Knicks firing Tom Thibodeau signals the beginning of the end

Could it be self-harm making it impossible for New York Knicks fans to have nice things?

Nah. As disappointing and obnoxious as the incessant bitching about Tom Thibodeau‘s coaching has been, it’s tough to ever blame the fans.

Granted, Knicks ownership has been known to react to fan chatter in the past, perhaps spontaneously, but the fans can and could never be held to that level of account.

The reality of the Knicks’ current situation boils down to the organization’s moving and shaking, while thinking entirely too highly of themselves in the process. Firing Thibodeau is a rich man’s idea that removing the hardest-working individual from the building is akin to getting one step closer to reaching the desired end goal.

Where the Knickerbockers currently find themselves is all on the organization’s shoulders. For whatever reason(s), Leon Rose, James Dolan, and whoever else may be involved feel that Thibodeau isn’t the right man to take the Knicks to an NBA championship.

Such nonsense is tough to even begin to digest.

Does an argument exist that moving on from Thibodeau is the correct move? Sure, a semi-sensical argument can be brought forth.

Does the now-former Knicks coach deserve criticism for some of his coaching displays in New York’s Eastern Conference Loss to the Indiana Pacers? Of course. No coach is beyond criticism, especially fan criticism.

The correct answer, and thus, the correct move for the Knicks to have made, however, isn’t about fly-by arguments and random coaching critiques. What matters is whether or not Tom Thibodeau served this organization as a net-positive or net-negative.

Is it Tom Thibodeau, another coach, a brand-new roster, or some combination that most significantly moves the New York Knicks’ championship needle?

The answer is so damn easy to spot that it’s ludcris to even have the conversation, and it begins with an objective look at the roster.

The Brunson-KAT duo is an unsolvable problem

When did the 2024-25 New York Knicks acquire the team talent equivalent to the Bill Russell 1960s Boston Celtics? I must have missed that memo, perhaps forever stuck in the spam folder.

Who in the world do the Knicks think they are?

Jalen Brunson, the captain, is the team’s leader; there’s little doubt about that. He’s also the Knicks’ undisputed No. 1 superstar.

The only way anybody can favor the Thibodeau firing is if that person also believes a team not only can win a ring with Brunson as the top superstar, but it’s a favorable position. Otherwise—if this very real discussion is in dispute—how could the coach firing be justified?

There isn’t a basketball individual on planet Earth who can confidently say that Brunson as a team’s top superstar is a no-doubt-about-it home run scenario. It’s not that a team can’t pull it off—the Knicks ventured into that territory just last week—but it’s at least a legitimate conversation that makes this reality a “tricky” one.

What was Jalen Brunson pre-Thibs?

In Dallas, the Knicks’ now-best player averaged 11.3 points and 3.7 assists in 24.7 minutes per game (277 games played). In New York, Brunson’s marks are a tad better … I mean, do we even really need to get into the numbers?

This version of Jalen Brunson happened under Tom Thibodeau’s watch. Period. Before the NBA All-Team version of JB, the Knicks organization faced relentless mocking at the hands of … well, everybody, for signing the man in the Summer of 2022.

Is there not one singular thought from anybody that Brunson could regress without Thibodeau? Not even a little?

Then there’s Karl-Anthony Towns, the man whose presence alone has seemingly gotten Thibs fired twice.

KAT’s offensive talent is unmistakable. At his height, some of the things he can do in today’s modern era are a hefty asset. Yet, similarly, his deficiencies scream caution just as loudly.

The man plays zero defense. Can we just be honest and speak straight? Couple that with Brunson’s deficiencies on defense—which are the heart of the matter here—and a basketball team is forced to deal with an impossible problem.

How does one effectively “hide” the team’s so-called “two best players” on the defensive end of the floor?

If anybody tries to provide an answer to that question, just know this one simple certainty: They’re blowing smoke because there is no answer.

It’s a situation akin to Phil Jackson pulling Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen off the floor in 1998 for a defensive situation. Imagine after MJ hit the famous elbow-jumper in Utah, Phil pulls him and Pippen off the floor because they’re clinging to a one-point lead in crunch time.

It’s behind comprehension that any team’s two “best” players must come off the floor, so rigidly, without controversy, when defense is required.

We’re not discussing the fourth and fifth best players on the roster; we’re talking about the team’s two “best” players—however you’d like to define it. Brunson and KAT’s names, statistics, and recognition are the reason that so many believe this Knicks’ roster is incredibly talented.

Therefore, they should also be the reason we all take a hard look at why this Knicks roster is misconfigured so impossibly, and it’s been the head coach who’s lifted them throughout the process.

If Towns is such an irreplaceable player, how in the world did the Minnesota Timberwolves not miss a beat this season? If Brunson is truly the best closer in the game, how could the Knicks win a monster playoff game with him on the bench for the great majority of the fourth quarter.

The last thing I want to do is hammer Brunson, because he’s one of the few players who actually “gets it.” But folks, can we analyze this situation a bit further, without the fan emotions involved?

No matter the lineup anybody provides, which is aimed at pointing to Thibodeau’s horrid coaching job through rotational and lineup decisions, the Brunson-KAT defensive deficiency rules all. Go ahead and dig; no matter the lineup provided, the impossible defensive nature that Brunson and KAT together provide will override it in importance by a long shot.

How does a coach make Karl-Anthony Towns move quicker laterally? How does he also force the opposing team not to attack his defensively liable point guard?

Where are those answers?

This roster is grossly overrated; they overachieved

Any Knicks fan who criticizes Rose for making the Karl-Anthony Towns trade these days is showing just how disingenuous he or she actually is. Yes, Brunson and KAT together on defense is a near-impossible situation to fix, yet it was also the correct trade at the time.

Taking that chance in a more offensive world was the right call. And guess what? The stubborn, defensive-minded Thibs took on that challenge and flipped a defensive team into the fifth-highest-scoring offense in the NBA (with 109.6 points per contest).

With that quickly-adjusted nature came sacrifices, no doubt. Generally speaking, these sacrifices were understood by media members and fans alike.

Everybody knew of this contrasting nature heading into the season. What was a grittier, tougher team that battled through injuries last postseason suddenly needed to be molded into an offensive squad.

Did that not happen? What are we arguing about here, exactly?

The other major item that was generally understood last fall concerned roster depth. Right? Or am I taking those crazy pills again?

Having closed the KAT deal and traded a boatload of assets for Mikal Bridges, the starting lineup seemingly improved. That was the consensus on the positive end of the business.

The negatives were universally agreed upon. At least that’s what I thought.

With KAT arriving on the eve of the season, this new group of players would require time to gel. Just as important, the roster depth was incredibly thin. Mitchell Robinson‘s injury added to it, and Precious Achiuwa also couldn’t start on time, as was the case for Landry Shamet.

The wheeling and dealing, combined with the injuries, made for an extremely thin bench. So much so that it automatically thrust Josh Hart into a starting role. Is a championship roster ever forced to start Josh Hart?

No matter, though. The Knicks won 50+ games for the second consecutive season, and they even knocked off the defending Boston Celtics in six games—despite not one living human actually thinking it was possible.

Yet, Tom Thibodeau still draws the ire of fans and pundits for not playing Delon Wright enough in the playoffs.

Speaking of Josh Hart, who’s here to tell me he’s more than just a role player? Anybody? If that’s the case, is this roster as good as advertised when Hart is the fifth-best player on the team? (Ok, even if he’s the sixth-best player on the squad, that’s still an indictment of the overall talent.)

Then there’s Mikal Bridges, the last of the Villanova Wildcats who cost the organization five first-round picks, four of which are unprotected.

Interestingly, Bridges is a rare case of a player who did not improve under Thibodeau. Although, to be fair, that could be argued.

Despite only averaging 17.6 points per night, he did shoot .500 from the floor, which is well above his career .484 mark (a number that was lower heading into this previous season). Bridges also dished out a career-best 3.7 assists this past season.

Either way, why does the NBA world pretend this guy is better than he actually is? It is the mystery of all mysteries in my hoops brain.

Leon Rose dishes out five first-round picks for a guy who’s never made a singular All-Star appearance, and we’re supposed to pretend he’s an undoubted “third star” on a basketball team? (Oh, and he didn’t even have an old head like Thibodeau to drag him down for the first six years of his professional career; go figure.)

Look, Bridges is a nice player. He’s a complementary player, perhaps even a role player, for those who want to stretch the definition of “role player” a degree or two.

He’s simply not as good as everybody pretends.

Perhaps Robert Horry summed it up best recently when appearing on “The Dan Patrick Show.”

“I was shocked because, if you look at what Tom Thibodeau has done for that team, getting them back to the Eastern Conference Finals … I was just shocked,” Horry said after being asked how he felt about the Tom Thibodeau firing. “If you really think about it, (and) if you look at the roster of the Knicks, they overachieved, to me. They were overachievers. They have a lot of guys who are role players, playing well in Thibodeau’s system.”

As much as I love OG Anunoby‘s game, his defensive prowess, is he anything more than a tremendous role player? Or, at 27 years of age, averaging 12.9 points per game on .474 shooting in his career, do Knicks fans still view him as a “budding superstar” who their now-former head coach was keeping down?

Oh, by the way, Anunoby’s 18.0 points per game this past season, under the evil and outdated Thibodeau, is his career best.

St. John’s head coach Rick Pitino said it best on WFAN recently:

“The problem with the Knicks is that you had everybody playing poorly in the last game,” Pitino said. “That had nothing to do with Thibs at all. Thibs is a great defensive coach whose hands were handcuffed with 7.5 basketball players.

“In pick and rolls, you had to down (drop coverage) pick and rolls because Karl-Anthony Towns can’t get out there. You can’t switch like the Oklahoma City Thunder, and front the post, where they are great at defense. So, the Knicks were hampered by their lateral quickness.

“None of that is Thibs’s fault.”

So, let’s break it down …

Brunson is an NBA superstar who plays no defense and isn’t exactly fleet of foot. To do his usual thing, he needs those iso situations and half-court sets. Not to mention the fact that Brunson wasn’t even close to an NBA star before Thibs coached him. To pretend that’s not the truth is to miss a big piece of this puzzle.

Towns is considered an NBA superstar who plays even less defense and is extremely slow. He finished the six-game ECF with a grand total of one block. Go poll all 30 NBA head coaches, and ask them who they’d rather have, KAT or Pascal Siakam. I’d wager good money that the results would stun the world.

Just with that, the limitations are insane.

Then, who’s the third guy, Bridges? If so, we’re talking about a guy who has never been an All-Star. Does he start for Carlisle’s Pacers? Perhaps. Perhaps not. By no means is it a guarantee.

Who’s fourth, Anunoby? Again, I love and respect Anunoby’s game, and he’s an excellent starting wing for a title contender.

Is Robinson or Hart the fifth-best player, and does either start for Indiana or Boston?

After that, we get to Duece McBride, Landry Shamet, Precious Achiuwa, Cam Payne, and Delon Wright.

Come on, folks, are we serious about blaming Tom Thibodeau for the Knicks’ shortcomings? He constantly overachieved with this group, just as he’s done his entire career with whatever roster he had.

What does ‘championship coach’ mean?

The argument that brings the most joy out of me, personally, is the short and succinct one that labels Tom Thibodeau as a guy who can never win an NBA championship. It goes a little something like this …

“Yes, I’ll forever appreciate Tom Thibodeau, but he’s just not a championship coach. He’s just not that guy who can take us over that hump and get us a ring.”

Nonsense.

If I’m not mistaken … yes, Thibodeau is an actual NBA champion. As the Boston Celtics’ top assistant (associate head coach), he was a major part of the 2008 championship team with Doc Rivers as head coach.

Let me say that again, just in case you missed it: Tom Thibodeau helped the 2008 Celtics win an NBA championship with Doc Rivers as the head coach.

Doc …

Rivers.

Got it? Has that melted into everybody’s brains yet?

But because he has yet to win a championship in his 13 years as an NBA head coach, he’s not capable of doing so in the future, according to far too many individuals.

A more nonsensical idea couldn’t be created if asked to do so as a homework assignment without grading involved. It’s a good thing the Dallas Mavericks didn’t heed that same advice with Rick Carlisle. Luckily for Kansas City Chiefs fans, their franchise wasn’t idiotic when considering Andy Reid.

Imagine Syracuse throwing Jim Boeheim out of town, before he won his first title after 27 years. Jeez, Dean Smith couldn’t get it done until his 21st season as a head coach.

A great coach can only be evaluated based on their entire body of work and with a hearty dose of nuance. When that’s understood, then Tom Thibodeau becomes an excellent head coach who had every opportunity to win an NBA title—as soon as 2026 with the Knicks.

Speaking of the man who booted Thibs’s Knicks out of the 2025 playoffs, the same individual who led Dirk Nowitzki’s Dallas Mavericks to the 2011 NBA championship, he had long been a guy viewed remarkably similarly to Thibodeau’s current reputation.

In the early 2000s, Carlisle kept knocking on the door with his harsh and rugged Detroit Pistons. Detroit pulled the plug after winning 50 games in back-to-back seasons to open his coaching career. It hired Larry Brown, and the rest is history.

Carlisle watched his former team win the chip in 2004. Scratch that; he actually watched from the sideline, as the Indiana Pacers head coach, when his former team beat him en route to the title.

What a loser.

After four “loserish” seasons in Indiana, where he failed to win a title, off to Dallas he went, winning the title (and stunning everybody along the way) in 2011.

Thibodeau’s first big-boy coaching job famously came in that very season, 2010-11, storming out of the gates with a young Derrick Rose-led Chicago Bulls team. Winning 62 games, they fell to LeBron James’s Miami Heat in the conference finals.

Thibs is no Buck Showalter

Ya know, those who love to dump on Thibodeau have grand designs that the Knicks will find the right coach that’ll undoubtedly lead them to the promised land. Many of them even think of Thibodeau as the Buck Showalter of the NBA.

Showalter, who was stunningly fired by George Steinbrenner in 1995, after the New York Yankees’ first playoff appearance in 14 seasons, watched Joe Torre take the team he built to a dynasty.

He then turned to the expansion Arizona Diamondbacks, built them, only to watch Bob Brenly snag all the glory in 2001. He even dabbled with the Texas Rangers before they finally broke through.

For Knicks fans, it’s simple: Appreciate what Thibodeau has done to build a culture, but look forward to the guy who has the goods to take them to the Canyon of Heroes.

Except Thibodeau is nothing like Buck.

Unlike Buck’s teams, which eventually go on to bigger and better things, Thibodeau’s teams ultimately show just how well the man coached.

After Thibs left Chicago, the Bulls went from 50 wins and Round 2 to missing the playoffs entirely. What followed were seasons featuring 41 wins, 27 wins, 22 wins, 22 wins again in a shortened season, and 31 wins (in Billy Donovan’s first season).

So, Thibs took over a 41-win Bulls team and immediately propelled them to 62 wins. Once he left, they went into the basement.

Next up is Minnesota, where the Timberwolves bestowed both head coach and front office duties on him. Unlike Chicago, he was in control of everything, and he did not get it done, despite some pleasant moments, including a 47-win season and KAT’s best professional campaign of his life.

Thibodeau went 19-21 before his ouster during the 2018-19 season. What followed were Timberwolves seasons featuring 19 and 21 wins, respectively.

No matter what criticisms are levied against Thibs’s personnel decisions in Minnesota, his overall production that consisted of seasons featuring records of 31-51, 47-35, and 19-21 is hardly bottom-of-the-barrel. By no means is it great, but what followed was entirely worse, and it followed the pattern experienced in Chicago.

The man ultimately winds up in New York, in a position he should be: head coach. Forget personnel from an actual hard-lined, in-name perspective. Do what you do best, Thibs: coach basketball.

Knicks fans know what happened. I think …

Thibs raises the play of nearly everybody

It’s easy to forget, but Jalen Brunson was not here in 2020. Thibodeau took one of the worst teams I have ever seen to the NBA playoffs in his first season with the Knicks.

Julius Randle, who had remained lost in the NBA wilderness, enjoyed a career year under Thibs. Better yet, despite some inconsistencies, he’s been a completely different player since meeting the coach.

With Randle leading the way, and the likes of can’t-miss prospect RJ Barrett, Frank Ntilikina, Nerlens Noel, and old-man Derrick Rose, who had to be steaming at his old Bulls coach for “ruining his career” previously (right?), Thibs transformed a 27-45 Knicks team into a 41-31 playoff squad that year.

So, we’ve established that Brunson’s best years have come under Thibodeau. We all know Derrick Rose’s best years also came under the same man. (Although, Thibs will forever be remembered as the man who “ruined” D-Rose; let’s be real.)

Who else has experienced their best years under Tom Thibodeau? Julius Randle absolutely has to be included. I’d say OG Anunoby as well. Even Mitchell Robinson could be thrown into that category.

What about Isaiah Hartenstein? How could such a middling player ever see the light of day on the cold Thibodeau bench? Did he blackmail the man “who wouldn’t want to play nine guys in a baseball game,” per Kenny Smith?

In all seriousness, Thibs is stubborn about his rotation; there’s no question about it. Legit criticism can be thrown his way on that front.

Where the world gets into trouble is when it pretends that the D-Rose injury was the head coach’s fault, or that a lack of talent on the Knicks bench is the head coach’s fault.

Sure, I would have loved to see Tyler Kolek get more play this past season. But let’s also not pretend that playing Kolek additional minutes would have pushed this team beyond Game 6 of the ECF. In fact, it could have had the opposite effect, as the team’s incredible conditioning helped them through the Detroit Pistons and Boston Celtics series.

Wait a second, Duece McBride must be another hooper who’s blackmailing the 7-man rotation coach, right? There’s just no other way.

Thibs was also responsible for developing Jimmy Butler. In fact, when looking back at those Bulls teams, the talent was nowhere near as great as many folks remember. All you need to know is that this head coach turned Joakim Noah into an NBA All-Star.

That’s right, Knicks fans. We’re talking about the very same (and extremely pitiful) Joakim Noah, whom Phil Jackson brought to town.

As great a job as he did with those Knicks teams, however, this page on the internet is not about history or the Knicks owning anybody anything. It’s much more about the facts of the matter and the idea that Tom Thibodeau still represented the organization’s best shot to win a title.

More often than not, a player who runs into Tom Thibodeau enjoys his best seasons under the man. And now, without Tom Thibodeau involved, we venture into the unknown.

Is Leon Rose truly ‘that dude?’

For some insane reason, it’s largely assumed that New York Knicks president Leon Rose is “that dude.” Thibodeau is gone, but hey, so what? Just hire a hungry youngster so the Knicks can finally play the right way and finally reach their potential. (Yes, you can feel the sarcasm dripping from your laptop or mobile device.)

“In Leon Rose, we trust,” Knicks fans utter in unison.

Are we sure? That’s my question. After all, it’s tough to gauge anything when the man doesn’t even respect the fans enough to face them in public. (At least his former head coach took questions and bullets in tough times, while staring at fans through the media’s cameras with questions relentlessly flying in his direction.)

The Knicks tabbed Leon Rose as president in March 2020. His first order of business was to hire Tom Thibodeau as head coach in July 2020, just as the world was ending (per the perceived nature of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic).

(I mean, for Knicks fans, what was the difference anyway? Life had been miserable for two decades at that point.)

The Knicks’ basketball operations haven’t just been a Leon Rose-led affair, folks; it’s been a Leon Rose plus Tom Thibodeau one. Every move this Knicks regime has made in the Rose era has featured an excellent basketball coach leading the way.

Every … single … move.

Are we sure Leon Rose is that guy we trust?

After all, this is a man with zero track record without Thibodeau beside him. There’s zero evidence that he’s the all-knowing superpower Knicks fans believe him to be—without a tremendous coach getting the best out of whatever is handed to him.

In the early going, Rose and the Knicks handed Thibs scraps. These were the entrenched pieces the new regime was forced to handle. Eventually, Thibodeau helped turn Brunson into the clutch master we know him to be today.

After the scrappy and beloved Knicks of 2024 just ran out of gas, banged up and undermanned, it was officially on to the next stage of the game, where Knicks fans could genuinely feel they were joining the big-boy table at NBA Thanksgiving …

True NBA contender status.

Despite the feeling of finally having a seat at that table, and thinking the organization is firmly entrenched with brilliance, I posit a much different argument.

Though it’s unpopular and rare, particularly while a significant chunk of Knicks fandom is dancing in the streets over Thibs’s firing, I submit to the good folks of New York City that the organization run by James Dolan just made its greatest mistake in quite some time.

This franchise got ahead of its skis, thinking it got ahead of the game, when, in reality, its head coach propelled them to this point, this stature, this moment in time.

History suggests that’s the case.

It’s easy to criticize an excellent head coach whose track record is littered with overachieving teams.

Think about the played-out and predictable pattern: A great head coach takes over and overachieves with a rag-tag group of players. They overachieve to a point where their playoff seed is much higher than it should be, based on talent alone, and ultimately, they wind up getting knocked out by the more talented team.

For the more simplistic thinker, it’s simple: The higher-seed team that loses must have been out-coached. This has happened to Thibs-led squads a handful of times in his career.

But criticizing Thibs for those losses only happens when the proper context is not introduced. How often he’s elevated teams into another stratosphere—independent of the team’s actual talent—is crucial when analyzing the entire picture.

The Knicks lost to the lower-seeded Pacers in six games. For that, disappointment reigns supreme. For that, Tom Thibodeau lost his job. But how can we not take into account the entirety of the Thibodeau-led picture in New York?

Not considering the entire body of work leads to automatic assumptions that Leon Rose is basketball Jesus.

Hey, he very well may be a tremendous personnel guy. This may be true despite the absurdity of trading five first-round picks for a non-All-Star player (Bridges). This may still be true despite pairing the worst defensive center (KAT) in the league with one of the worst defensive point guards (Brunson).

It’s bad enough to construct a team where 40% of the starting lineup cannot play defense, but it is incredible to do so when that 40% are the team’s two best players. The cherry on top is that they play point guard and center. Sheesh.

I’m not here to tell you that Leon Rose doesn’t have the goods. I’m only here to tell you that it should at least be analyzed further.

A world exists that features the Knicks hiring the next head coach who succeeds in spades, so much so that they actually do win an NBA title. But that world does not include this roster, as currently instructed.

The end begins now

The firing of Tom Thibodeau signals the beginning of the end for the New York Knicks—at least as it concerns the Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns-led version.

If a legit superstar joins the squad, then all bets are off. If Rose takes a hard look at this flawed roster and appropriately fixes it, then he’s on the right track.

However, by no means will a Brunson-Towns-specifically-led version improve upon the team’s 2025 result. Not without Tom Thibodeau coaching them.

Without Thibs, the Knicks—as we all know them—just lost the architect who made it possible for them to overachieve well past the point of this roster’s actual talent and complementary configuration.

It’s over.

Or, at the very least, this moment marks the beginning of the end.

Finally, New York Knicks fans had a legitimate basketball coach. Finally, they had a genuine team to call their own.

Finally, they had a guy whose fearlessness allowed him to construct a hard-working basketball team that represents the city the way it should—and did so without apologizing along the way.

After two decades of nonsense, one man accepted an impossible challenge in 2020. Not only did he take scraps and produce positive results, but he did so while passing every test in the roughest media market of them all.

Do fans believe that’s an easy thing to accomplish?

After a Round 1 exit in 2021 without talent, they missed the playoffs in 2022. Jalen Brunson arrives in 2022, the man who signed the free-agent deal that had the entire NBA world laughing.

All Thibs did from there was create an NBA superstar, continue Julius Randle’s ascent, and make the playoffs three straight times. Oh yeah, here’s the best part: His teams have improved each season with Brunson leading the way:

• 2022: Round 2 loss to the Miami Heat in six games
• 2023: Round 2 loss to the Indiana Pacers in seven games
• 2024: ECF loss to the Indiana Pacers in six games

And despite receiving a brand-new team on the eve of the regular season (the KAT trade), he gets no shot at a second year with this squad? Are we for real?

It’s nonsensical.

Criticisms regarding Tom Thibodeau’s coaching have been and will always be fair and present, as is the case for any coach in any sport. But when adding those criticisms up, and looking at the entire bag, the weight of it cannot dare dream of approaching the overwhelming positive weight this man still produces to this very day for whatever team receives the fortune.

The Tom Thibodeau-produced positives outweigh the negatives by a long shot. They always have; they always will. Just ask anybody who’s encountered his services in his basketball life, particularly Doc Rivers.

(Yes … Doc … Rivers is an NBA championship head coach.)

Shame on everybody who could not recognize that overwhelming truth.

Good luck, New York Knicks.