Why Jalen Brunson will FAIL to lead New York Knicks to NBA Finals | Draymond Green Show

Welcome to the brand new Draymond Green Show YouTube channel. Hit subscribe so you don't miss out on any of our content. Jalen Brunson has now passed Carmelo Anthony in playoff points. Um, and I know it's been this debate about is Jalen Brunson, uh, like one of the greatest Knicks ever already and all of these things. And I have a hard time saying Jalen Brunson is higher up than Melo because I came in the league underneath Melo. You know, Melo, one of the superstars in the league when I came in. And you know, just watching Melo my entire life, you know, I feel like one of those old heads that be hating on the younger guys. Like, when our generation, when this guy did that, and can never see past that. But I still gotta roll with Melo for now. But Jalen Brunson is making his mark. And I think right now is a great time for us to bring on our guests because If we gonna talk Knicks, I wanna talk Knicks with these crazy-ass Knicks fans that they just banter and banter and banter. So let's welcome our guest to the show, uh, the host of the All In podcast, one of the most successful angel investors of our time, Jason Kalkanis, my friend.

What's up, Draymond?

What's up, my brother?

It's good to be here, uh, and I have been watching and taking notes on the Draymond Green Show. I know you have a lot of feelings about the Knicks, and you know I have a lot of feelings about the Knicks, and I've been rooting for them my whole life since the Patrick Ewing era when I got to see Jordan and Ewing and Alonzo Mourning and all this stuff. And you've been dogging me in the group chat and at poker for over a decade about my Knicks. And here we are. You're in Cabo getting that fishing in in May. Getting that early sun and my Knicks, my Knicks in 6 in the first round versus the MVP with our future MVP. And here we are. Looks like the brooms are out for Pacers. I, I called it a gentleman sweep 5 and I'm ready for Celtics. I'm ready for Celtics. And you know what? The Celtics do not wanna play the Knicks. I can tell you that.

You, you, y'all actually think that y'all, number one, He talks about me being outta the playoffs. So, so again, when I— Coming in hot. When I, when I talk delusional Knicks fans, he talks about me being out the playoffs, being fishing in Cabo in early May as if they've won a championship. Y'all are in the second round. Like it's the second round of the playoffs.

You have no idea, Draymond, if you, if you have a man who's dying in the desert, right? And you give them a Dixie cup of water, that's like swimming in an ocean for us, man. This is, you just pop champagne bottles. I'm at the buffet. We have been starving for decades. We got a little bit of Carmelo, uh, you know, but since then, you know, we, we've had a lot of pain. You know, we had Dead Tony, we had Eddie Curry. I mean, we've had pain and suffering, man. Let us enjoy it is what I'm trying to tell you, Draymond. Let us enjoy it. But that I, I, I have questions for you. And by the way, I just wanna say your podcast is so great outta the gate.

Thank you.

And you went from doing, you know, what's really easy, you know, being part of a panel or popping in other people's podcasts to the second most difficult, which is doing solo podcasts. And, you know, doing a solo podcast is so hard and you, you, you do it so tight, especially after you're getting off the court. You know, when you do it after a game, I mean, unprecedented. And so I just wanna give you a lot of, a lot of kudos for that. 'Cause it's, it's impressive to me for somebody who's done 2,000 episodes of podcasts.

Thank you. I appreciate that.

The question I have, you know, for you is, you know, Brunson, we as Knick fans have been watching him get better and better and better. And he had those moments, you know, on the Mavs when Luka was out. And I, I asked Mark Cuban, uh, we're friendly, and I said, how good is this kid we traded for here? And he said, he's very good. I said, how much upside? He says, he's got upside. But this is more upside than the entire NBA expected. So for sure, putting aside You know, the fact that you're very rarely not in the postseason and the Knicks are never in the postseason. I, I wanted to ask you, as a player, what are we seeing from Brunson? Because there's people, you know, Chuck and, and Shaq who are kind of dogging the Knicks. You're dogging him. But let's talk about that player because I've been watching all season as he gets better and better and more unstoppable and more unstoppable. And the floater, the 3. Yeah. The picks, I mean the mid-range, this kid can do it all. So, so how good is he? Putting aside the Carmelo comparison, just how good is he and is there upside left? My two questions for you.

Y'all see this crazy bromance going on? This man just gave us a complete rundown to Jalen Brunson on the Draymond Green Show, but I'm here for it 'cause I actually like and respect Jalen Brunson. Jalen Brunson is a winner, has been a winner, so he got my respect. But here's the thing, J Cal, If Jalen Bronson was who he is today and everybody believed that he would be who he is today, he wouldn't be a Knick. Because you don't let, you don't let star players get away, let alone walk for nothing. And he walked from the Dallas Mavericks for absolutely nothing. The fact that they are actually in the position that they're in when you lost a guy like that, for absolutely nothing one year prior is absolutely incredible in itself. But no one expected Jaylen to be this. No, he also wouldn't have signed— when Jaylen signed his deal, which I think is right around 4 years, $100 million or something like that.

Yeah, about $25 million a year.

Everybody was like, oh my God, he's overpaid. I can't believe they paid him that money. Do they think he's gonna be a number one option? Worldwide West is paying him because he's had relationship with him since he was a kid. You know, Leon Rose, they're taking care of their CAA guys. And although it appeared that way, that, that, that's what was happening. I mean, the NBA even launched an entire—

Yes.

—tampering allegation thing over because Uncle Wes was so close to Jalen and the family all these years. And all of those things were launched from the NBA standpoint. Meaning nobody thought that this was who this kid would be and that it was only happening. They were only signing him to the Knicks because they were taking care of family.

Yeah.

And Jalen has made everybody look like idiots. He's made, he's put the New York Knicks on his back. He's got people talking about him within the ranks of the greatest Knicks of all times. And although the Knicks hasn't won a ton, the, the great Knicks that have played, like there's been great Knicks that have played for, for the team. And when you look at what he's done over and over and over again, he missed the entire second quarter last night and has 20+ points in the second half to carry those guys to a win. I mean, it's, it's been incredible. To Mark's point, he has some upside for sure, but no one believes that he had this much upside because no one, well, the Dallas Mavericks would've never let him walk.

No, they would've got some picks. They would've done a sign and trade. This was the best signing that we've seen, like a straight up signing. Since when? Like when do players ever just get signed in the free market? Doesn't happen anymore.

It doesn't happen. Uh, unless you're Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, who's just trying to get back home, right? Like they were trying to get back to Los Angeles, but you don't really get signings like that. And like I said, it's not even so much the signing because we've seen big guys like Kevin Durant sign with the Warriors, right? Like we've seen Shaquille O'Neal, like you've seen over the years star players sign other places. But the thing about Jalen is, the thing about this signing is again, the value of the contract.

It's incredible.

So they got this guy, Now here's the thing for Jalen. When, when like he has to make All-NBA and do these things so that he can get the full max extension. Because if not, if he doesn't, and, and I'm not even sure that that's how the rule works, but Jalen with years of service, I don't think he'll be able to sign a max extension. And don't fully quote me on that 'cause I could be a little off with the rule.. But I don't think he'll be able to sign a full max extension unless the Knicks have cap space. And if they have cap space, they can use that. But because the extensions work on the last number of your contract, so you get a 7.5% raise, I think he's able to get, um, on the last number of his contract. That doesn't put him near the full max. That's the situation the Knicks are in. And that's what makes this signing. Mm-hmm.— even better than, than the play is looking.

Okay. So now I got another question for you, and I think that that's a really important way to set the table for my next question. 'Cause Dallas didn't know what they were giving up, and obviously nobody in the league knew he had this much potential. And the Knicks obviously knew he had potential, but they were putting him alongside Randle and our number 3 pick at the time, MidJay. I'm sorry, RJ Barrett.

Oh, the RJ Strays.

He's a stray. He's a— why? I, I never liked the kid. Jesus. Come on. Every time he drove the basket, he would miss layups. You can't miss layups.

So Knicks fans hated RJ Barrett.

We just felt he was a blocker and not committed. He didn't feel like he had the conditioning, the heart. He didn't drive. He, he didn't fit the dog mode that Tibbs and the Knicks fans want. We want dogs on our team. We want Mason, we want Oakley, we want Starks, we want grit. We want people who play both sides, defense. And if there's a scruff, you know, we basically want Oakley, Draymond level players who are going to fight to the end. This is why when I met you, I said, you know, like in another lifetime you would've been a Knick because the Garden would love you, Draymond. You know that. And I don't know how many years you got left in the tank, but if there's any way to get you on my Knicks.

You think y'all got better with getting RJ out?

I absolutely believe RJ was a blocker for our success. 100%.

Wow.

Because, You got to remember, who did we get when we got rid of RJ? We got OG. OG. And OG is the Tibbs, Tibbs player. He'll play, he'll play 40, 42, 48, whatever number of minutes you give him. He'll play defense, he'll set screens, and he can score the 3. This is what Tibbs wants. So this is my next question. How much credit do you give to this front office? Because you worked with the best front office, I don't know, in 20 years. —and you put together the two best, most beautiful teams since, you know, the, the— what was it, the '73-win Bulls, the '72-win Bulls, whatever.

'72-win. There's only one team with 73.

'73, that's you. And then '72 was theirs. So let's pause for a second here. They got OG the year before we got Hart. We got your guy, Al Dente. He was underrated, clearly. And, uh, then this kid Hartenstein. Who is like, I mean, a passing big man with the soft touch and the floater. How, how good is our front office? Because we have nobody. I think our highest rated draft pick is maybe the 16th or 17th. You know something about going low in the draft and then—

Absolutely.

Becoming an all-star and a champion. How good is our front office? 'Cause we've now established that we got Brunson for a steal. Now go down the line, the 4 players I just talked about, Hartenstein, Hart, OG, and your guy, Aldonte. How good's our front office right now?

I think y'all front office has done great. For all those, for all those things that has happened with y'all team that you just named, I think the front office has done a great job in putting together a team that is just good enough to excite Knicks fans in the Garden and just good enough to win a couple playoff series and not quite good enough to win a championship. I think y'all front office has done an incredible job of that. I'll also tell you another underrated move of the front office. Bringing in Tibbs, because Tibbs actually fits your, like to your point of what you just described with the New York Knicks, Tibbs actually fits what New York culture is. It's go, go, go, hustle, bustle. You hit the streets of New York, you're walking to this meeting, you're running to that meeting, you're crossing over in front of this taxi. Like it's go, go, go, go, go. Josh Hart's playing 48 minutes. Draymond Green's playing 46 minutes. Dante's playing 45 minutes. Like that, he actually fits the New York model like bar none. Now here's the thing though, when you start talking about all of those Olympic, excuse me, all of those minutes, OG Anunoby hamstring, you know, like it don't always show up right then, but it shows up in the most important times and yet, kind of the worst times. Like OG Anunoby is probably now out for this series. Like that's a big game changer.

Hamstring is not pretty, right? That's a hard one.

He's probably like, he's probably won't be back until midway through the next series. And when he gets back from that, he probably still won't be right. Like that's gonna take a while to get over because you also gotta get over that mentally. And so to your question, I think the front office has done an incredible job from the coaching staff they've put together to, the roster that they've put together. But I'm gonna tell you this, Coach Izzo used to tell me this term all the time. And he used to say, Draymond, we have this term in basketball, in coaching, we have this term in coaching that we like to use. And he, and you know, when you look around, a lot of guys really fit into the mold. And I'm like, all right, coach, what's the term? Just good enough to lose with. And that's what I think the Knicks are. Yeah. I think the Knicks are, fun team to watch. I think they're hard nose. I think they got guys that compete, but I don't think they quite have enough to get over the finish line. And guess what? It's looking like there's gonna be a new champion in the NBA this year. A young champion that we've never seen in the NBA before as a champion leading a team to a championship. That look like it's pretty much gonna happen. 'Cause I think Denver's toast. Right. And so, The only chance that doesn't happen is if Denver wins again. They don't stand a chance. However, it's, I'm sorry to tell you, J Cal.

Yeah.

I don't quite think it's the Knicks year. I don't quite think so.

You know, I, we don't necessarily think like this is the year, the year we've lost. We've been down, we've been down basically 3 starters, 4 starters this year and we still put up a 50 burger, 50 burgers on the grill without without the blockness monster Mitch Robinson, without Randle, who's a bulldog and had his best season, and he seemed to got his head straight this year and accepted a role and, and, you know, got downhill and just made quicker moves. 'Cause I, I don't know if you saw the Atlanta series a couple years ago, man, the big stage at the Garden. He was—

It was bad. It was real bad.

Bad. He was bad. Yeah, it was bad. I mean, this year was his best, best performance. I, I'm kind of bummed about him. And so, you know, we, we're realistic. It ain't pretty, but it's gritty and nobody wants to face us. 'Cause you were out there saying, oh, we're not getting past the 76ers. Joel Embiid, we got no answer.

Man, Joel couldn't move. Zip, zip, zip.

Zip, zip, zip.

The guy could not move. He's out there playing.

He was 80, what was he, 70%?

He's out there playing on a half of a knee. Can't move. Like, Come on. All right, but listen, I'm happy.

You still thought they were gonna beat us. You want me to tell you what this is gonna lead the Knicks to?

I'll tell you what this is gonna lead the Knicks to.

Okay, tell me.

You just mentioned the Atlanta Hawks.

Okay.

And when they beat y'all, and when they beat y'all in the Garden.

Yep.

That team then thought that they had a squad that was ready to compete and they haven't reached near the conference finals since then. They've barely reached the playoffs since then because like in the Eastern Conference, the Eastern Conference weak as fuck. In the Eastern Conference, you can sometimes get the right matchups even all the way up to the conference finals. So I'm gonna tell you this, there's a 0% chance in the NBA, I mean, excuse me, in the Western Conference that you're going to get to the conference finals without facing like a dog ass team.

Yeah.

And in the Eastern Conference, You can get to the conference finals à la Atlanta Hawks with like playing very mid teams. And so that's kind of what y'all are doing right now. And I think what this is setting up for y'all up for is what happened to the Atlanta Hawks 3 years ago when they made the conference finals and they never got back. Another team to give you some perspective on this.

Hold on.

Nope, but one second. Another team that did this to give you some perspective on this, was the Portland Trail Blazers years ago when they had Al-Farouq Aminu, Alan Crabbe, all those guys. They had all those guys and they went to the conference finals and we swept them pretty much without Steph Curry coming. Because Steph Curry came back game 4 of the sweep, came off the bench, had 5 points or 6 points the whole game, and then went crazy in overtime.

That's—

And that— Portland Trailblazers team, they never did anything again. They, however, you know what they did? They ran off and paid all of those guys because they thought they had a team that had a chance and, and it was a fluke. And so that's what the Knicks are setting y'all up for right now. And it'll be probably another 15 years of misery that we all will sit around and laugh at Knicks fans with, with their delusion about— Here we go. Knicks for clicks.

That's just, that's just what it, that's just what happens. You know what's going to happen now. Everybody wants to play on the big stage. You said it yourself. You love the Garden. It is the Mecca. And now we have a high-functioning team. And our owner, he's busy. He's busy with his Sphere. He's happy. Dolan's happy. He's got music. He got tech. He's in Vegas. He got the Eagles. He got U2. He's not courtside. And you know who we got courtside? We got Oak, Starks, DeBusch. I mean, we got— Yeah. Not to push your recipes, but we got everybody. They got Steph Barber on the sun. We got the Knicks dialed in. We have more picks than we could ever use. We have more picks. First round picks, second round picks. We are stocked. And you know what? This is the time that a great player— could be Spider, could be somebody else— says, you know what? If I was part of that squad, I'd be the missing piece. And you know about getting the missing piece because you've helped. Maybe sort of, kinda, you know, no tampering, but you've kind of sort of talked to people about, you know, where maybe their future lies.

So, so you think Donovan Mitchell gets y'all over the hump?

They're not going down, they're going up. Who we gonna land this summer? You think Donovan Mitchell gets y'all over the hump?

You think if y'all get Donovan Mitchell, that gets y'all over the hump? Is that, is that what you and Mitch—

Listen, what does it mean over the hump? I'm just talking about getting better every season, which is what we've done since Tibbs has gotten here in the front office.

Here's the problem, J. Cal. You only get so many seasons to be getting better and not win until they break pick it up. So who is the guy that you think or hear, and before we get outta here, who is the guy that you think or you hear that is available around the league that Knicks fans will wanna see come in? And not only see come in, but can see past the Knicks fans' blinder because y'all ain't never won shit in a, in— Yeah. 40-something years can see past those blinders and say, this guy can actually get us over the top. Not come in and get us to the conference finals because we're just happy because we're Knicks fans and we never win. Who is the guy?

I mean, I hear people say Spider, I hear them say Mikal Bridges. I, I hear a lot of names come up. You tell me. I mean, you're in the league and you know, we had KD go to the, the, the New Jersey Nets. Instead of coming to the Knicks. I mean, the worst career move in history. Not only did he leave the dynasty where he was cherished and loved out here, he went to the, the worst franchise, like, in the league, uh, and it was a complete disaster. So, I mean, are we not a place that player— what, what— I mean, you know the back channel. Do players look at the Knicks differently in 2024 than they did when KD and other people just said, you know what, it's whack, the owner's whack, don't go there. Be honest.

If I'm honest, I think it may be a little more intriguing than it was then because people, there was a time in the NBA where guys weren't really looking to go to a Knicks, weren't really looking to go to the Lakers till LeBron went to the Lakers. The Lakers weren't getting any free agents for 5, 6-year period, right? Like where they weren't getting any. They signed Roy Hibbert in free agency, Timothée Mozgov in free agency.

Yeah, they gave him a big check.

Like I love Lou O'Deng. They signed Lou O'Deng at the tail end of his career and gave him money. Like, so there was a time where the Lakers couldn't get free agents at all. The Knicks couldn't get free agents at all. And I think guys were really over, playing in the big market like those. Like it didn't really matter if you went to the big market at that time. You know, that was around the time Paul George was a free agent. Kawhi Leonard was a free agent. Like you had guys that could go to these two huge market teams.

Yep.

And they chose not to. And so I don't, however, I think that has changed now. And here's why I think it has changed. I think that has changed because of social media. I think that has changed because of all the other things around basketball, all the business around basketball. Yes. That is not basketball. I think that has changed because guys are now looking at these particular organizations in these cities and saying, that organization, that city can help me with X. So if I go there, then I'm allowed to, I'm able to do this. For instance, LeBron James came to LA He, Maverick, Rich, they've built empires in LA in 6, 7 years, right? Like, and so I think guys are now starting to look at those two teams in particular, Warriors and, you know, from a Silicon Valley standpoint. Silicon Valley. Like, I think guys are starting to look at these teams now and say, what does that city, what does that organization have to offer me from a standpoint that is much bigger than basketball?

The NBA playoffs are heating up, man, they have been. So good. I know it's over, but Lakers-Nuggets may have been a 5-game series. It was great. Knicks-Sixers, amazing. Why don't you sign up for the DraftKings Sportsbook app? Takes 90 seconds. The official sports betting partner of the NBA. If you're in DraftKings, once you sign up, you got to check this out. New customers bet $5 to get $150 in bonus bets instantly. Great proposition, right? $5, you get $150. Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app. The code's Colin. C-O-L-I-N. It's me, C-O-L-I-N. Really quick, really easy. If you've never bet sports before, check it out. Really makes the games fun. The code is Colin. New customers get $150 in bonus bets by betting $5 only on DraftKings. The crown is yours.