The Knicks have a Jalen Brunson problem that a KAT trade won’t necessarily solve

If the New York Knicks want to compete for a championship, their defense needs to be better. It really is that simple. Now the hard part is figuring out how to improve the defense with two bad defensive players (Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns) making up the core of a top-three offense while sharing the floor for over 60% of each other’s minutes.

Cities experience a lot of heat. Keep what I’m about to say in perspective because the Knicks are still four points better offensively with Towns – a borderline All-Star averaging north of 20 points and 11 rebounds per game – on the court, but in addition to his poor defense and often stupid fouls, he’s having the worst shooting season of his career.

For these reasons, City names spark trade rumors before the deadline next Thursday. The Knicks and Giannis Antetokounmpo clearly have eyes for each other, and if this deal were to fall through, Towns would almost certainly be one of them. But earlier this week, veteran NBA reporter Marc Stein said there is a “lingering belief” among rival teams that Towns could also be available in non-Giannis trades.

But even if Towns were to be dealt, the Knicks would still have a problem with Brunson on defense.

Yes, we are all aware of Brunson’s impeccable offensive value. He’s as cool as can be. But in today’s NBA, the net worth of even the most elite offensive point guards is called into question if the tradeoff is defensive ineptitude.

Look at Trae Young. He is one of the best offensive players in the world, and his salary was just transferred to the Wizards. The Bucks will pay Damian Lillard $113 million over the next five seasons to play for someone else. Nobody wants Ja Morant. The Mavericks traded Luka Dončić for crying out loud.

The Knicks aren’t going to trade Brunson, and that doesn’t even mean they should consider it, but there’s a reason why Stein also reported that New York has “explored avenues” to acquire Jrue Holiday. It would be a perfect match. Holiday isn’t just the prototypical standout player; he is the real player who took two teams, the Bucks and the Celtics, to the championship bump.

The Knicks need to move up a level if they want to compete, and they need to cover Brunson defensively. Again, Towns feels like he’s taking more pressure on his defense, at least nationally, but the data indicates the Knicks are actually significantly more handicapped by Brunson. Just look at the numbers, according to Databallr.

Overall, the Knicks are +8.7 with Towns and no Brunson and +3.3 with Brunson and no Towns. Of course, the real problem is that these two guys are together. This is probably too big a hurdle to clear if we want to have a realistic conversation about the title challenge.

The Knicks followed Boston’s championship plan by loading two-way wings with Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby and Josh Hart, and adding their fifth streak with Towns in the Al Horford/Kristaps Porziņģis role, providing space for an elite scorer (Brunson/Jayson Tatum) to exploit. Adding Holiday would almost be a copy and paste job.

The glaring difference, of course, is that the Celtics had no defensive holes. Holiday remains a great defender. But the Knicks have a lot of good defenders right now, and they’re still stumbling over the Brunson obstacle.

If the Knicks made deals for Giannis And Holiday, now we would talk about something serious. But for now, let’s stay away from the pipe dreams and focus on one question: Can the Knicks win a title with a small, deficient defensive point guard as their best player?

Many teams have asked themselves this question and they almost all come to the same conclusion. Unless your name is Stephen Curry (who’s actually not a bad defender, to be honest), this probably won’t happen.

The Knicks will try to prove otherwise, but Brunson’s honeymoon can only last so long. For a minute, Knicks fans were so happy to be relevant that Brunson couldn’t do anything wrong. But now that the Conference Finals box has been checked and a Finals berth, at minimum, has become the expectation (so stated by the owner), Brunson either needs to be better or the Knicks need to cover him better, whether Towns ends up being traded or not.