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00:00All right, the Knicks got beat up on the West Coast and they're now 2-7 in their last nine games.
00:05Knicks fans, of course, went straight to Twitter or X, whatever you call it.
00:10They went in full panic mode.
00:11Is it Mike Brown? Is it Kat? Who knows?
00:14But how are the Knicks going to stop the bleeding?
00:16Let's discuss this with Mike Vaccaro, our New York Post sports columnist,
00:20trying to make some sense of what exactly is going on.
00:24Mike, we'll start with the Jalen Brunson injury update that we got.
00:28He missed the Warriors game, obviously.
00:30But he was labeled day-to-day, which is always a good sign because it shows there's no severe injury there.
00:36That's the good news.
00:37But the bad news is it's the third time in just this calendar year alone that he's injured that right ankle.
00:44I know folks want him to have an MVP season.
00:47But do you think the Knicks need to start thinking about load management with Brunson
00:52to keep him fresh for April and June in the playoff run?
00:56Well, the tricky thing about an ankle, Brandon, as you know,
00:59as an athlete, I'm sure you sprained your ankle a billion times.
01:02I mean, it's not necessarily something that you fix by just having a lot of rest.
01:08I mean, even the other day, it wasn't even like Jalen, you know, hopped on it or stepped on someone's foot.
01:13He just misstepped.
01:14And look, we know enough about ankles that once you sprain it once, it's vulnerable to be sprained again and again.
01:21That's the part of, you know, there's the old ad is that you've got to have a break than a sprain.
01:25And I don't know if that's a medically sound piece of advice, but you understand that if you sprain your ankle once,
01:30you're probably going to sprain it again and again.
01:32And, you know, if it had happened in the 53rd minute of a double overtime game,
01:37maybe you have a better case for, you know, being tired being the problem.
01:41But in this case, I just think it's an issue he's going to have to deal with.
01:44And the Knicks have to hold their breath.
01:46Look, I mean, we see the difference between the Knicks with him and without him.
01:50And sometimes you need a reminder of this because sometimes, you know,
01:53in the course of an individual game, you know, a certain lineup will look terrific.
01:57And people say, well, you know, that was without Brunson on the floor.
02:00Like, all right, maybe you can survive that a day or two or a quarter or two or,
02:04you know, five or 10 minutes at a time, but certainly not an extended period of time
02:07and certainly not in the playoffs.
02:09And so that's certainly going to be something that I think you look at as a Knicks fan,
02:12because it's not like it's going to get stronger overnight.
02:15Ankles just tend to be vulnerable once they've been sprained.
02:18And obviously he's got a sore spot there.
02:21Yeah, I look at it like he can play as well as he's been playing throughout the course of the year
02:26to make a statement on why he should be the MVP, but it's when he's not in the lineup
02:31that goes to show you why he's this team MVP.
02:34When Jalen Brunson goes down, Cat needs to step up.
02:37A lot of people have been upset with Cat's inconsistency.
02:41Mike Brown has kind of called him out, but Carmelo Anthony called him out.
02:45So here's a video on Melo on Cat, and then we're going to get your response to that.
02:50Now, Cat is the bridge between all of it.
02:56Cat is the bridge between JB doing what he do and the others doing what they do.
03:011,000%.
03:02That's why people are so f***ing.
03:04I don't think people look at it that way.
03:06They don't talk about it.
03:06They don't talk about it, but he is the bridge between Jalen Brunson
03:10and the other guys on that team.
03:12That's the difference between the Knicks being here and here.
03:14And it's a lot of pressure, right, if you really think about it.
03:18But Cat is the difference between the Knicks being a third seed
03:23or getting to the East of Conference final.
03:27Okay.
03:27All right, Mike.
03:28So do you agree with what Melo just said?
03:31And what is this team's ceiling with Cat as its number two?
03:37Well, we saw what the ceiling was last year.
03:39I think it's the very same ceiling.
03:40I mean, there's no doubt that they're a team capable of getting to the finals.
03:43And, look, I realize there's a lot of concern about the Knicks right now,
03:47and rightfully so.
03:48You know, I mean, we've seen the Nuggets lose Jokic for a month,
03:51and yet they keep still winning.
03:53The Knicks should still be able to win without Brunson,
03:54without the pieces they've had.
03:55They've not had a full team, really, since the NBA Cup,
03:59and that's something to consider when you think about how inconsistent they've been.
04:03But Cat is the guy that's really the concern
04:05because he clearly has not had as good a year this year as he had last year.
04:09He hasn't had a season that's anywhere close to what his standard season is.
04:12He looks a little disjoint.
04:13He looks a little frustrated, still picking up bad fouls,
04:16still making plays that make you shake your head sometimes.
04:19And, you know, I just think you have to go back on a player's history.
04:23I mean, clearly he's a better player than this.
04:25He didn't just forget how to play basketball overnight.
04:28And so, yes, I agree with that.
04:29Look, I mean, Cat is a guy who is an all-league player.
04:32He's an all-star player.
04:34And so when you have a guy playing at that level, you're going to be better.
04:37And he hasn't played at that level.
04:38I don't think he deserves to be on the all-star team this year.
04:40And I think that, you know, if he gave him truth serum, he'd probably agree to the same thing.
04:44But I also know that even in the course of this year, there have been stretches where you'll remember,
04:49oh, yeah, that's right.
04:50This is one of the best players in the league.
04:52And that's what you need because obviously that gives teams two, you know, foundational players they have to be concerned about.
05:00And then the other guys in the team can kind of feed off them.
05:03And that's when they do their best thing is when the other team is focusing all their energies on stopping Brunson and stopping Towns.
05:09And there are a lot of Knicks fans that agree with you, Mike.
05:11They're upset, rightfully so.
05:14They're upset with the Cats.
05:15They're upset with just the overall effort of this West Coast road trip.
05:19So I got three tweets of Knicks fans going full basketball Karens on Twitter last night after the loss.
05:28I'm going to read them and then you respond with what you think.
05:32All right.
05:33Tribe Brian Music says, OG and McHale are not wingstop.
05:37They never were.
05:38Their defense is actually getting worse.
05:41Do you agree?
05:42No.
05:43I mean, all you have to do is look at the Celtics series last spring.
05:47I mean, they won the first two games of the series because of those two guys playing defense.
05:51Anybody who wants to question OG and OB's defense, I question whether they know what they're looking at.
05:56You know, I think this and I have a feeling that all of these things are going to go back to the same denominator, which is it is a long season.
06:04You know, the Knicks are still 10 games over 500.
06:06They're one game worse than they were a year ago.
06:09And look, last year they won 51 games.
06:11They're basically on pace for the same team for the same season.
06:14And I think everybody was happy the way that went last year.
06:18You know, I don't look.
06:19Is the Knicks defense overall a problem?
06:22Of course it is.
06:22They gave up way too many open threes.
06:24They have to get better at doing that.
06:26There's no question about that.
06:28Those two to single those two out is odd because those are really the only two guys I think that bring it every night.
06:33Stacey Brown Media says, Leon Rose moving from Tibbs to no defense.
06:39Mike Brown is up there with giving six picks for Bridges and trading for Cat.
06:45And whatever happened to the elite defense from Macau and OG and even Deuce?
06:49Play in team at best now.
06:52SMH.
06:54Play in team, bro.
06:55I mean, look, anything can happen.
06:57I mean, look, if Brunson's out for a month, sure, they might fall to the 7th seed.
07:00I mean, you can't guarantee that, but when they're, you know, I think people, it's hilarious how quickly things change in the NBA.
07:07You know, on New Year's Eve, they were almost 20 points up on the Spurs with a chance to go into a tie for first place in the East.
07:14That wasn't that long ago.
07:16You know, yes, they scuffle since then badly.
07:18Now they haven't had their team since then either.
07:20They're missing Hart, a huge element.
07:22They're missing Brunson the last couple of days.
07:24They have not had their full team since before the NBA Cup.
07:27I think you have to take that into consideration.
07:29You have to remember how well they were playing when they were at their full strength.
07:33And it's the nature of a basketball season up and down.
07:36I mean, I would say they're probably not going to finish with the number one seed, but, you know, let's say that the Pistons do.
07:42The Pistons are a team that Knicks beat three times on the road last year in the playoffs.
07:46Clearly, you know, to make judgments like that in January, I get it.
07:51Look, fans are frustrated.
07:53And you know what?
07:53This is far better than it was as recently as five and six years ago when people didn't care.
07:59I mean, caring too much, you know, is far preferable than not caring at all.
08:04So I get it.
08:05I understand the frustration.
08:06I do encourage a lot of people, and I hear from a lot of the same people, you know, take a deep breath.
08:12We are literally at the halfway mark.
08:14There's 41 more regular season games to go before you can actually start judging this team.
08:20From the start, we all said this team is going to be judged entirely on what it did in the playoffs.
08:24Mike Brown specifically would be judged on whether he got this team to the finals.
08:28And, you know, we're still months away from determining that.
08:32So I would encourage it.
08:34I'm not saying that you shouldn't be concerned.
08:36I'm not saying that what you saw last night, the last couple of nights in California, wouldn't, you know, shouldn't be bothersome.
08:41But I would encourage a deep breath.
08:43It's a good team.
08:45They were playing terrific ball as recently as three weeks ago.
08:48I don't think they forgot how to play.
08:50There's a picture out there of Mike Brown and Draymond Green hugging.
08:55And then, you know, Mike Brown has kind of thrown Cat under the bus after some post-game press conferences.
09:02There's a fan out there that thinks there's something there between Cat and Mike Brown.
09:09Do you agree?
09:11Well, I definitely think it's been a hard time for them to adjust to working to each other.
09:15And, you know, Mike Brown, you know, unlike a lot of coaches in this league and every other league, has been pretty quick to admit that, you know, a lot of that is on him.
09:23He has to adjust to his players.
09:26And Cat's the one glaring example because Cat's been having some struggles.
09:31And there's no question about that.
09:33And look, I mean, it's something that there's still time to fix, but it has to get fixed.
09:39And this goes back to what we were talking about earlier with Carmelo's comments.
09:42I mean, Cat is such an important part of what the Knicks ceiling is that he's got to get right.
09:47I mean, right now he doesn't look right.
09:49You know, I tend to look at a guy's, you know, basketballreference.com page and say, well, this is a guy who's been at a pretty certain consistent level for a long time.
09:59He's still relatively young.
10:00And there's no reason why that basketball player isn't still in there, but it's on Mike Brown now to draw that out.
10:08Last tweet, Alex B of Knicks Central says, Knicks were 19-7 before the NBA Cup championship.
10:14Knicks are 7-9 since the NBA Cup championship.
10:18But thank God millionaires won 500K.
10:22What's your response to that?
10:23Well, you know, I think one of the funny things about sports fans is that we're always looking for something to complain about.
10:29And there's been a lot of things with the NBA Cup.
10:31We didn't want the banner.
10:32Some people wanted the banner.
10:33Just, it's silly.
10:34You know, all the money.
10:35You know what?
10:35No one was complaining the night they were schooling the Spurs.
10:39You know, even last year in the spring when they made it to the Eastern Conference Finals, I don't think people felt as good about the Knicks as they did the night they won the NBA Cup.
10:47Now, whether you care about the NBA Cup or not, the fact of the matter is the teams they beat en route to the NBA Cup, including the Spurs, you know, made people feel awfully good about this team.
10:57And rightfully so.
10:58But they look terrific.
10:59So I don't think you can minimize the competition.
11:02Sure, you can make fun of millionaires making money.
11:04I get that.
11:05And certainly, you know, we did a lot of lampooning of the banner and all that, you know, right up to the owner, kind of making light of it.
11:13But, you know, I think that that's, you know, yes, it's easy because they haven't played well since then.
11:19There's no question about that.
11:21Do I think the NBA Cup is responsible for that?
11:23But I don't.
11:24All right, Mike, thanks for coming on and reading these tweets, my man.
11:30Anytime, my man.
11:30It's good to talk to you, Brandon.
11:31You happy about John Harbaugh?
11:33Oh, absolutely.
11:34You know, I love the new coach.
11:35Knicks fans, not so much.
11:37They're kind of hating their new coach right now.
11:38But like you said, that's just how it goes around here in the city.
11:42That's exactly right.
11:43You know, I love the new coach.
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