The Knicks winning the 2018 NBA Summer League held in Las Vegas was not the primary goal of their team president Steve Mills and general manager Scott Perry. They finished 2-3 as the 12-day league concluded Tuesday night, with the Portland Trailblazers defeating the Los Angeles Lakers in the championship game.
Mills and Perry were focused on the development and performances of individual players during practices and games, particularly their top two picks from last month’s draft, 6-foot-9 forward Kevin Knox, selected No.9 in the first round, and 7-foot forward/center Mitchell Robinson, acquired in the second round with the 36th pick.
Assessing the pair from their showings in games, a tempered analysis is that Mills and Perry exited the desert city highly optimistic that Knox and Mitchell are solid foundational pieces for a future playoff contender. A less restrained view is they have an imminent All-Star in the 18-year-old Knox and a potential Rudy Gobert (the NBA’s 2017-18 Defensive Player of the Year) and Clint Capella-like impact player in the 20-year-old Robinson.
The University of Kentucky product Knox was named to the All-Summer League First Team after averaging 21.3 points and 6.5 rebounds in four games. Robinson, a 2017 McDonald’s All-American from Chalmette High School in Chalmette, La., less than 10 miles from New Orleans, skipped playing in college to prepare for the NBA draft and thus fell to the second round, despite being projected as a lottery pick a little over a year ago.
He validated himself as first-round talent in Las Vegas as he was clearly one of the most dynamic raw athletes in the league. Robinson played in all five of the Knicks games and put up impressive statistics, averaging 13 points on 67 percent shooting, pulling down 10.2 rebounds, leading the league with four blocked shots per game.
He will unquestionably be spending most of the remainder of the summer working on improving his strength and conditioning to handle the physicality, pace and speed of the pro game. However, the NBA is a futures league. And it’s not impractical to envision Robinson in two or three years growing into one of the more versatile front court players the franchise has had in recent memory.