Of all the years for the New York Knicks to draw mockery for their consistent lottery shortcomings, 2020 shouldn’t be one of them.
We know why the New York Knicks were once again the laughing stock of the NBA’s annual draft lottery. The team with the sixth-worst record earned the No. 8 pick, continuing a streak that hasn’t seen the league’s biggest market move up from their predetermined draft spot since 1985.
In just about any other year, that ridicule would be justified. Because with any other draft class, conventional wisdom suggests the higher pick affords the chance to select the better players. The difference between picking in the first half of the top-10 offers significant advantages to the second.
As with everything, however, that has occurred worldwide this year, the NBA’s class of 2020 has proven different from its predecessors. For once, then, maybe New York can use its lottery shortcomings to its benefit.
Where in the draft a player is selected has a lot to do with the pressures they face heading into their rookie season and for the remainder of their careers. Nobody would’ve cared had Anthony Bennett’s failures been lost in the sea of late lottery picks who suffered a similar fate. Instead, going No. 1 shined a light only a handful of players failed to handle.
The external stress of being a top draft pick increases tremendously for those selected by the Knicks. Though the bar amongst their fanbase has dropped to levels seeking the most basic levels of competency and player development, New York’s never-ending media market would love nothing more than to anoint a savior of Madison Square Garden.
A coronation of such magnitude works when it was potentially a head like Zion Williamson’s underneath the crown. Though not the prohibitive favorite coming out of high school, Williamson took little time to earn that title well ahead of the 2019 Draft.
Teams would’ve done anything for that top pick because the prize was that tantalizing. The same traditionally goes for any top-five pick. A year after Zion along with Ja Morant and R.J. Barrett, the bar has dropped considerably in 2020, returning shades of 2013 where no prospect was at a level high enough to break away from their draft classmates.
This isn’t to suggest the 2020 Draft will be barren of All-Stars or even high-end talent. Your Giannis Antetokounmpos and Rudy Goberts — picked 15th and 27th, respectively in 2013 — can always be unearthed with the right tools. But for those looking for a surefire Rookie of the Year favorite, nobody can say with any certainty who comes close to offering the best odds in a draft with some of the weakest top-talent we’ve ever seen.
That doesn’t absolve the Minnesota Timberwolves, or any of the teams picking top-five, from making sure they beat those odds. Would the Knicks have been any different, if not worse off in failure given the lofty standard they’re held to?
Picking correctly looks to be a near-impossible task the Knicks would not have been able to avoid without trading out of it. It’s why, despite the influx of talent New York desperately needs, failing to land a top pick isn’t missing out.
Are any one of the available draftees worth the deadly combo of being the No. 1 pick in a place like New York? Do the Knicks earn any benefit of the doubt if the toss-up they choose falls poorly?
Drafting at any spot rarely offers much assurance, but more often than not it presents a significantly higher risk/reward ratio than anyone in the 2020 Draft can.
Teams would probably like to control their fate instead of letting the decisions of others do it form them. Considering the draft’s landscape, it’s unlikely to return to bite the Knicks as much as previous draft-related nightmares have. And who knows, maybe amid all the uncertainty, the draft’s best player slips through the cracks all the way to No. 8.
The Knicks dodged a challenge with odds massively stacked against them. For a franchise clamoring for all the right reasons to be in the spotlight, that’s why this is one they should be thankful to have avoided. Despite what so many in and around the NBA might have to say that would make fans feel differently.