The Ringer NBA Show - Knicks Win it All with Ben Stiller! | Real Ones

Episode Date: June 14, 2026

The Knicks have finally ended their 53-year championship drought, defeating the Spurs 94–90 in Game 5 of the NBA Finals to capture the title. Logan Murdock and Howard Beck break down how New York got it done, and Knicks superfan Ben Stiller joins the pod to celebrate and relive the glory of a long-awaited championship. (00:00) Intro (0:44) Knicks Win (06:26) - Jalen Brunson wins finals MVP (38:42) - Wemby discussion (52:41) - Ben Stiller joins the show! Hit the mailbag: [e-mail] Hosts: Logan Murdock and Howard Beck Guest: Ben Stiller Producers: Victoria Valencia and Clifford Augustin The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines Buy any two Ferrero Brands and you could win $1 million. Visit GoAllInAndWin.com to learn more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Well, Bobbin, Real Ones. Logan Murdoch here. Howard Beck in a few. Ben Stiller in a few few. One of the all-time real ones. The New York Knicks just pulled off the incredible. I have no words. This was just such a great season from them. Me and Howard get into what we saw throughout the series and the final game.

And then a buddy Ben Stiller comes to tell us what this all means for the city of New York. You know we're not fucking around on Real Ones. You know how we do. I'm not without any further ado. Cliff, Victoria, play the theme music. Was popping, real ones, Logan Murdoch here in my beautiful, beautiful cozy home. And Howard motherfucking Beck, they're live from the NBA finals after the Knicks. Probably biggest win in organization history.

I don't really have any words for this. The first championship since 1973, Howard Beck is on site right now. Just what is the emotions right now in San Antonio as you're going? I had a whole thing that I was going to go into and all this soliloquy, but like just you're there. What is going on? How do you feel? What is this moment like on the ground?

I don't even know how to describe this moment, Logan, because this is the 24th NBA finals I've covered. So therefore, the 24th championship ceremony that I've been present for. But I have never seen one where the team clinched on. on the road and then celebrated with, I don't know, probably 8,000, 10,000. I don't know how many Knicks fans were in the building, but this place did not empty out. The Spurs fans mostly left. The Knicks fans stayed and the building still felt damn full. Absolutely incredible.

An incredible clinch anyway. It was everything that the Knicks have exemplified throughout this run. Just they're never out. Double digit deficits mean nothing. Jalen Brunson can apparently score anytime he wants to and they turned whatever they're calling this building now

the Frost something center used to be the AT&T Center they turned it into like Madison Square Garden Texas Edition. That born in the middle of San Antonio just in the country just in the middle of San Antonio outskirts of San Antonio somewhere to 210. They're building a new one they can't abandon this place soon enough But I think the Knicks absolutely owned the night, obviously owned this series, winning it in five, winning their first championship in 53 years.

And I think one of the other things that was just really cool in watching this unfold and close out, Patrick Ewing was here. I got a chance to chat with him a little bit ago before we started recording. Alan Houston is here. Guys who were like these 90s icons who got close, who were in the finals and couldn't seal the deal, but they're still attached to the organization. And I felt like it was almost like their emotions were just as strong as what you saw from Jalen Brunson and O.G. and Anobie and Carly and Towns. And there's just this, you know, generations of Nix who are attached to this, who kind of feel like some ownership of their own, I think, too. So that was really neat too.

But yeah, mostly my main impression walking out of here is going to be, holy crap. Like, not only did they pull this off, but they pulled this off as like, a road team that doesn't just dominate the court, but dominated the whole damn building. This episode of the Ringer NBA show is presented by Ferreiro. The world is watching. Go all in for your team this summer with Ferreiro. Enter for the chance to win a range of prizes

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Go All In, buy any two Ferreiro brands, and you could win $1 million. Official rules apply. Learn more at go all in and win.com. I did chat with friend of the show, Ben Stiller, for a little bit. Again, just like minutes before we got on. He's been ducking us. I don't know if you broke that, but he's been ducking us. Dude, the man is busy.

He's walking out of here with the coaches clipboard. One of the assistant coaches handed it to him. He had it tucked under his arm. I said, how did you get that? He's like, one of the coaches gave it to me. I'm getting it framed. I want them all to sign it, but it was only a dry erase pen on it.

So like it would be pointless to have them side it with the dry erase because it would just disappear. He then seemed delirious. His eyes seemed a little red. He was like still holding a cigar and I think soaked in champagne and cigar smoke.

I'll get back to some of that. But it was just, it was. No, keep going. Keep going on. What was going on? Give us sides of the silence. Well, no, so the normal champion. The championship procedure after this happens is the media weighed outside the locker room,

then the media is let in. We're in there to watch them like burst the champagne and the beer and everything else and celebrate. And then you talk to the players in the locker room. Obviously, some are going to the press conference, but you're getting a lot of guys in there. You're getting to feel the celebration. The Knicks are the first champion. And again, in my time doing this or that I'm aware of.

And listen, I've covered the losing locker rooms in time. So I can't vouch for this entirely. But I'm pretty damn sure this was the first one in which the media was completely shut out and isn't that just like the Knicks. I promise on a celebratory night, this will be the only negative observation I make about them, but they kept us shut out. Ben was in there. We were not.

Ben is obviously a friend of the franchise and is doing a documentary that he's now publicly talked about. So he was soaked. The rest of us got in there and the celebration was already over. That's typically what happens on championship nights, like where I remember being one in Cleveland and you're literally, it's a delirium. And then once ever the media gets in, typically that's when the team goes out. So you're just in this empty room, but some players are, you know, in corners. And like, it's kind of like a biblical experience if you've ever

been in one of those types of things. There's just so many different things and different storylines that are happening in a real time is like you're in a history book, just manifest. This episode is brought to you by Activia. You might already be eating yogurt, but not all yogurts are created equal. Activia contains over one billion probiotics per serving to survive and reach the gut alive. When it comes to gut health,

Activia is the number one family doctor recommended probiotic yogurt brand. Choose Activia. Feel good from the inside out. Visitactivia.ca for more details. But speaking of what, let's get to some of the game, the game. We got to start with Jalen Brunson.

The finals MVP, 45 points. the first 45 point game and it closed out series since 98 and that was Michael Jordan against Utah. And it was funny. Like when I saw that he had the final tally of 45, that was the first thing I thought about was the 98 Jordan, right? Where he was literally carrying this offense and carrying this team throughout this series, right? He was their offensive NGO, G.N. Annobe, notwithstanding, but he was their guy. And just so much that he has gone through, right,

the trade from Dallas. And, you know, myself, I was skeptical of what he could do with the Nix as being the lead guy, right? And then he's the face of this due generation of the front office in the Nix that we don't lead by Leon Rose and World Wide West is also in there, right? And there's all these, this uncertainty. And he brings certainty into this organization and also is the face of an organization that has a competent front office after all of these years.

and then you see him carry a team like the Knicks who one of the great playoff runs in NBA history it's up there with the 01 Lakers that you covered Howard the 16 and 1 Warriors that I was around it's right up there and this is probably a little bit more special in a lot of ways just because it was New York and just because of a lot of ways we didn't see this coming but Jalen Brinson is the face of all of that

what would it like to see you know him in that moment where you see him in the hallways and going through types of things. And like, what is his legacy on this series? And what are we going to look back on when we think of Jalen Brunson in this final series and by extension, this post-e? You can't describe what this Knicks team is

without starting with Jalen Brunson because obviously this whole era starts with them signing him after Dallas failed to lock him up, right? One of the great just mis-cuses or just just bumbling by the Mavericks. Like, how do you not lock up the guy that you drafted in the second round and help develop and it could see this coming on some level? Nobody could see all of this coming, obviously.

But my gosh, we could litigate the Mavericks and all their dumb decisions another day. But Jalen Brunson does not project as physically, athletically, in any way, the typical NBA superstar, right? He has been said to be too small. Clearly not the case. We need to maybe put aside or bury the, get a small guard, lead a team to a championship narrative. Now, if it's the right small guard, if it's a really special one, obviously that negates all of this anyway. But you said it a minute ago about like this is a kind of a championship that we didn't really see coming.

And you could see the outline of it, Logan. You could see the Knicks. They were in the conference finals last year, obviously. So they were a contender. they were in the mix, but whether or not you thought they actually had enough to get past the elite teams, whoever that might be, right? At one point, we thought it might be Cleveland, or we thought it might be Boston even without Tatum and then, oh, Tatum is back. They had the superior regular season record, Boston. Detroit had a far superior regular season record. Couldn't even make the top of the

finals, too, all season. Yeah. The Thunder and the Spurs were the two 60 win teams this season. They were going to face one of them and they got the Spurs. Now, we could say, well, the Spurs were really young, maybe not ready for this moment yet. ahead of schedule, all that, that's fine. But the fact is, the Knicks didn't have the best record. They didn't have the brightest star power. And that's, I think what's remarkable about this championship run and about this team and what's so special about them is Jalen Brunson, second round pick, who was cast aside

or not even locked up by his first team. Carl Anthony Towns, a number one overall pick, but one who, his, the knock on him for 10 years in Minnesota was he's great, he's just not good enough. He can't be the guy you build around. You know, McKell Bridges bounced around a little bit. Josh Hart on his fourth team, traded multiple times. Oji and Anobie, and Anobi, Toronto liked him. They drafted him. He helped him win a championship. He was out for that series because of appendicitis. But like, they didn't, they traded him because they thought he's going to want too much money. He's not a fully, he doesn't have the offensive game. Yeah, we love his defense, but he's not.

So all of these guys, I think that's the, that's the, that's the, character of this team or the thing that kind of pulls them all together that that unites them all. Like, this is kind of a group of scruffy underdogs in a lot of ways. And I include Towns, who was a number one overall pick in that. Mike Brown fired by the freaking Sacramento Kings. What the most dysfunctional. You're getting this work tonight, Sacramento. You are going to get this work. Mike Brown, fired by the Sacramento Kings just like, what, a year and a half ago or whatever it was. I mean, and you know, listen, fired by Cleveland twice, fired by the Lakers. That's how it goes with coaches sometimes. But in a lot of ways we thought with Mike Brown that this was

his last chance at being a coach going into the team, right? This was probably his last shot that he was ever going to have. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and poor went out for Tom Thibito, who obviously did a lot to instill a new culture in this team after this franchise had just been in the desert for decades. I think Tibbs does deserve some credit for getting them to the precipice, and Mike Brown brought it home. I'm not saying that they're in the same place necessarily if they kept Tibbs. I think Mike Brown brought a lot of offensive dynamism and creativity to this and deployed Kat in new ways that helped bring out his playmaking. But still, this whole process starts with them hiring Leon Rose, Leon hiring Tibbs,

then them eventually signing Jaylen Brunson. and then they just kind of methodically piece this together. For decades, the Knicks were all about blockbuster deal after blockbuster deal, splashy trades, and always big names, but they're at the end of their careers or they're hurt or they're kind of like tarnished superstars. And this was the first time where they didn't do any of that stuff. They didn't go chasing anybody. They got Jalen Brunson and everybody said it was an overpay.

And then they just kept building from there. Yeah. I think that, I mean, that's the thing, the thing about, you know, the Knicks were just so poorly run over these last few decades. Honestly, as long as I've been alive, all I've known is a front office that was pretty bad, except for the Walsh years when they get Carmelo

and they have the Knicks tape years. That was like the only time during my lifetime that I felt like the Knicks had it together a little bit. And then they, you know, Dolan would strike again and again. And that is another storyline that we're going to get to in a second. But I want to stay with. this Knicks team right here.

And the thing that I loved about this Knicks team is honestly, you know, one of the things that was going into the series, it was always about young and old, right? And with the Knicks, they were just guys that knew each other, right? They were guys that, um,

that played great alongside each other, that knew exactly what their roles were. And then I just suppose that with San Antonio, who we're going to get to them and they're going to have their own section. but what all the the Knicks won because they could turn it on the final minutes because they knew each other

the best and they knew where they needed to be and that was the key in the series they were only Cliff has this stat right here the Knicks out scored the spurs by 12 points for the entire series which is nuts right but the reason why they were able to do that and eke out those wins

is because they trusted each other more plain and simply they knew each other's roles and that's what I'm always going to love about this team. Not necessarily, I mean, there's the individual storylines that we could go to. Carl Towns, you know, like you just said, playing for his mother, but also like, you know, midway through the season, like he thought he was going to get

traded, right? There were, he was scared to death because he loves the Knicks so much and wanted to stay, right? And then, you know, you have McKell Bridges, who has the ups and downs throughout this postseason. And always, like, every time he does something bad, oh man you know how much they gave up for him you know they gave them all these picks um he has that in the back of his mind you know even somebody like alvarado who is a mid-season trade this i think

goes to my what i would love to talk about and just about where the league is going but you know this was a great year because we had so many stories and we had so many stories on this next team like of it was like a writer's dream of all of the things that the subclass that that we had that we got to see What does this mean for the league, Howard? Right? I think we've always talked about, you know, where Adam Silver is and, you know, this parody is fucking up. I think we learned two things. I think that big markets matter.

And I think that we learn that, yeah, parity can be very, very entertaining because we didn't know what the hell was going to happen. But Adam Silver has to be really, really excited about at least the on-court product of what's going on right now, right? eighth champion in eight years the league got the parody it wanted we we hit this note pretty much every time uh every june now because because the trend continues um one of the biggest market teams just won maybe it's i guess the biggest market the biggest market just won but the biggest market didn't win by acting like a big market team where they're just running out out spending everybody else they didn't even do what the warriors did when the warriors were like, you know, doubling, tripling everybody else's luxury tax bills.

The Knicks, like, this is an expensive team and getting more so, but they didn't do this by running out and outspending everybody. I'm not even sure where their payroll ranks, but I don't think it was, um, they're not an electric tax. So they did this in much more of like a small to midmarket way, right? It's signing Jalen Brunson away from the Mavericks at a time when he was not yet a superstar who would command the max. trading for guys that other teams just for whatever reason felt didn't fit at the time,

whether that was Bridges or Ananobe. You mentioned the Jose Alvarado pickup at midseason, which was another really savvy move. Mitchell Robinson is like the only next draft pick, I believe, who's in the rotation. Got the biggest offensive rebound of the night. Yeah. In Nick's history, maybe. Well, the biggest offensive rebound in next history was the one by Ananobe did the tip in. My bad, my bad, my bad.

My bet. My bad. My bad. Obviously. I'm tired. I'm sorry. I apologize. Yeah.

I'm sorry. We're delirious here. They, they, dude, they built this like a smaller mid-market team. Like this is, you can't even say like, oh, this is like the revenge of the big markets or anything. They didn't build that way. This isn't, no, no disrespect to the Lakers, but this isn't the Lakers stealing hook up from Dallas in a, in a ridiculous trade. Or even signing LeBron, right? Like, they signed Jailin Brunson, but he wasn't even a slagin.

star. Like he's a freaking finals MVP now, but nobody saw that four years ago, whatever it was when they signed him. Like, so I, I, the, the, what it says for the league thing is, is a really difficult one because I think every single finals might give us a different version of the same lesson or just a slightly different lesson. And I, I do think, I do think if there is something for the rest of the league to see in this next team about the way to build, it's, it's, It's, you know, look, finding a diamond in the rough like Jalen Brunson, not easy. But once you know you've got the guy, do everything possible to put the complementary pieces around him. Jalen Brunson, not a great defender, but we're going to go get big wings like O'GN and O.B. and McHale Bridges.

And, you know, Julius Randall got us as far as we think he could get us. We're going to flip him and Don DeVincenzo for Carl Anthony Towns, which, by the way, Towns, only available because of other Mexican. mechanisms the league put in, luxury tax, second apron, Timberwolves, up against it, feeling like they can't afford to keep towns at that price, suddenly he's available. Without the second apron, I don't think Carl Anthony Towns is a New York Nick. And so the Knicks were opportunistic. They were smart. Josh Hart.

I don't think of even mentioned freaking Josh Hart's name, or maybe once. But another guy who, like, they saw something in him that told them, this guy would be incredibly important to our culture, the way that the team, operates the selflessness that Josh Hart plays with and the hustle and just the intensity, you need that. You need that. And like to me, like obviously Jalen Brunson's their most important player. In a lot of ways, I feel like Josh Hart is, is their second most in terms of their identity, right? He's not their most talented. Ananoby, you know, is more so, Towns is more so. Josh Hart in a lot ways I feel like is second only to Brunson in terms of what he meant to, you know, I guess what we

will now have to call hashtag Nick's culture. So if there's a lesson for the rest of the league, it's like go get fucking good dudes who play their asses off and compliment each other well. Well, I mean, I think what it also is like, I think NBA is just turning into the MLB, right, like where you have to have dudes that give you a chance to win and just give you a chance. You just need a team that's going to have a chance. You're going to get the Pacers. They're going to get the Knicks of the world. And if you get onto a hot streak, you can fuck around and win a title and steal one.

And it's just so funny right now because in the beginning of the season, we just were like, oh, yeah, a Western conference team is going to win this championship, right? Even all the way up until going up into the finals, right? We were like, I personally, I don't know who you picked, but I picked the Spurs in five. Reason being, I picked the Spurs and Six. Yeah. Yeah. Reason being because we were like they were going to be the most talented team, right?

And I think we got a, I think as a viewing public and even NBA observers, we got a real lesson in what it's a reminder, maybe not a lesson, a reminder of what it actually takes to win a title, right? Because, you know, Victor Womenyama and his post-game presser, which is, I think Victor is going to be like the new LeBron in terms of post-game pressers because it's going to be must-see TV as it happens. But one of the things that he talked about was just how the Spurs just did not have answers and how hard mistakes are in the finals and how costly they can be.

The most minor mistakes can be the most costly that they can have. And that's the lesson that young teams need to know, right? I think we got tricked into, like, not to say that, you know, it was a great trick move from the Spurs. But they got so good, so fast, and they got here, they were so special because they got here on talent alone. Not to say they weren't well coached, not to say, you know, all those things. But what the Knicks have that they didn't was the Knicks, like I said,

just knew where they were supposed to be. The Spurs, and we're going to get into them in a bit. But with the Spurs, they just didn't know who to go to. They didn't know what to do in this situation, right? They're still throwing dribble weaves to get Darren Fox. jump shots and he's terrible in the game, right? They're not, or they're throwing lobs to wimby when they don't have any other options, right? Whereas the Knicks were very methodical and knew who they were going to be.

And I think, you know, back to the point was, you know, we thought that as a basketball collective that the Spurs talent could overcome that. And we got a reminder of like, there's just a little bit more to go. And I said this earlier, Howard, I think that I kept watching this series like, damn in three years, this is going to be good. Dylan Harper is going to run an offense in three years. Defon Kassel is going to know his role in three years. Maybe Deering Fox, if he's on the team or not,

he's going to be hopefully a completely different player, but this team is so new. And that was really the difference in this series, right? Like one team knew themselves way better than the other, and they played to their strengths. I think that's going to be the lasting impression in this series. First person I ran into once I was out, you know, down from our perch in the press row

and came down downstairs. The first person I ran into was Dylan's dad, Ron, who I covered with the Lakers back in the day. They lost, but Ron's like just the proud dad. And he's, you know, without like this, not a direct quote, but basically he was like saying, like, yeah, my kid's fucking great, man. Like it was basically the conversation we had. Yo, that was my son I'm doing the same way.

And he's going to be really fucking. great. You're saying like in a few years, it's in a few months, man. Like, give him another offseason, his rookie years behind him. The dude is already an incredibly high impact player, great defender, makes really smart plays, just has a great feel for the game. Obviously, needs to work on a couple things, you know, his three point shot among them. But holy shit. So, yeah, listen, on the Spurs aspect of this, if your best player is your center, unless that center is Nicola Yokic, I think it's really hard, and especially because Wembe's 22, it's really hard, because this is what we do, right? We say, well, like, who's the best player in the series? Well,

Wemby's the most talented player. Brunson's the most accomplished player, but these are the two best players in the series. So, you know, can the Knicks match Wemby or can the Spurs match Brunson? Wemby does, Wembe's not a playmaker. Wemby is seven feet five and occasionally puts the ball on the deck and is just so long. Like, there's, it's just, it's just, it's just, it's just, it's just, It gives, it's just too much opportunity to just, like, swat it away, or he dribbles it off his foot or something. He can't just say, must have a basket. This is not old school Knicks of, or old school MBA of the 90s where you just dump it in to the big guy. That's not the way that the NBA works now and that's not who Wembe is.

So the handicap the spurs have in this regard is that your best player is all is not a playmaker. You can't just, so they've got to run stuff to get him closer to the basket. They've got to find ways to put Wemby in motion so that the shots are easier and so that he's not settling for a three or then putting the ball on the deck and losing it. And there are other players who are great with the ball in their hands. Castle really struggled the last couple of games. Dylan Harper, Deerron Fox. And Fox had his struggles too. I think by next season, like, listen, I already way prematurely said when they got Dylan Harper, maybe they were going to have to trade Deer and Fox.

but the way Dylan Harper has emerged so quickly. You were kind of vindicated yourself. I was thinking about that. Like that was, you kind of like, it took a long time? It was a delayed vindication, but you did vindicate yourself. Maybe, but I also think like having Deer and Fox, and granted, he did not make the veteran play in game four when he failed to dribble out the clock or force the foul instead of trying to beat O.G.

N and Nobie to the hoop. But I think having a veteran... This spring, Denham gets a softer, lighter update. Introducing Old Navy's drapey denim wide leg, a new fit that moves with you. It's everything you want denim to feel like for summer. Easy, breathable, and effortlessly cool. With a fit that creates natural movement

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Just style you love and quality you can trust. Visit Wayfair. Every style, every home. Point guard, ball handler, organizer type who had been around and been in playoff series was actually important for them. Maybe it's not as important now. And you do need, listen, Dylan Harper needs to start. Dylan Harper needs to play huge minutes. So maybe as soon as next season, this is more about Harper, Castle. Obviously, you're keeping Vassel. You've got Keldon Johnson. Like, you've got a really deep guard rotation already. Fox's start. to feel more and more like I thought he might be a year ago or after the draft last year, maybe he is superfluous at this point. And maybe you swap him out for a little bit more support at another position.

But also I think that like that was also a tag to go thing. It was very much obvious that Dylan Harper was the best guard that they had. And Ms. Johnson just has to make that adjustment, man. Like I get it. I understand, but this is the NBA five, right? You have to. And that's, and he deserves. I mean, he's a young coach, but he deserves blaming this as well.

Like, it was, it was glaring all series what Dylan Harper meant to this team, right? We even back when we were in Sweden in game one, we're like, where the hell is Dylan Harper right now down the stretch of the game? So, Ms. Johnson does. Are we in Sweden for game one? Did that happen? That happened, man. We were in stocking for game one, bro. But, yeah, I'm just saying, but like, the thing about the Spurs right now is, you know, I was, it was funny.

I was talking to, I was talking to Cliff and put a little bit on blast, but he was like, if Popovich was coaching this team, these mistakes wouldn't happen. And my thing was, these are two completely different types of Spurs teams. The one that Popovic inhibited, even in 1999, because that was Clips for Tour, was 1999, you know, they had a young Tim Dunflin.

But they had a David Robinson, right? They had an Avery Johnson ad, a Steve Kerr. This Spurs team is completely different in makeup from that. Like, their veteran players are like Luke and Kennett and Harrison Barnes and Deeran Fox, right? No disrespect. But like those, it's not the veteran type of group that is surrounding Wembe right now because they're all young, right? Including with the young coach. And they're trying to figure all this out together.

And like, I don't want to be too hard on them because this was not supposed to happen. They fucking be thrown the champs. and then they just find, we were trying to figure out when they were going to show their youth in a postseason and I think the most impressive thing about them is like they're the youngest team that we have seen get to this point,

probably like Oklahoma City, but just like when Oklahoma City won in 2012, we were reminded that it takes way more than talent to ultimately win a title, right? Like, you have to know what you're doing down the stretch of games. And the Spurs had no answer for what to do down the stretch of games.

Even in this one, like what's six minutes left down the stretch of games, get to the game part of it. Six minutes left down the stretch. It looked to be over, even though the spurs were up to. What was like in an arena? Tense. Did the crowd know that the Dix were going to win? Because at home, I'm like, yo, they're probably going to.

I think the Knicks are going to take this. Here's the thing. You and I have been in a lot of NBA arenas for a lot of big games, and you can tell the tenor of a game sometimes by how the crowd's reacting. But that is presupposing that the crowd is actually invested. only in one team, the home team. That wasn't the case tonight. So there are cheers no matter who's scoring.

There are booze at weird times. There are Let's Go Nick's chance that are now countered by Go Spurs Go chance and an MVP chance for Brunson. And like, so like the feeling in the building, it was just like it was like, you know, fucking war, like between these two factions. Fortunately, from everything I could see, by the way, a very kind, polite war overall. Everybody was cheering, booing, chanting, whatever. But I didn't see any real, like, tension, tension between fans. Even in the Concourse pregame, fans were, like, walking by each other in groups,

going, go, Spurs, go, go. And then they're coming in the other direction going, like, let's go Nix, let's go Nix. And they're just all having fun. And it was great. Like, this was the best version of fandom, not the toxic bullshit version that we've unfortunately seen in recent days back in my city. but they the vibes were just weird

and when it was coming down the stretch I think it was like first of all close out games they always say close out games are a bitch close out games are really tough this almost felt like one of those like game seven like Celtics Lakers back in the day where it was like nobody can make anything

like so many especially that first quarter so many turnovers so many missed shots and then late it was like the Knicks were kind of like okay, it's just time. And they just started to methodically, especially Jalen Brunson, to start methodically like,

okay, putting points on the board and the Spurs didn't know what to do with it. You're right to cite Mitch Johnson. You're right to cite the Spurs youth. But I think it's an interesting thought exercise to go back and look at how close some of these losses were, right? So Wemby's pass off of Castles back

that turnover back in game two. Obviously, the blown 29 point lead in game four, you know, Deeran Fox's brain fart, if we want to call it that. All these little things that could have turned the series the other way. Every single game, the Spurs lose in five, which seems like a short series, and it is. It's the gentleman's sweep, as we call it. But every single game was winnable for the Spurs. And a slightly more seasoned version of them, even one more year under their belt, this might be a different outcome.

Because the talent is there. Absolutely. And by the way, the guts and the will and the grit and all the other fun, like intangibles that we like to throw around, all that shit's there too. Those guys fucking fight their asses off. And they played their asses off. And they had the Knicks down by whatever, 12, 14 again, 15. Does it get to 18? Never got to 20, I don't think.

I apologize to the listeners. I don't have the box score in front of me. I have no notes in front of me whatsoever tonight. I am usually 16. Thank you. Thank you, producer Cliff. 16 was their biggest lead. I have nothing in front of me.

Usually, you know this, Logan. I usually have copious notes, but this is like straight from game to back of house to locker room to I smell like cigar smoke to, Hey, Ben, what's up to like potting. So like I have no notes whatsoever to lean on. But they built another 16 point freaking lead. Of course they could have won this game. And a better executing more polished team maybe does.

And so like I'm just. the Knicks absolutely earned this championship, but I think we can walk away from this series thinking, incredible run by the Knicks, super impressed by the Spurs. One of the lasting memory that I will have from this is the resurrection of Jim Dolan, if you want to call it that.

It was crazy. He's had a bit of a series, had a bit of a season, also just had a run as the Knicks owner in general. What is it like for you as a former beat writer to see this journey? And I don't know where you were during the trophy presentation, but yes, we're going to talk about the Jim Dolan of it all. What was it like to see this version of Jim Dolan

after the beat writer who had to just battle with them all of these years? How was that for you? I'm not going to rain on anybody's parade on the night that they've won the first championship in 53 years and the first of Dolan's very jagged rain as owner. Like, we all know what the record is. A lot of firings, a lot of controversy, a lot of infighting, a lot of politics. A lot of people banned. Everybody's banned. Bands Charles Oakley.

Who was in the building? There's a lot, a lot, a lot to dislike about the way Jim Dolan has run the Nix. And especially for Nix fans, because, you know, you talk about how they've been tortured for all this time. It's mostly because of him, starting in about, you know, 99, 2000 when he took over. And so all the dysfunction of the 2000s and the 2010s is on him. I guess if there's a redemption play here for him, it's that he hired Leon Rose. Leon Rose was the lead, you know, of CIA's basketball division, right? Leon Rose, who had started off as a small-time agent back in the 90s, Rick Brunson was his first client.

Jalen Brunson is his godson. And he ran CAA after his agency was bought by CAA, right? So Leon Rose, not a front office person, not a team executive, not a lifetime basketball person. He was a lawyer, an agent. And the reason that Jim Dolan hired him was because as Jim Dolan, and has always done, he hires people who he already knows and trusts or have a flashy name, right? He hires Isaiah Thomas because he's Isaiah Thomas. He hires Phil Jackson because he's Phil Jackson. He hired Donnie Walsh because David Stern told him to. That was an interesting one. But he goes through

a ton of executives and he's often just gravitating toward people who he found who are loyalists, who are his guys. And Leon was another one of those in my perception. And so I dismissed that as as another like, here we go again. I've said this many times already. Like, you know, obviously I was wrong on the Leon Rose part of this. Leon put together a really strong front office from the personnel and scouting aspects of it to analytics and salary cap. They have been super smart, again, and methodical about the way they put this roster together. And yeah, like, you know, maybe Leon knew something that everybody else didn't being,

Jalen Brunson's former agent and his godfather and who had represented Rick Brunson forever. But if there's, again, if there's a redemption play for Jim Dolan or a redemption arc here, it's that he finally got one thing right, the most important thing right. Hire somebody to run basketball ops who will do a great job, empower them, get out of their way, don't meddle. And for the last five, six years, that's been the playbook. Jim Dolan did a lot last week to stir up a lot of bad memories for Nick's fans in terms of the way he sometimes runs things and his tone deafness. But here they are.

They won a championship. I don't think it means all is forgiven. It does not expunge the record. I mean, it kind of reared his ugly head in game three. Like Dolan definitely, he reminded people of his Dolan. And even on the day of game four, when he was back on the radio spouting a bunch of nonsense. And trying to, you know, start a fight with the mayor of New York, who's one of the most popular people in the city, certainly way more popular than the Jim Dullen or the president are.

So, you know, just picking dumb fights is kind of what he's done. He's picked fights with the NBA. He's continuing to, you know. Even tonight, keeping the locker room closed as long as he did, I think, was another just thumbing his nose at all of us in the media and the league. That's who he is. But this is his night. We don't need to dwell on it. Let's talk about it's his team's night.

Let's be honest. It's just team's night. Listen, here's the thing. That's the last thing I'll say about this. It's never about the owners. And if we wanted to start getting into the things that make certain owners onerous, like, or I should say, odious, like, there's a lot of stuff we could dive into. You can't root for or against teams based on the owners because a lot of people became

billionaires through means that we would not necessarily otherwise approve of. So it is what it is. And it's about the players and the coaches and the front office and the people who put all of the blood, sweat, and tears into this. The owner signs the checks, cashes the checks, gets to hold the trophy first for whatever stupid reason. One of the dumbest traditions we have in American sports, I don't know if this is the case around the world. But one of the dumbest traditions we have is that the owner gets the championship trophy first. Those guys don't do anything except cut checks. And that's really all you should do.

Hire people, hire good people, get out of the way, cut the checks. It's not about you in the end. Hey, man, Cloud is a hell of a drug, Howard motherfucking Beck. Let's talk about Wemby. Let's talk about his playoffs in totality, right? Where this is his first postseason. It's crazy to even think about that. Gets injured early on.

Beats Oklahoma City. beats of champs. And it seemed after that game won against Oklahoma City where it utterly dominates Chet Hongren in that front line, even with the stats, it never seemed like he was as aggressive at that point, right? I know the defenses were differently, covered him different. But even when I was just kind of disappointed just from watching tonight, like even when the Knicks put their smallest lineup of

series there. There was no hey, I'm just going to get and I'm just going to punish this front line. Me and you, Howard, we're blessed enough to be at a signature Wemby game in Los Angeles right before the All-Star game, right? And remember that that game, there was

no front line for the Lakers. LeBron, Norah Luca played that game and Wemby just said, give me the fucking ball and I'm going to dunk over everyone. And I'm going to just be, I'm going to live in the paint. And he had like, we look up against 25, 26 points in the first quarter. That's the wimby that I kind of wanted to see. And I felt like he needed to constantly throughout this series after the Oklahoma City series, constantly like just be reminded of you need to be

aggressive. You need to be aggressive, especially with the point guard situation that was going on, right? He was tasked to be the lead ball handler in a lot of ways. He would see settled a lot for threes. There wasn't a Shaquille O'Neal. Yeah, give me the damn ball. Like, fuck the offense. Just give me the ball and let me cook. There wasn't a lot of that. And it felt like if I look at that tape,

I'm scared to death if I'm the rest of the NBA because he still was closer to that first game we saw in Summer League of the guy that has all this talent who hasn't yet figured it out yet. And now it looks like in the next few years he's going to and when he does make it click, it's going to be just bonkers. What did you feel until totality of this postseason. And what is this postseason? What do you think is going to tell us about the future from

Victor Wominiam? I mean, the sky is the limit because he can actually physically touch the sky. The man could grab a cloud if he wanted to. I can't remember the last time I was as impressed by a 22-year-old. I said to somebody sitting next to me earlier tonight in that first quarter, right, he had like three blocks in the first, what, four or five minutes, that awesome two-headed reverse dunk. And I said to somebody, like, because I don't react, right? We're reporters. I don't react much. You've seen this.

You see what we were in a room packed with Knicks fans in Sweden, watching game one. And I'm just like, nodding along. And everybody's going nuts around me. Wemby makes me like just involuntarily shriek and go like, oh my God. Whoa. Ah, uh, uh, uh, I'm just making fucking noises. and like he's just and it's not just that he can do the things he does athletically and physically. It's that he is he's ferocious.

Like he looks so skinny that you, I think we just get an impression like, oh, he's going to be too frail. He's not going to be aggressive, whatever. Like that guy gets his ass knocked to the ground so many times he hops right back up. I don't see him complaining to the refs very much. He, you know, games that, you know, we talked about. this. I think it was the last round against Oklahoma. He's gassed one game and it looks like it's over. And then he comes back just absolutely attacking the next one. He's making his mistake still. There are some bad, you know, some just bad decisions with the bowl sometimes, some ill-advised

shots. He's still trying to figure out the best way to attack with his body and skill set. But that's going to come with time. He's three years into this. league. It was so crazy because in this post game, I think it was Tim Reynolds who asked this question of the AP, the great Tim Wernold. And he asked like, yeah, man, Jerry West, it took him

12 years to make it to this point and win a title. It took LeBron nine years. It took Jordan seven, eight years. What is it like for you to have that acceptance that it's just not your time right now, right? And like that you just don't have all the answers.

And the fact that we are so comfortable evoking him already with the all-time greats. That's pretty special even after this finals, right? Because it's very clear in his game. He doesn't know everything about his body. And he doesn't even reach the, he doesn't even touch his prime yet, right? And he's doing this. And on one side, I'm just like, I know, we both cover the league long enough to know how hard it is to win an NBA championship

and how many things have to go right for you to do so, and how lucky you need to be to get there. And I still want to bet on Wembe every time because whenever you see him, you're just like, I don't know who was stopping that when they figure it out. And I don't know which side to go on right now because there's the one side where, you know,

the spurs figure out in real time and they're back. But there's the other part is like he might be the great player that doesn't do it, right? There's just so much with Wimpy this season. And I don't know we could talk about reputationally what he's going to be, right? Like the backlash is coming, whether it's fair or not, right? You know, even just how he was ref, right? Even this season, this postseason, when he had the elbow on Nazaree.

And when he was, he may or may not have, you know, told his teammates that, you know, go rough that motherfucker up in the OKC series, right? And even this series, right? He fucked up Brunson a couple times. and one of the Brunson hits that he had, like that probably should have been a flagrant foul. And so we saw the old total package of Wembe right now. But I think the other thing is he needs to figure out some level of control, right?

Because not just with the flagrant and stuff like that, but just even control within the offense and what he's going to beat because there's so much raw talent there. I think this series was a reminder that he needs to figure out how to harness it. and figure that part out to get to the next step. He's got some developing still to do, but I also think to go back to the Dylan Harper, Staphaun Castle aspects of this too, right?

Like this was Castle's second season at Harper's first, and those two guys are immensely talented, and when you have two guards who can do so much with the ball in their hands and draw in the defense and hopefully eventually become more intuitive as playmakers, they're going to make his job easier eventually. they're going to find ways to get him the ball on the move or closer to the basket. They're going to over time you develop that chemistry in terms of like the alley-oops

and that kind of connected that you have, that telepathy that you sometimes get between playmaker and big. And they'll get that. They'll learn that over time. And so you've got these three pillars, two guards in the center, all of whom are just immensely talented who are just scratching the surface. one just finishes third year, second year, and first year. Like, we're in too much of a rush.

And I think they, the spurs are partially responsible for making us all feel like we're in a rush to crown them because they got here so fast. But we need to take a step back, take a deep breath, and remember how young they are and that there's a lot of development still to come. But my God, they've already been to the NBA finals. And by all means, we know this. There are no guarantees in this league. And, you know, a lot of teams we thought would have a long runway. And for whatever reason, you know, free agency, injuries, salary cap problems, whatever it may be, something gets in the way, something stops it. But this team, by all indications, should be a contender for the next five to ten years.

And those three guys are going to all be absolute studs. They already are, but there's so much development. I'm going to do something that I know you hate, but we're going to have this conversation. What did this win do for Jalen Brensen in terms of his nictum, right? Is he, is he, is he, is he, is he, is he, is he is this put him as the best nick of all time, or at least the most beloved nick of all time where I know you're having these internal battles and I know that there's been conversations throughout throughout this. So yeah, what's your bid? Let's talk through this. I asked Patrick Ewing and he kind of just said he's, he, he, he, he, uh, made it just, well, he's one of the greats.

He's one of the next grades. I'm like, okay. I said, so, but so up there with who? like you and Willis and Clyde or whatever. He's like, yeah, you know, I said, so is he behind her ahead of you. What do you say? He just stopped. The point is that he's in that conversation, period.

But Patrick's response and his point was like he's already there. He was there. He's like, this championship isn't what puts him there. His play all the way up until now already had him there. And I think that's a really interesting and important point, right? Because you could be an all-time great as Patrick himself is without winning the title. And Jalen had already put himself in the conversation among greatest Nicks just by what he's accomplished. And some of that is statistical.

Some of that is the win totals. And a lot of it, too, to go back to previous theme here, is just making the NICs respectable again. Just making them a contender again, a team that matters again. And so, yeah, for all the above reasons, he is an all-time great Nick. How you want to order them, probably it's going to be all the usual things, right? There's going to be some recency bias. There's going to be some generational bias. And there's going to be just some preference involved in all this.

I think if you want to bake in the fact that it's been 53 years and he's the first guy to bring them back to this point to deliver a championship, if you want to say he's the, he's the greatest Nick or co-greatest with Clyde, co-greatest with Clyde and Willis, I think any of those things are fair. all due respect to Patrick, he couldn't get them to the championship and he was injured in the 99 finals. There are a lot of other candidates necessarily to put in there if you're talking about the greatest nick of all time. So I think this is one for the fans to decide ultimately, right? Like the fans and I think basketball historians, I don't consider myself as much a historian as as Bill, for instance.

I'm sure he has, you know, a really well-informed, well-researched take on this, because he has, you know, he's dived into the archive so many times on this. I have a hard time with these things. Like, you know, you know me, rankings and lists. Not my thing. I tried, man.

I fucking tried. You gave a great answer, but you didn't go all the way. I know you're going to go all the way with it. What does this mean for New York, man? You've been there 22 years. What does this mean for him? My daughter texted me as soon as the final buzzer hit and she's like fireworks. I think it was like a two-word text basically.

He's like the fireworks are back. As soon as the game was over, there were fireworks going off in Brooklyn. I can only imagine what the scene must look like in New York right now. There's something, I talked to Mike Breen about this last night, that the Knicks strike a different court in New York than the Yankees, the Giants. The Mets and Jets are kind of on a different kind of tier. And the Nets are kind of an afterthought. The Nets don't matter. The Rangers, whoever, whichever New York team you want to put into this conversation.

And the Yankees have won a lot of championships in the last, whatever, 30 years. It's different with the Knicks. Like, it's a basketball city. And it's, you know, basketball is the city game. And it, I, to use the phrase, just hits different. It hits different. And like, listen, I've been there for 22 years, but I wasn't born there. So I'm not going to have as, as, as, you know, nuance to take or as passion and impassioned take as somebody who grew up on all of these teams. And, um, and saw all the ups and downs of all

of them. But the energy I have felt around the city and just the sheer number of Nick's gear all the time. My one mile walk to the gym a few times a week in Carol Gardens, Brooklyn, the number of people I pass who have a Knicks hat or jersey or shorts or sweatshirt or all of the above on has multiplied by a factor of like 10 in the last two months alone and certainly by a pretty big factor even in the last several months, the last several years as they've risen to prominence again. Like the city is so fucking energized by them and it is a unifying force. That's what we love about sports. It's a unifying force. I watched sitting there tonight as the final buzzer hit all these Knicks fans in the section right in front of me.

And like, I saw like five Knicks fans in a group hug. I think they all knew each other. It was like, you know, three women and two men. And there was just like this one big group hug. And like there was all kinds of Knicks fans here who I think were probably complete strangers when they arrived. And it was just like, you know, just a delirious bedlam in the stands as they celebrated. And, you know, again, like it's the emotion of sports and its ability to connect people

that we love about it. And that's what we're seeing right now on a massive, massive scale because the Knicks are in a massive, massive city and their fans are fucking everywhere. It's 116 in the morning in San Antonio. Ben Stiller is soaked in champagne and cigar smoke. And he's just kind enough to have wandered down the hallway

through this fucking labyrinth of an arena to rejoin the real ones. Ben, there's the cigar. That's great. Ben, how you feeling, man? It's just, I don't know. I don't know. I feel like I didn't do anything.

And I feel incredible. They did something. I enjoyed it. And I've been enjoying them do their thing for a long time. And it's nice to see them finally do it at the highest level and make it to the top, man. It's just crazy. Like, do you, like, you must have emotions that are pretty intense. You're like, I know you're filming too.

So you're actually working. Yeah. But you're invested in this. I mean, I just feel so happy. It's just, it's like that thing, you know, like when you, it's a buildup of so many years, so many years, it was just like, no, it's not really going to happen. Or the Knicks, you know, the Knicks. Or you, you know what I mean?

Like, I felt like you would look at me like sort of like, yeah, I get it. You're a fan. And I feel for you. I understand. But, you know, the reality is. And then you would like list the reality, which was true. And now the reality. is that we are the fucking champions.

You are the fucking champions. Was I, was I that condescending towards your fandom? I hope I wasn't. No, you're a professional. Like you're not, no,

you're always very nice and you're professional, but you're like, and you obviously know so much about basketball. So it's like a doctor where like, I'm going to go, hey, I'm going to be okay, right? Doctor,

you're like, yeah, you're going to be okay. A couple of issues on your chart. But, you know, that's kind of what it's been. So it's,

I mean, I got some questions too, correspondent. Yeah. Go, go Logan. Ben, motherfucking stealing. What the fuck is up? Mix, baby!

Mix, baby! Mix! I got a question for you. Mixing five! When the seconds were going down, which age of your childhood flash in front of you? Right now, I am nine years old.

I've been nine years old for like the last two hours. In terms of how I feel. Did you think about, did you think about Clyde? Like, about the old team? What was the emotions in the seconds that were going down? It was, it was a feeling of like this, you know, that thing when something actually happens and you can't believe it's happening? That thing, it's like it's like you're, I wasn't numbed out to it, but I was right

next to Mr. Dolan, he was, you know, he was saying, oh, I guess I think this is going to happen. I think we're going to win this. and it was kind of like, I don't know, man, it's hard to believe. It's really hard to believe. And I just immediately like went out onto, it's a whole surreal feeling that is, I don't really, I wish I was more articulate about it,

but it's like a feeling of all those years of loving the Knicks. And in my lifetime, I honestly didn't know if I'd ever see a championship. What was it like for, what does this Jalen Brunson run mean? Where does he fit within the Knicks ethos? Is he the best Nick of all time? Where is he right now for you?

Logan already tried to trap me with this question. I have a good answer. I mean, look, you can't, I don't think you can say what his career is until his career is over, you know, in terms of really where you put him. But he's definitely right now, like, I mean, in my mind,

He, you know, he hasn't won two championships. He's won one championship. So, you know, right? You'd have to say like with Clyde, right, he has two championships. Yeah. But in terms of like what he has done, what he represents for this team, what he's like as a player, his grit, his determination, his accessibility as a person, his lack of pretense, his determination, his sense of humor, his connection with his teammates, his selflessness in that way,

his just overall just vibe is something pretty incredible. And I'm just totally down with that guy. I love that guy. So yes, I'd say one of the greatest, you know, he's in the top tier right now, right? I mean, but you have to like, I mean, these are like Willis Reed and right. You know, Clyde, there's like guys, you know, for me, like, but guys who, you know, Carmelo are incredible, but like he brought us a championship. Come on.

He did. He did. He did. On his back. Really? Could you talk about just like the journey you and all your celebrity partners who was having like all of Nick's nation? But like you guys were the face of it. Can you talk me through the journey of you guys going from this city or that city or you guys on a group chat?

Like what is that like? How does this work? We're like, you know, trying to figure out ways to scam rides and get there and scam tickets. I'm like, Shalema's like, hey, you got a lead on a ticket for Cleveland. I don't know. I bought one. but they said they're going to revoke it and I know a guy or, you know, it's like, I mean, there's a lot of stress.

There was a lot of stress in terms of like away games and trying to figure out how to get there, how to get the tickets. But also it started last year, really, you know, when we went on the road to Troy and to Indiana. And, you know, like, it's also like there's never been a team where we've been doing that. Like this is, you know, that's a new thing. Like, yeah. But it's the belief in this team, the fact that they got to the point where they, you know,

they did what they said they were going to do. And last year, I feel like we all, like, were so bummed out the way it ended, even two years ago, too. And I think there's a connection with the team where we just felt like I just wanted to be there. So I don't really think about it. Like, you know, I know people say like, oh, the celebrity fans or whatever, but like we're, I'm just like, I look at it as a fan as a fan who has incredible access, who's so lucky to be able to have that access.

And I know so many fans who, you know, love the Knicks, who, you know, it doesn't matter. Like, if you're in the front row, or if you're in the back of Massacre Garden, it's as exciting and it's as great. And so it's kind of like just being a part of this community that is really, really connected. And I'm so excited to talk to all my like Nick's Twitter friends,

you know, who are just like freaking out right now. And it's just like, it feels like a very connected group of people who are just like so, so happy. And I just feel so lucky that I got to experience it in person. and I'm you know I'm just like it's incredible are you telling chalemay like are you telling him like yo back in my day Clyde was that dude Willis was that dude you wasn't even there I know that you know I know that J.R. Smith is your goat but I don't understand this are you giving him like history lessons what is that relationship through nix like how do you how do you really cultivate a new nix fan no we're I think we've just been living in the first of all he's not new I mean, he's been, he's been with it.

Like he's not, you guys, you and that were a little old. Right. But his lifetime, right, we're older. I get it. But like, but he's, you know, he's been with it since he was like 10 years old or whatever. So like it's like, it's like same thing. He's just a kid like, you know, I've been with it since I was 10 years old. So it's kind of that same thing. Like his memories of that, those teams, it's not like ever like, oh, like, oh, you know, Clyde, that was the team or whatever. Like, but they were the winning team, right? They were the ones that won. So it was always that thing of like, you know, are they ever going to do it. Man, I love the Knicks. But boy, they're heartbreaking. There was always that running commentator. The Knicks break your heart. But that's the thing that I think is most interesting, Ben, for like a fan of your generation, which is my generation, but I'm not a fan. You're a little older than me.

But like for Chalemay and for younger fans. I'm a fan of seeing my friends happy. It's great. So you happy, see other friends in New York happy? It's great. There you go. No, but like you had to live through. You got to see the highest high when you were a kid when they win championships.

The 70s are otherwise a pretty rough period. The 80s are rough for a while until Ewing gets there. There's, you know, two finals in the 90s, but they're both losses. The 2000s of the 2010s, the less said, the better probably. So like you had to go through the torture of it to get to this point, which I would imagine makes it all that much more satisfying, which I think for some of the younger Knicks fans, maybe they could, I don't know if they take for granted or not, but they probably didn't have to feel it as much. Like they didn't, they weren't as, uh, just, just tormented as,

as, as you would have to have been over the course of like, well, I have more years. I have a lot more years, but I think pain is pain. Torment is torment. My son, you know, is 21. Yeah. We moved back to New York in 2010. So, you know, he was a young kid when we came back here. I grew up and he moved away for a while, but I came back in 2010. So he started watching games at the roughest, really the toughest time. Yeah. You know, for those. was like that eight or nine years. So he's got pain. Like he has maybe more pain than I do because he'd ever had the winning part of it too. True. Or the memory of that. It was just sort of an idea. Like I actually have the memory of, you know, of those teams. So I think like everybody, it's all

valid. Like everybody has has what they have in terms of like the Knicks. And I think it's, you know, if you're a fan, you're a fan and you feel it deep inside. Okay. So my follow up to that is just this. And I think, I remember you were on JJ Reddix pod several years ago where you kind of like squirmed a little on this one because he was asking you about like some of the rough years. Right. But I do wonder like, are there moments there where you're thinking like, because you see they make the same mistakes over and over again. Organizationally and everything. I know this so don't necessarily want to go down some of that road. But just like how does a fan keep the faith when an organization like disappoints you over and over that many times?

And did you ever actually, I mean, you had to have thought at a certain point we'll never see this day. And I know that the point of fandom is that you always have the faith. But like, I imagine it was tested. Yeah, it was, it was a hard time for sure. You know, I think the Phil Jackson thing was like a really tough time because it was everybody was so hopeful. Yeah. You know, like you can't blame them for bringing Phil Jackson in in terms of like as an idea,

maybe the reality of it. Yeah. Yeah. What do you think? Well, obviously, I have high regard for Phil and covered him with. The Lakers as a coach, but like he's, he was never a front office guy. So I thought he was missed cast. So maybe that was, yeah, but we as fans would like respond to it's like Phil Jackson's coming.

Yes. Yeah. Well, it was like Mary Brown's coming. Exactly. Isaiah Thomas is coming. And they crashed and burn. They all crashed and burn. Yeah.

So that's a little bit of the institutional kind of like, you know, memory of that kind of thing. Yeah. So there were times, especially I think after Phil Jackson where it felt like, okay, well, then this is never going to happen, you know? And then it was just like, it felt, you know, kind of miss, we were like kind of like in the, in the sort of, it just didn't feel like it had any direction. But, you know, slowly over the last five years, right,

there's really been an upward trend, right? And Leon Rose, you know, did his thing. And man, these players, like the players that, you know, it was like when we lost Dante, that was one at one moment where I thought like, okay, gosh, because it was like a special magic happening. Yes. And I questioned that.

And I didn't know Kat before he came. And I just quickly, you know, just came to love Kat because I realized like this guy is, again, like a lot of the players on the team never really got their flowers, never really were celebrated. And it has something to prove. And he, you know, he has been able to withstand the media hype and pressure cooker of New York. And a lot of players haven't been able to. And he could. And he understood how to weather this year, how to get through this year to get to this. Which is interesting because I think one of the concerns when Kat arrived was like, is he going to be tough enough for that?

Like he's from New Jersey and everything, but still like because of his public persona and I think people could look at him as soft as a personality or as a player sometimes. And it was like, can he handle the crucible of New York? Because a lot of guys have been broken by by that spotlight. And he can and he could. And he had the toughest test, I think, in terms of having to withstand that and to shut out the noise and having to learn. Because look, he had this great year last year, right? And then Mike Brown came and all of a sudden, you know, he was kind of lost in this system and he was saying it. And everybody was like going, when are they going to connect?

But we knew he was a great player. But there was the question, can he win a championship? And then he had to deal with all of this adversity this year in terms of fitting into this team or how people perceived him or like this quote unquote soft. all that, which is all kind of bullshit, really, because it's all just perception from the outside. Yes. But really when you get to know someone like that, you realize, oh, this guy is like really dedicated to winning. And he is trying to figure out how, as a guy who's, you know, number one traffic and has had

to, like, shed a lot of ego to make it work on this team. He is, I think, a huge key to why we have this championship. Yeah. Okay. OG and Anobie. I need you to, I have a couple more questions of this, but OG and Anobie tip in. Take me through that. You're on the sidelines.

Was that, where does that rank among life moments? Number one, I think. Oh, in terms of life moments? Yeah. Oh, life moments. It's up, it's up there for like, you know, like moments of like special incredible things happening, you know? But like it's a sports moment, like a New York sports moment for me, probably number one.

How were you feeling during that comeback and take us all the way through to the comeback? I was, I was, I was feeling like we were going to lose the game. I felt like, you know, because. because it was just, we were down. We couldn't get back. We kept on, you know, trying to get back in it. I felt like I was at the point where like, okay,

we're just going to have to figure out how to regroup and go back there. And, you know, I, Christine, my wife was with me was much more positive. And she kept on looking at it and saying, look, you know, we can get back in this thing. And then it started to happen. And as it started to happen, I still was like not really fully on board until we were like four points down. But, you know, and having seen what happened with the Cleveland game and how we did that, it was, I was like, okay, can we really do that again? This is, this seemed worse to me. Though I think maybe a certain point in the fourth quarter, we might have been in better shape than we were even in the Cleveland game when we started to come back at certain points. Yeah. Yeah. But like it just felt like so daunting. And then that play at the end is like I just feel like it's the sort of like epitome of just an amazing sports moment.

terms of the grace, the athleticism, the timing for OG in terms of, you know, everything that went into him tipping that in and what it looked like. And you know, those the images of this shot, this hand of God, the hand of OG. It's one of the most graceful sports moments I've ever seen. And it made, I mean, I've never felt anything like it. I was filming it too. But then all of a sudden right after that, there was this moment of like, oh my God, this is girl.

I actually ran out on the court like with my camera like filming. the celebration part. And then I realized, oh, wait, the game's not over because they still have it a second and whatever, 1.2 seconds or whatever left. So that, you know, that, then there was that moment. And then Kat tips it, which by the way, people don't really talk about. Because in real time, nobody saw it or noticed it. And I'm not sure if the broadcast even did.

I didn't know until like 12 hours later because social media started putting that clip out. And I already written a whole story about all these other things that happened. And I didn't even mention that because I did not know. But you can see it. Or the crazy. He see three that he hit too, where he fell into the bench. Yeah. Another pivotal shot.

Yeah. Incredible. One of the most incredible moments. Two more things. Two more things. One thing, what was it like to see Wemby at his biggest moment? What was that like? Did he put the fear of God of you? What was that like? He's so interesting, you know? He's so interesting because, you know, he has that look in his eye, like he knows something. And, you know, he's, I don't know, man. I can't feel. figure him out yet. I think he's a formidable opponent, you know, it's like this game even,

you know, like before the end where it just, it's sort of, it all kind of fell apart for them. But, you know, he, you know, when he's on and he's hitting the shots and or when, you know, it's so like daunting when he would block a shot, it's kind of like demoralizing, you know, just when he goes and blocks something just because it's so like, nope, you're not going to do that. I think he's going to, you know, he's going to be a great and everything. He's probably going to learn from this, but I think, you know, honestly, it feels to me like, you know, this moment, there's probably nothing like this moment I know as a fan when I'm feeling, the pressure I'm feeling is a fan. I can only imagine for the players. You know, it's, yeah, he is like

from another world in terms of, you know, when you watch him on the court, but, uh, Knicks, man, the Knicks figured out how to deal with that. Jalen Brunson said, I don't care. I'll shoot over you. Last thing. I need you to look in the camera right here. I need you to do. give a message. It said, Nick's tape, Nix Mafia, the city of New York, going into the parade. I need you to look right here.

I need you to give me some energy. I need you to give a message to New York right now. New York. We did it. Nix! Champs! Woo! Nix did it!

Nix win! Nix in five! Yeah, yeah, right. All right, but that has been another addition of real ones. That was... That was fantastic. We should get Ben to do all the shits, bye.

Bye. Let's do it as a group. All right. All the shits. Bye. Must be 21 years and older and present in select states. For Kansas, an affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 and older and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Gambling problem.

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