders and they still have 11 picks to trade away...... They might not be the favorites or the 2nd favorites to win it but they are ECF material. Having different opinions is not a bad thing around here.
What odds would you give them to win the title this year? Making a CF doesn’t mean you’re relevant or a contender, look at the hawks and blazers appearances
Except that Brunson is more consistent than Trae Young and whoever the Blazers had (Lillard). Brunson is undersized but I do think he is a Top 3 guard right now......as of now.....he is playing better than Luka arguably, though Luka is injured. Put Brunson on the Thunder or Minny, and they would not miss a beat. The Knicks being limited does not mean Brunson is a worse star player. The NBA is structured to have teams with 3 star players (1 of them borderline)..... The Knicks with or without Randle only got 1 of them.....come back at me when they got 3.
I mean ya he’s playing better then an injured dude, i would hope so. They also are only alive because of injury/refs/lucky shooting. Healthy philly beats then in 5, bucks obviously smash them also. For all the praise, his TS has dropped almost 5% in the playoffs, though it will go up because they’re playing a terrible team
You'll come around to it eventually. Brunson ascended really fast for us to grasp but he has done it, I mean the Knicks are a good but not great team....that is why they are not a top contender but just barely a contender not because of Brunson being Number 1. Luka is more versatile, much better passer but if we are talking scoring strictly..... Last year I would not have called Brunson a Top guard but he is now.
The beauty of Brunson is he doesn't have to be, he is only making 26M a year. But tbh I also see Brunson as a legit superstar. He is better than Trae Young, Lillard, Jaylen Brown and Irving IMO. He is also much better than Jamal Murray.
None of those guys are superstars or even close really. At his current value brunson is amazing, but that’s only for one more season before he’s a supermax
I guess that would depend on your definition of superstar. For most people having a max as your market rate is already a superstar. If you limit superstar to top 5 players ok I guess he isn't a superstar. Brunson won't be a supermax cuz he didn't get drafted by NYC. His max deal will be smaller than the super max. I think his max will be in the 40-50M range while super max is 60M+ or something.
Ya my standards for it are much higher than others. If Boston offered jalen brown to the rockets for nothing, i would say no. Same with guys like dame, sabonis (obviously he wouldn’t even be able to fit), any of those fringe guys. You might be right on Brunson’s contract though, i’m not sure what he will be eligible for.
Playoff performances hold more value than regular season. Kawhi was never healthy to dominate a regular season but he was at least great in 2 playoff runs....
There should not even be a Super Max, the athletes are getting enough.... And the salary cap should not even rise that high.........the economy is not really that great.
If you don't give the money to the athletes, where should the money go? Then that leaves a bigger slice of the pie for the owners to keep. Don't they have enough money too?
The owners have other investments, sport teams is mostly a hobby to them....I am not worried where their money goes otherwise. It is about regulating a team and having a competitive team and not just paying 2-3 players the most money and the rest is just semi trash players.
Brunson has been considerable worse in the playoffs then he was in the regular season. Playing an AWFUL indy team will help inflate his stats but even with that his drop off has been massive
All things considered the Playoffs are 2 tiers above RS level....and he is also averaging 6-7 more shot attempts averaging 35.6 ppg. I do not think it is much worse if you consider the circumstances that you play the best teams versus he is shooting better percentages against weaker competition in the Regular season. Plus he is getting extra defensive attention in the Playoffs without another Superstar next to him. I am not sure what you have against EC teams but they are not pushovers....they might be weaker but they are still no pushovers.
Its interesting the team overall shot 35% and 23rd in the league. Best team shot 38.9%. and the top teams are shooting at around 38%. The Rockets are within the bottom with several teams shooting around 35%. None of those teams are playoff teams except for Magic. One thing I noticed with the Rockets is the consistency in making threes. They miss a lot of wide open threes as teams sag into the paint to defend Sengun or Green. Notice in the playoffs those teams hit their open threes. There’s also a lot of variation with Rockets shooting .400 and above some games but many .260 and below games. Wild swings and highly inconsistent. Teams know this that’s why they continue to clog the paint as Jabari and company continue to miss wide open shots.
