Patrick Ewing’s NBA Legends profile starts with just one word: “Warrior.” There may not be a more apt descriptor of who Ewing was during his time with the NY Knicks.
Is Patrick Ewing the greatest player in New York Knicks franchise history? There are arguments to be made for Willis Reed and Walt Frazier, but as the Knicks leader in most major statistical categories and a top 25 All-Time scorer, it’s hard to argue against him despite Ewing never winning the big one.
Even though he never brought a title to the Garden, Ewing is the Knicks’ win-shares leader, per Basketball Reference’s Franchise Index, and he led the team to 13 consecutive playoff appearances under the tutelage of six different head coaches.
Ewing was the constant during the 90s heydays.
Still, it’s hard to argue that he may not have won that title with a bit more from his supporting cast.
For comparison, Ewing played with two players–Charles Oakley (#5) and John Starks (#11)–during a run in the mid-90s who are top 12 in win shares in franchise history. Compare that to Michael Jordan’s run from the same era where he played with three other players–Scottie Pippen (#2), Horace Grant (#5), and Toni Kukoc (#12)–who rank in the top 12 for the Bulls franchise.
This is no knock on some great former Knicks, but one additional piece might have been what put him over the top.
Do any of you remember that show Quantum Leap? To briefly summarize, Scott Bakula would time travel (and I guess soul travel, technically) into the lives of other people and right some sort of wrong. It was great.
We’re going to do a Knicks Quantum Leap today by exploring three players Patrick Ewing would have loved to pull a Scott Bakula and join him at some point from 1990-1999 to help him capture the ring that eluded him.
It’s hard to imagine that any of the players in this article would have pushed the Knicks past Jordan’s Bulls, but any one of them might have made a huge difference during Jordan’s hiatus.
Is this a wild premise? Yup.
Is it worth exploring in the off-season? Also yup.