{"id":122175,"date":"2025-02-06T15:37:09","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T20:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=122175"},"modified":"2025-02-06T15:37:09","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T20:37:09","slug":"knicks-big-man-should-have-been-moved-this-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/02\/06\/knicks-big-man-should-have-been-moved-this-deadline\/","title":{"rendered":"Knicks’ Big Man Should Have Been Moved This Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"

Contrary to the past two seasons, the New York Knicks stood pat this trade deadline, watching contenders around them trade for stars, hoping to bolster their rosters. After acquiring<\/a> OG Anunoby<\/a> and Josh Hart<\/a> through in-season moves over the last few years, the Knicks did not have much to do. They unloaded their assets in the offseason, trading<\/a> for Mikal Bridges<\/a> and Karl-Anthony Towns<\/a>, moves that have worked spectacularly for them. Yes, the Knicks were rumored to be shopping Jericho Sims<\/a>\u00a0and Mitchell Robinson<\/a> around the league, and while Sims was traded for cap relief, they took Robinson off the market on the day of the deadline.<\/p>\n

Knicks’ Big Man Should Have Been Moved This Deadline<\/h2>\n

Knicks’ Early Defensive Concerns<\/h3>\n

The Knicks entered the 2024-25 season with key concerns in only one area: interior defense. Mitchell Robinson and\u00a0Precious Achiuwa<\/a> had been injured, and Towns’ defense had never been his strong suit. So they struggled, starting just 11-8 over the first month with a defense giving up 113 points per game. Achiuwa’s return<\/a> helped initially, but as of late, it has been a detriment. The Knicks defense is 2.0 points worse<\/a> when he’s on the court, giving up 115.8 points. <\/span><\/p>\n

To compensate for this flaw, the Knicks collapse into the paint when opposing players try to get to the rim. However, this leaves the perimeter open, leading to wide-open threes that have killed the Knicks all season long. Opponents shoot 37.8% from 3<\/a> against the Knicks, the worst defensive mark in the league. Ideally, that’s where Mitchell Robinson comes in.<\/p>\n

Mitchell Robinson<\/h3>\n

Since entering the NBA, Mitchell Robinson has been an awesome rim protector, arguably one of the best in the league. If he qualified<\/a>, Mitchell Robinson would rank 2nd amongst active players in blocks per 100 possessions, with a staggering 3.8. He is an elite rim protector and can hold the fort down, even when playing alongside mediocre defenders. Robinson’s return would give the Knicks another elite rebounder alongside Towns and Hart, and the Knicks would be able to generate 2nd chances at an extremely high level.<\/p>\n

His height and strength would deter opponents from even coming close to the rim, and this would help the Knicks’ wings focus on their perimeter assignments without worrying about collapsing into the paint. Mitchell Robinson gives the Knicks a lob threat and helps generate easy offense by giving him the ball inside.<\/p>\n

Mitchell Robinson Should Have Been Moved<\/h3>\n

In Robinson’s case, “the best ability is availability” rings true. For all his talent and greatness, Mitchell Robinson’s long-storied injury history has limited how high the Knicks could go. He has played just 90 games combined over the 2022-23 and 2023-24 NBA seasons. Robinson’s healthiest season came in 2021-22, but that is looking like an outlier more than anything. Since the 2020-21 season, the Knicks have played in 369 regular season games. Robinson has played in just 193 of those 369 games.<\/p>\n

The worst part is that his recent injury might be his worst one. After injuring his ankle against the Philadelphia 76ers in the 1st-round of the playoffs, Robinson underwent ankle surgery in the offseason. His initial return timeline was set for December, but since then, it has been continuously pushed back. Currently, there is no clarity on when he will return. The Knicks have struggled against potent offenses because it’s extremely easy for teams to draw attention to the paint and then kick it out to the open man.<\/p>\n

The Last Word on Trading Mitchell Robinson<\/h3>\n

This whole argument is based on Robinson’s health issues. His impact on the Knicks will be noticeable, and the Knicks will likely be a much better defensive unit when he’s back. However, there is no guarantee that he will not re-injure his ankle or that he won’t sustain another injury simply because his injury history has not been kind.<\/p>\n

The Knicks should have considered moving on from him. At the deadline, they could have acquired a stable big man who can be reliable come the playoffs. However, if Robinson is healthy throughout the playoffs and the Knicks win it all, nothing matters.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photo Credit: \u00a9 Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Contrary to the past two seasons, the New York Knicks stood pat this trade deadline, watching contenders around them trade for stars, hoping to bolster their rosters. After acquiring OG Anunoby and Josh Hart through in-season moves over the last few years, the Knicks did not have much to do. They unloaded their assets in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5089,"featured_media":122398,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12,1608,62],"tags":[1616,4745,1382],"class_list":["post-122175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-knicks","category-basketball","category-nba","tag-mitchell-robinson","tag-nba-injuries","tag-nba-trade"],"modified_by":"Jacob Stephens, Associate Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5089"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122175"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":122400,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122175\/revisions\/122400"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}