EwingsGlass wrote:“If more guys bought in and understood their role, the NBA would look a lot different… Honestly, I think it’s the NBA’s fault because we reward guys that necessarily don’t win. We reward guys that lose sometimes, we pay guys that lose truthfully. I think the NBA has got to do a better job of rewarding winning, guys that impact the game.”1) I think he is right. 2) I think he is the type of player that loses by this model. 3) It’s this inefficiency that allowed the Knicks to win a championship. The Knicks are full of players that derive value without point totals.
I think a deeper corollary to his comment is that the guys with points - “money stats” get paid and those with hustle stats, positive plus minus, and defense are what is necessary to win championships - and don’t really get paid. Hart, OG, Mikal, Robinson, Deuce all produced stats above their points scored - the Knicks paid OG and Mikal. They get judged on their contracts based on their scoring. But I think we are over that now.
The fact that guys like Jordan Poole and Anfernee Simons have higher earnings in the NBA than say Josh Hart is tantamount to that problem.
Hart - arguably our “worst” shooter” has less PPG than either, but higher FG%, EFG, TS% than both Poole and Simons. Just less points per game. Not being selfish for him a ring but 40mm less in career earnings. Those two are some of the worst examples but volume shooters on bad teams get paid.
And the thing is, for either Deuce or Hart to stay with the Knicks, their next contracts basically have to come from KAT. Or they cannibalize each other.
You nailed it.
Give or take the second apron decisions, if Brunson followed his previous contract to gain his max value, perhaps $10-20M in cap space is not available to sign other guys. One guy that may not have made it would have been Shamet on the Last Man Signed theory.
You really NEED to trade for an underpaid asset like Mikal 2 years ago at $24M and then $33M this year, or have multiple high draft picks that are on rookie or rookie extension numbers. Those "extra" picks were actually salary cap management as well as player role and skill and then Brooklyn leverage, etc. You are not just trading for Mikal the player, you are trading for the player and his contract number.
For long term, deep playoffs level teams that need the depth, your 3 top guys combined probably need to exist within a certain level of % cap space so that you can fill out the rest of the bench. Leon and Brock and the nerds prob have a target number. Denver suffers from poorer management of this, GWS battles it every year cause they have chosen to give Steph 38% of cap $62M and you need not worry about what their bench is and it hurts them. OKC gonna need to do something after next year and were forced to trade a starter this summer. Boston had to trade out starters and main rotation pieces over past 2 years and Knicks will be at that decision point soon with KAT, Hart, Brunson and then the consequence of Deuce and others. Mitch is obviously a consequence already, he was cannibalized.
7/24/2026 10:37 AM
