NBA Way to Goat for franchise: New York Knicks
We continue with the Goat ranking, franchise to franchise. Today, it is the New York Knicks turn
Continue The Ranking Goat Franchice to the NBA franchise. Before continuing, it is important to define the evaluation criteria: it is not about best players but of the ones that have had the most impact For the team in its history. We put, in a situation, trajectory, championships won, faithfulness and, of course, quality.
This committee composed of a single person has decided to immerse yourself in swampy waters to bring definitions. We will be inflexible. We will be dogmatic. And we will bring answers.
Made the respective clarifications, We get into New York Knicks Top 10.
Adjust your belts. It is time to take off.
More Goats: Los Angeles Lakers | Boston Celtics
The ten position for Oakley It is, in itself, a message: there are the best basketball players and the best players of a specific team. The inmate of the Knicks In the 1990s belongs, of course, to the second category. Oakley He had everything that the great apple loves: fight, character and fidelity. A warrior under the boards.
They will not find it in the Hall of Fame, but in the heart of New York fans. In the most beautiful memories of Spike Lee. He averaged, in a decade at Madison Square Garden, 10.4 points and 10 rebounds by appearance, he was twice in the defensive team of the year and had a maxim that taught the public, rivals and colleagues: if they make us points, they must win them. Blood, sweat and tears.
Came from Chicago Bulls, the team nemesis of the Knicks With Michael Jordan at the head, but found in New York, next to Patrick Ewing In painting, your true home. Disciplined student of Pat Riley, was All-Star in 1994. A sports thug.
9. Carmelo Anthony (2011-17)
They once said that Melo He was a black hole: a ball that fell into his hands, he never returned. But in the Knicksdespite the illusion of championship never concretized, he did not badly.
It is not a knick of pure strain, because Melo We will always associate it with Denver Nuggets, but it was the player who, having been born in New Yorkhe returned the joy to the Big Apple when he signed in 2011 with Chaunley Billups, after several years of continuous frustrations and lack of emotions.
In his seven seasons in the franchise, Anthony He averaged 24.7 points, 3.2 assists and siere rebounds per game, with 36.9% in shots behind the arch. Beyond the individual, the group was in debt: with him as star they arrived three times to playoffs and won a single series. Too little for the dust that raised his arrival.
8. Bill Bradley (1967-77)
We do not know how many fans know this, but here we go: in addition to legend of the Knicks, Bradley He was senator of the United States for New Jersey and presidency candidate. In fact, he competed with Al Gore to be a candidate of the Democratic Party in the elections of the year 2000, which ended up winning George W. Bush.
Outside the desk, Bradley He was an excellent basketball player, always attentive to the orders of Red Holzman. He was also a curious man: after playing at the University of Oxford, he went to Olympia Milano, something atypical for the time, and won the 1967 European Cup there in the Knicks He played ten years, was part of the two championships that won the franchise (1970 and 1973) and averaged 12.4 points, 3.4 assists and 3.2 rebounds per game.
A special man who deserves, without a doubt, to be in the Top 10 of the history of the Big Apple.
7. Bernard King (1982-87)
The committee composed of a single person opted for King above Anthonybut believe me that subjectivity plays here, because your cases are quite similar. It is not a player who protrudes for his faithfulness, nor for his rings experience, but he did marked an era for his scoring capacity, his determining height for the post of the small eaves and his surreal percentages of annotation (54.3% in field shots).
Played from 1982 to 1987 in the Knicksbut in reality there were four seasons. And in each of them he left his seal as a different player, highlighting the 60 points turned against the New Jersey Nets at Christmas 1984, a regular series in which he finished at most scorer with 32.9 points per game.
In the fight in the ranking, it takes some advantage to Carmelo In playoffs: under the command of Hubie Brown, the teams of Bernard King They arrived in playoffs twice and won two series.
Be careful, because Brunson Today is sixth, but it can end up being the best Knick of history. He already had a gesture that exalts him: sacrifice money in his renewal last season to assemble a competitive team.
Brunsonfrom the Dallas Mavericks, it is today the king of New York. It was twice all-stop in the Knicks And he scored 5,535 points, in addition to delivering 1,415 assists. His great challenge will now come as leader: chosen by the NBA as the clutch man, that of the determining instances, must already be rearmed without Tom Thibodeau in the substitute bank.
Pull He led the Knicks to recover his greatness: after several years of frustrations they won, with him as leader, playoff series in 2023, 2024 and 2025, the year in which the conference finals reached for the first time since 2000.
Brunson is decisive. And unlike all the players of this ranking, its history continues to be written.
5. Earl Monroe (1971-80)
The best nickname in the history of the NBA? The Pearl. The pearl. Fine, elegant, different. A player to save in the trunk of memories and bring him to the most distinguished conversations. And if it seems little, he had another magical nickname that then attributed it to Michael Jordan: Black Jesus. These nomenclatures were not random: we talked here about a Playground legend, a man who brought magic to the league before Magic Johnson.
Monroe He was one of the best perimeter in history and won a title with the Knicks In 1973. For 1970, the year that New York broke the drought, The Pearl made of his in Baltimore Bullets, where he was a rookie of the year (1968) and played his first four years in the NBA.
Four times All-Star, he arrived at Hall of Fame in 1990 and shared greatness with two Gigantes de la Grand apple as Willis Reed and Walt Frazier. The one of Monroe It was meaning, but it was also significant: the form. Virtuosity. The way to do things. Winning is Better Than Losing, and Championships are Why you play the game.
“I don’t think he was a player as good as Michael Jordan, but he was more fun to see anyone. He had a spectacular personal style and a spectacular charism. Woody Allen, New York legend, to The Observer in 2002.
4. Dave Debusscher (1968-74)
We enter the definition stage. Welcome to Top 4. The transfer of DEBUSSCHER Since Detroit Pistons was the turning point for the take -off of the franchise, because just some time later the Knicks The 1970 and 1973 championships won. In fact, they arrived and played their first conference final after 16 years outside those instances.
Is one of the four players of this top ten (Bill Bradley, Walt Frazier and Willis Reed) that participated in the only two championships of the Big Apple. It was eight times there in his entire career (1966-1968, 1970-1974)-five in the Knicks-and arrived at the Hall of Fame in 1983. As a member of the franchise, he made 6,957 points and took 4,671 rebounds. But more than in attack, his performance was in defense: a fighter, aguerrido, combative, determining. Since he arrived at the franchise, he was always in the defensive teams.
It is known that DEBUSSCHER It was key for Reed be in the mythical party 7 of the NBA finals of 1970. Bill Bradley He said it was DEBUSSCHER who inspired Reed to appear at the Madison Square Garden despite the injury that afflicted him.
He averaged, like Knick, 16.0 points, 3.1 assists and 10.7 rebounds per game. Native of Detroit, divided his career: 440 games with the Pistons, 435 with New York.
3. Willis Reed (1964-74)
Reed It meant a lot for the Knicks. Not only for the two titles achieved in 1970 and 1973, but because he was a man who played above his possibilities. Smaller than his colleagues in the center position, he looked unforgettable battles against giants like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wes Unseld or Wilt Chamberlain.
He played ten years in the big block, but in just seven seasons he was really healthy. He was a rookie of the year in 1964 and in addition to winning the championship twice, it was both MVP opportunities of the finals. It is included, in this section, The mythical ‘Willis Reed Game’ In 1970, in front of the Lakers, in which he entered the Madison Square Garden in game 7 overcoming an injury and inspiring his team to win the title.
ReedMVP in 1971, entered Hall of Fame in 1982. ‘The captain’ may have been for many the best Knick of history. But the injuries forced him to leave soon: he retired at age 31, with 650 games played and averages of 18.7 points and 12.9 rebounds per meeting.
2. Patrick Ewing (1985-2000)
The 90s belonged to Ewing. He arrived in the 1985 draft to the Big Apple and the great mischief of his career is that he said goodbye without being able to win titles. But his faithfulness, his talent and his link with the city that does not sleep, was infinite. Say Ewingin New York, it’s like saying Sinatra.
It was eleven times All-Star, rookie of the year in 1986 and won two Olympic gold Ewing It was a central piece on the two sides of the court. No ball, it was decisive. He took the franchise to 13 trips to the playoffs in three years and played two NBA finals (1994 and 1999). It is also the maximum historical scorer of the Knicks and its validity was a determining factor to have the second position of the Goat ranking. Only in the outcome of his career came to wear the Seattle Supersonics and Orlando Magic uniform.
Pat He led the franchise, in addition to converted points, minutes, rebounds, tapas and robberies. A legend with all the letters.
1. Walt Frazier (1967-77)
Synonym for elegance, Frazier It is, for whom he writes, the best Knick of history. Key piece in the only two franchise championships, he was in the ideal quintet four times and was there seven times. He was not just a basketball player, he was an artist: Clydenickname that he received for wearing a hat similar to Warren Beatty’s Bonnie and Clydehas one of the best performances of a player in a game 7 in the entire NBA history: 36 points, 19 assists, seven rebounds and five robberies so that the Knicks They defeat the Lakers in the 1970 decisive game.
He was always grandiloquent. On and off the court, there were no chances that Frazier Not being the protagonist. In that, he always twinned with the city of New York: it was contained, but it was also form. Basketball-art from the transfer: music, sport and show. In his ten years with the Knicksalways stood out for his defense. A white gloves thief who was seven times in the defensive team of the year and is a member of the Hall of Fame since 1987.
It is, up to date, the maximum historical assistor of the Knicks. His 10 -number 10 shirt hangs from the Madison Square Garden roof since December 15, 1979.
