The New York Knicks signed five veterans to Exhibit 9 contracts ahead of training camp. Leon Rose's front office has set the stage, once again, for a competition to determine how the end of their roster is going to shake out.
The NBA’s defending champions spent the first two months of their offseason retaining the vast majority of their free agents in Landry Shamet, Jose Alvarado, Mohamed Diawara, and Jordan Clarkson, but still need more help at the center position. Three of the five veterans they signed ahead of training camp, however, are not big men.
These Knicks are clearly looking to close out the summer doing more than filling a hole in their depth chart. And the addition of Konchar seems like a direct nod to Clarkson’s revamped role from last season, which involved smooth on-ball operation and playmaking without many 3-point shot attempts. Konchar is a similar type of player, bringing a combination of grit and savvy veteran instincts to the table on both ends of the court.
Clarkson and Brown were a match made in heaven (by Leon Rose)
It’d be quite on-brand for Mike Brown if Clarkson’s late-career development was indeed what inspired the addition of Konchar to the team's championship-winning roster. The coach came into his first year as head coach of the Knicks with some of the highest expectations possible. He, and his players, simply delivered.
Part of that process involved collecting as much data as possible, something that was frankly lacking from Tom Thibodeau's approach, before hunkering down and finalizing both a rotation and style of play for the postseason. Brown's team was even more flexible than that, albeit out of necessity, pivoting offensive approaches entirely when New York was already three games into their first-round series against the Atlanta Hawks.
During the regular season, Clarkson fell out of favor with regard to his spot in the nightly rotation — but was eventually rewarded for his sustained hard work in practice with sporadic chances to juice up the team's offense. Especially with his new set of priorities out there on the court, Clarkson earned his spot in the rotation back and kept it throughout the team's championship run.
It took several months and a complete reinvention of Clarkson's game in his 12th season in the NBA to get there, but the end-product was a testament to Leon Rose's ability as an executive, Brown's ability as a coach to get the most out of his players, and Clarkson as a winner.
Now, the Knicks have proof that Clarkson's archetype — his new one — works in Brown's system. That may have been what cleared the path for the pre-training camp addition of Konchar, who the team may have previously seen as too redundant given that Josh Hart is already playing a majority of each game.
That's exactly why Brown was hired to lead the Knicks, though. He moved like a developmental coach for a legitimate portion of the regular season and still delivered a title. The improvements his staff brought out of Clarkson throughout the year helped the team in the playoffs. And now, they're paving the way for even more improvement.
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