NY Knicks made fun of in Space Jam: A New Legacy

After a season in which the NY Knicks seemed to finally gain some respect, they were teased once again on the national stage by LeBron James in his new movie, Space Jam: A New Legacy.

The joke was made after LeBron’s family in the movie were trying to locate him and the idea was brought up that he was possibly “abducted by the Knicks.”

This stems from the past as New York (who had been struggling mightily for a long time) made multiple attempts to swoon Lebron to the Big Apple in order to try and turn their fortune around.

While this joke might be funny to the average NBA fan, it looks like it’s the Knicks that’ll be getting the last laugh.

The Knicks get the Last Laugh:

The filming of Space Jam began on June 25th, 2019 when the Knicks were coming off a season where they finished 17-65.

The following year we saw improvement but the orange blue still finished a lackadaisical 21-45.

With this being the case, it definitely makes sense that the Space Jam team wanted to take a jab at the Knicks who had been some sort of laughing stock in the NBA for quite some time.

Despite this, upon the film’s release, the Knicks had just finished their best season in 8 years going 41-31 and winning their first playoff game since 2013.

This is a Moment of Pride for Knicks Fans:

While seeing yet another Knicks joke in a movie could be deemed unfortunate; I think it can be looked at as a moment where we Knicks fans should be proud of how far this team has come.

In previous seasons we knew these moments were inevitable and had to learn to embrace the criticism towards the franchise.

Now we know how much of a good future this team has and whenever we see Knicks jokes like this one in the new Space Jam movie, it’ll be much easier to put it aside and bask in the glory of what’s to come for New York’s number 1 basketball team. 

Here’s lookin’ at you, Brooklyn…

Does LeBron have a future with the Knicks?

After watching the film I did actually ask myself if I could see LeBron one day wearing orange and blue after his Lakers contract expires in 2023.

To answer that question: No. 

I understand people have said he loves to play at MSG and that he maybe wants to experience a season or 2 in NYC, I don’t see the Knicks front office being in favor of it.

What I believe and hope this previous season did was establish a culture that shows that the organization wants to develop talent rather than pay a surplus of stars big money to build a super team instantaneously.

While I understand some fans would love to see LeBron in a Knicks uniform, I think he’s more likely to look elsewhere along with the fact that Leon Rose and Co. aren’t going to want to sign a near 39-year-old as a big piece of a team that’s building towards contention.