What has made Jalen Brunson the perfect candidate to succeed in New York is his ability to tune out the deafening noise that comes with playing for the Knicks, where the magnifying glass is as intense as anywhere in the sporting world.
Saturday night provided every opportunity for him to take a victory lap on the countless hordes that doubted him. He willed the Knicks to a fourth double-digit comeback of the 2026 NBA Finals against the San Antonio Spurs, scored nearly half of his team’s points in a 94-90 victory to win New York its first championship since 1973, and was named Finals MVP.
Yet, as always, he took the high road.
“I didn’t respond to them then, and I’m damn sure not going to respond to them now,” Brunson said.
He doesn’t have to. He’ll never have to. But one of the benefits of this hellscape that we call the internet is that the receipts are immortal.
It was December of 2023, and Brunson was in the middle of the second season of his initial four-year deal with the Knicks.
The point guard had led New York to just their second playoff appearance in the last 10 years the season prior, which also included their second postseason series win since the start of the 2000-2001 season. He was smack-dab-in-the-middle of his ascendency to superstardom in the midst of what would become the team’s second 50-win season this century — and yet the avalanche of doubt was unstoppable.
It was none louder than on this winter day two-and-a-half years ago, when WNBA legend, former San Antonio Spurs assistant, and current Las Vegas Aces head coach Becky Hammon appeared on ESPN and went in on the Knicks’ reliance on Brunson to be their main man.
“At the end of the day, they don’t have a dude,” Hammon said. “You gotta have a dude, you gotta have a 1A dude, and they’re missing that if we’re just getting down to brass tacks.”
When former NBA forward Kendrick Perkins pointed out that they do, and it was Brunson, Hammon quickly snapped back, “He too small.”
“If your best player is small, you’re not winning,” she continued. “John Stockton, Allen Iverson, Steve Nash. Steph Curry is the only one… and he’s the greatest shooter on the planet.”
Brian Windhorst then smuggly added, “She is right.”
Of course, he’d try to stick to his guns, because after the Knicks signed Brunson in the summer of 2022 to a four-year, $104 million contract, Windhorst initially said, “He’s not going to be the type of player to elevate them to contender status.”
The thing was, both Windhorst and Hammon were dead wrong. Of course, they were not the only ones.
When Brunson made the jump from Dallas to New York, the Knicks were coming off a 37-win season playing second-fiddle to a Nets team that had picked up Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, and James Harden.
“Jalen Brunson isn’t the answer,” noted Knicks fan and ESPN loudmouth Stephen A. Smith blabbed.
“It’s an awful idea,” Nick Wright of Fox Sports, a platform that makes its money off spewing awful takes, said, adding that this was “the saddest sweepstakes ever.”
Even Rich Eisen, a devout Knicks fan, said that “Kevin Durant is playing basketball in New York City, and you’re just talking about, ‘Can we get Brunson?’”
The Nets, who remain irrelevant in this city, imploded. Brunson soared and dropped eggs on the faces of every single one of these “experts.”
The three-time All-Star put together the final masterstrokes on what has become the Knicks’ most memorable season in half a century, becoming just the fourth player in NBA history to drop 40-plus points in a championship-clinching game.
He scored 32.6 points per game, which is the 22nd-highest average in a single NBA Finals, though it is even more impressive when you realize that the 21 spots ahead of him are occupied by Michael Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal, Jerry West, and LeBron James, three times each.
And he did this all while leaving $113 million on the table, a significant pay cut, to ensure Knicks president Leon Rose had the funds to build a winning supporting cast around him. He is not just a 1A or an MVP candidate. He is officially a Knicks legend.
“He understands what winning is about. He comes, and he probably takes a pay cut that I wouldn’t have taken,” Knicks head coach Mike Brown said. “Every time they would’ve thrown that number in front of me, I would have said no, and I feel like I’m a good guy. He set the bar before he even stepped on the floor. Every time it came to renegotiate a deal with him. That set the standard.
“Now, when you take his play into account, it’s off the charts, man. I love [Patrick Ewing]. Pat’s up there. I hope Pat doesn’t kill me. He’s bigger than me. We’re both old and slow, but because he’s a longer reach, he might be able to kill me, but Brunson, he is him, man, when it comes to New York basketball, he is freaking him.”
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