Less than one minute into his introductory press conference on Tuesday at the team’s training facility in Tarrytown, New York, newly named Knicks head coach Mike Brown engaged in what could either be perceived as shameless pandering, cognitive dissonance or sincere belief when he said:
“Our fans, they’re the most knowledgeable, passionate, probably in all of sports.”
Knicks fans like to fancy themselves as such, even those that ridiculously and dangerously scaled lightposts and climbed atop vehicles celebrating outside of Madison Square Garden on Seventh and Eighth Avenues on the night of Friday, May 16, after the franchise made it to its first Eastern Conference Finals appearance since 2000 by defeating the then defending NBA champion Boston Celtics, 119-81, to win their best-of-seven series 4-2.
The tone around the Garden and among those revelers was much different on May 31, when the Indiana Pacers prevented the Knicks from playing a Game 7 at home with the prospect of reaching their first league Finals since 1999, taking Game 6 125-108 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis and the series 4-2.
Three days later, Tom Thibodeau was fired as the Knicks’ head coach.
It was surprising but not shocking. There were rumors entering the playoffs that the Knicks’ primary decision makers, chiefly owner James Dolan and team president Leon Rose, with substantial input from executive vice president-senior basketball advisor, William Wesley, were considering a change in bench leadership.
It seemed at the time, and still does, a risky and confounding move given Thibodeau’s success during his five-year tenure as head coach after being hired by Dolan and Rose in July 2020, four months following Rose’s installment as the Knicks’ president replacing his predecessor, the terminated Steve Mills. Coach Thibs, as he is commonly known, won 50 games in the 2024 campaign and 51 this past season, progressing from the conference semi-finals to the conference finals respectively.
He was instrumental in the Knicks regaining respect and credibility in NBA circles, most importantly among the league’s stars, who prior to the arrivals of Rose and Thibodeau didn’t have the Knicks on their list of preferred teams for free-agent talent. Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving choosing to ink free-agent deals with the Brooklyn Nets in the summer of 2019 instead of the Knicks was a clarion and urgent signal that the Knicks had devolved into insignificance.
So after five seasons together, Rose and Thibodeau have upped the stakes. The Knicks are now expected to reach the Finals next season or all this work should be considered — rightfully, by a plethora of the team’s fan base and analysts, including this writer — a bust. The justifiable scrutiny comes after a long, head scratching coaching search in which Brown, fairly or unfairly, can be labeled the Knicks’ choice by default — a consequence of being denied permission by the Dallas Mavericks to speak with head coach Jason Kidd, as well as being shown the door by other teams to interview their head coaches.
However, Brown is capable of taking the Knicks to basketball’s promised land. He is smart, flexible, and experienced. He possesses the temperament to manage varying personalities, utilize analytics and his instincts, and implement suggestions from his higher ups — in today’s sports parlance translated as working collaboratively with the front office — the latter which ostensibly was one of Thibs faults that led to him being canned.
As a head coach with the Cleveland Cavaliers (2005-2010), Los Angeles Lakers (2011-2012), Steve Kerr’s top assistant with the Golden State Warriors (2016-2022), and a head coaching stint with the Sacramento Kings (2022-2024), the 55-year-old Brown, a military brat from Columbus, Ohio, who attended high school in Germany, the two time NBA Coach of the Year (2009, 2023), has directed some of the game’s all-time greats: LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant.
Still, the Knicks job is arguably Brown’s most pressurized and unequaled challenge
“I’ve been to six Finals with three different teams,” he said on Tuesday. “And the commonality that they all had is they all sacrificed for one another. They’re all connected. The connectivity, it’s at the highest and it starts with ownership on down. They all have a competitive spirit, and there’s a high level of belief not just in the process but each other. So those four things are common amongst the teams that I’ve been with that have participated in the Finals.”
Rose invoked Brown’s vast exposure to the highest levels of NBA stress and competition.
“Mike has coached on the biggest stages in our sport and brings championship pedigree to our organization,” Rose said in a statement released on Monday.
Most of the accountability of the Knicks meeting championship expectations is on Rose and the players, not Brown. He is the driver but not the architect, which is Rose, nor the engine, the most important parts being Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns.
Channeling the resonant words of the late Al Davis, a Brooklyn native and former owner of the Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders, now Las Vegas Raiders: Just win baby!