Ranking Every Dumb Move That Helped New York Knicks Reach the NBA Finals

It takes a village to build an NBA championship finalist.

And sometimes it even takes residents from other villages to lend a helping hand.

Just ask the New York Knicks, headed to the 2026 NBA Finals, who were built off their own savvy and gall, but also on the backs of other teams' flubbery. 

Virtually all of this squad's main characters can be traced back to another squad giving up on them and/or gifting them to the Leon Rose-led front office.

Some transactions were more egregious than others. But they all played a role in New York bringing NBA Finals basketball back to the Mecca for the first time since 1999.

As for which moves ended up being the biggest heists, well, that's why we're here: to rank all the greatest hits in increasing order of "OMFG, the Knicks were really able to do that?!"

Honorable Mentions

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These moves are easier for the other side to explain, but hey, we are KnicksInTheFinalsMaxxing here, so let's rank 'em anyway!

8. Brooklyn Nets Sell High on Mikal Bridges

"F*ck the picks" has become a rallying cry in the Big Apple these past few weeks. But is far from an immutable sentiment.

Surrendering control of six first-rounders and one second for someone who'll probably never make an All-Star game amounts to a King's ransom.

With that said, the Bridges trade requires—and has always required—more context. The Knicks paid a premium in picks because they didn't send out any players of immediate value. And as a 50-win team adding a core player without giving up consequential names, their individual picks immediately declined in value.

Tack on a contract that has paid Bridges less than 17 percent of the salary cap and helped New York expertly navigate the aprons these past two years, and that's how you get to this price tag.

Of course, while Brooklyn probably still accepts this deal with the benefit of hindsight, it's working out quite well for the Knicks. Three of the picks have already conveyed: the two 2025 firsts and 2025 second. They've turned into Ben Saraf, Nolan Traoré and Adou Thiero.

7. Portland Trail Blazers Show New York the Power of Friendship via Josh Hart Trade

Some of us criticized the Knicks for giving up a 2023 first-round pick, Cam Reddish, Ryan Arcidiacono and Ante Tomić for Josh Hart. It's me. I am "some of us."

In my defense, my concern lay entirely with the first-round pick. To undermine that defense, I must point out the selection turned into No. 23 overall (Kris Murray).

6. Oklahoma City Thunder Actually Gave Up on a Small Guard Who Defends, Shoots and is Nicknamed Deuce

On draft night in 2021, the Thunder shipped out the No. 34 and No. 36 picks so they could move up to No. 32, where they selected Jeremiah Robinson-Earl. New York used No. 34 on Rokas Jokubaitis, who has never come stateside.

At No. 36, meanwhile, the Knicks grabbed Deuce McBride, who is currently one of their best defenders and three-point shooters and playing out the second season of a three-year, $12 million sweetheart contract. If not for the fact Oklahoma City made this trade before Deuce had an NBA sample under his belt, it'd crack the top five for sure.

5. Landry Shamet Falls Through the Cracks

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Landry Shamet has been passed around like a bong for most of his NBA career. The Philadelphia 76ers, Los Angeles Clippers, Brooklyn Nets, Phoenix Suns and, most recently, Washington Wizards all had him and in some way sent him packing.

Lower-body and shoulder injuries are catalysts for the journeyman resume. Shamet's various departures didn't exactly incite picket lines outside arenas. Still, the entire league whiffed on him this past summer.

Despite finishing last year on the Knicks, buried underneath the wrath of Tom Thibodeau, he wasn't guaranteed a roster spot this season. New York brought him in on a training-camp deal, and at the time, it had room for only one veteran's minimum slot. Given the team's need for ball-handling, Malcolm Brogdon was widely considered the favorite to land it.

Luckily for the Knicks, Brogdon suddenly retired on the heels of some poor preseason showings. That etched Shamet's return in marble. (Note: New York could have offloaded another salary to make room for both Shamet and Brogdon. The point still stands.)

Oh, what a return it has been. During the regular season, he was one of only 11 players to rate in the 75th percentile or better of three-point attempts per 75 possessions, three-point percentage and defensive matchup difficulty while racking up at least 1,000 minutes, according to BBall Index. His company: Anthony Edwards, Brandon Miller, Devin Vassell, Jerami Grant, Kon Knueppel, Deuce McBride(!), Mosey Moody, Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Royce O'Neale. 

You'll notice Shamet is the only player on that list making the minimum. And while he began the playoffs on the outskirts of the rotation, that didn't last long. The Knicks don't erase a 22-point deficit in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals and set the stage for the Cleveland Cavaliers' total implosion without him.

We could shame the Wizards for waiving him back in 2024. Or we could scold the rest of the league writ large for letting him fester on the open market this past summer only to see the Knicks take their sweet-ass time bringing him back, get best-minimum-deal-in-the-NBA production out of him and, equally ridiculous, secure his Early Bird rights ahead of this summer.

4. The Sacramento Kings Go Full Kangz on Mike Brown

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During Mike Brown's two full seasons at the helm of the Sacramento Kings, he instilled an offensive style that became League Pass pornography, guided the team to its first playoff berth since 2006 and steered them to 45-or-more victories in consecutive years for the first time since 2005.

Naturally, the Kings being the Kangz, they showed him the door 31 games into 2024-25 following a 13-18 start. Makes sense. Being five games under .500, after picking up 46 wins the year before, is inexcusable for a franchise with aspirations of being...much worse.

Mission accomplished. Sacramento is 40-84 since firing Brown.

In true "This team is governed by Vivek Ranadivé" fashion, the move made zero sense at the time. Insider quotes like "Nobody wanted to fire Mike" immediately began trickling out. His exit was also the beginning end of the end for De'Aaron Fox. He told the Kings that he didn't want to play for a fifth coach in less than eight years. So, they of course forced him to play for a fifth coach in less than eight years.

Brown's Sacramento exit deserves to finish higher on the LOL Kangz scale we're operating on throughout this exercise. But the Knicks turned over a bunch of other rocks before settling on him, suggesting they didn't know x-for-o what they'd be getting.

It worked out for everyone in the end—except the Kings. It especially worked out for the Knicks. They have a coach more inclined to plumb the depths of the roster and try different things on offense, including wholesale tweaks requested by one of his players.

3. Minnesota Timberwolves Get into the Julius Randle Business

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For so long, the Karl-Anthony Towns trade from September 2024 has vacillated between a win-win proposition, a home run by the Minnesota Timberwolves and a swindling by the Knicks.

Blockbuster verdicts can take a while to render. The jury's officially out on this one. And the Knicks came out waaaaay ahead.

The value Minnesota received for KAT was right on the, ahem, money: Two-time All-NBA player Julius Randle, Donte DiVincenzo and a first-round pick that became Joan Beringer. The Wolves seemingly increased their on-ball dynamism with Randle, deepened the rotation with an extra body and created financial optionality that would open other doors.

Suffice it to say, that logic was a failure. Congratulations to the Wolves' governorship for paying Randle, DiVincenzo and Beringer a combined $10 million less ($47.1 million) than Towns ($57.1 million). Or something.

Look, it's not like Minny has been an abject failure. It made the Western Conference Finals in 2025. DiVincenzo's Achilles injury, along with Anthony Edwards' knee issues, torpedoed this year's postseason run. But that's precisely why you have Randle: to pick up the slack. He didn't. Instead, he shot under 40 percent on twos and less than 20 percent from three in the San Antonio Spurs' semifinals annihilation of the Wolves.

We needn't pretend as if everything's gone swimmingly for the Knicks and Towns. It hasn't. Whatever. Smooth seas don't make good sailors. All that matters is what's happening now.

And right now, Towns is no worse than the third-most valuable player on a potential title winner, functioning like the exact kind of floor-spacing playmaking hub and, yes, fight-like hell defender Minnesota could've used.

2. The Toronto Raptors Choose the Wrong Post-OG Anunoby Return

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The extent to which the Toronto Raptors fumbled OG Anunoby's future has taken a while to fully unfold. It's a gruesome review now.

Flipping him and Precious Achiuwa for RJ Barrett, Immanuel Quickley, Malachi Flynn and a second-round pick that became Jonathan Mogbos was panned by many in real time. There were also those who believed that, when accounting for injuries and next contracts, Quickley would be the most valuable player in the deal.

So much for that.

Anunoby is probably the second-most important player on a team that can win the title. Karl-Anthony Towns is making a case for himself, but Anunoby's defensive ubiquity and versatility is arguably harder to approximate.

Regardless, the five-year, $212.5 million contract he signed is more than halfway done, and it's hardly a disaster. Allocating around 26 percent of the salary cap, on average, to an All-Defense talent with third-option chops is a reasonable investment even if your best player and top-10 superstar isn't making less than Jalen Suggs.

The Raptors erred on multiple fronts in hindsight. First and foremost, they waited too long to move OG. He was months away from declining his player option and entering free agency. They could've gotten more had they acted sooner.

Then-team president Masai Ujiri also messed up by accepting players over draft equity. This may have been a symptom of Error No. 1. It definitely wasn't a sign Toronto wanted to rebuild through the middle. Pascal Siakam wouldn't have been shipped to Indiana weeks later if that were the case.

Finally, all the hemming and hawing over how much Anunoby's next contract would cost was, injury concerns and all, real galaxy-brain stuff. Especially when the Raptors, under new front-office lead Bobby Webster, eventually went on to give up a first-round pick for the right to give Brandon Ingram, on average, 24-plus percent of the salary cap to be an imperfect fit alongside Scottie Barnes.

1. The Dallas Mavericks Undervaluing Jalen Brunson...MULTIPLE TIMES

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Jalen Brunson enters the NBA Finals fresh off winning Eastern Conference Finals MVP and making All-NBA Second Team for the third consecutive season.

Not bad for a guy who the Dallas Mavericks decided wasn't worth a four-year, $55 million extension...on at least two occasions.

To be fair, not even the Knicks could have predicted Brunson would become this. To be even more fair, he was clearly worth the $55 million deal the Mavs passed on. They knew it, too.

After overplaying their hand in extension talks, the Mavs then overplayed their hand in trade negotiations with New York at the 2022 trade deadline. According to Fred Katz of The Athletic, they pushed for at least one of their own first-rounders the Knicks owned, believing Leon Rose and crew wouldn't have the ability to chisel out cap space and go get Brunson that summer. New York balked, talks fizzled and the rest is history.

Not only did Brunson's four-year, $104 million pact with the Knicks that offseason morph into one of the league's best bargains, but he followed it up by submitting to highway robbery and signing a four-year, $156.5 million extension last summer. Now a consensus top-10 player, he will barely rank among the NBA's 50 highest salaries when it takes effect next season.

Even if you were on the fence about the steps that the Knicks took to snag Brunson in the first place (*raises hand*), this was always comically poor asset management from the Mavs. Fortunately for them, the lead executive at the time, Nico Harrison, has since been fired. Unfortunately for them, he stuck around long enough to trade Luka Dončić in one of the most objectively boneheaded moves of all time.

At any rate, Dallas' irrevocable pain is New York's gain. None of what's happening right now is possible without him—or, for that matter, the Mavs.

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Dan Favale is a National NBA Writer for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Bluesky (@danfavale), and subscribe to the Hardwood Knocks podcast, co-hosted by Bleacher Report's Grant Hughes.