Steve Popper: Knicks' Jalen Brunson ready to get back to business following busy offseason

It’s been a little more than three months since the Knicks put the finishing touches on their first title in 53 years, and it seems as if the celebration has — deservedly — never stopped.

You wait long enough for the party, you understandably don’t want it to end. But it’s just about a week away from the start of training camp, and no matter how many shows he’s found himself stepping into, how many runways he has walked, you can be sure that Jalen Brunson will be ready to put the joy and the tears behind him and, as captain, bring the team with him.

Brunson spoke of it earlier this month when he appeared on the Road Trippin’ show.

“I just think like when you see teams loading up, you see like the season, the schedule getting released, you’re getting closer to the season, you’re like, ‘Yeah, it's all good to be on break,’ but then like you get that hunger back,” Brunson said. “You get that hunger back and, honestly, since it was a good three weeks . . . or 2 1/2 weeks, and then once I realized I need to get surgery, then I kind of turned the page.

“So, like, since that day, I've been like, the gears have been going. So I'm ready. I'm ready for another challenge. And then there that's definitely going to be a challenge, 100%.”

The Knicks have seemed to be everywhere, from the morning shows immediately after the celebration — when they sat without having slept at all and needed sunglasses to hide the signs of exhaustion — to the U.S. Open and autograph sessions around the nation.

Winning a title is a first for really all of them, other than OG Anunoby, who didn’t play when the Toronto Raptors won their title. So it’s a unique experience, and how they approach this season, with the work done by other teams in the Eastern Conference to match up to what the Knicks accomplished, it could determine whether they can repeat.

Health could be the most important factor. Brunson underwent a surgical procedure in July to repair a wrist tendon issue that had bothered him during the postseason (although it was hard to tell based on his Finals MVP performance, as he averaged 32.6 points per game, including a 45-point Game 5). He has been spotted working out on the court in recent weeks and is expected to be ready for the start of camp.

“We have all these people telling us how great we are,” Brunson said. “We won in New York. Everyone in New York is up on their high horse. Everyone's saying the best things about us. Even though in the middle of the year, they were probably saying the worst as well, when we [went through a stretch of] two and nine. So, like, there was definitely like a roller coaster of a ride.

"But it's important for us to come into the season to be like, ‘All right, like that's over with, right?' We don't want to speak of the trophy. We don't want to talk about the trophy. We don't want to see the trophy, right? We want to come in with the same mindset, if not an even tougher mindset than we had last year.

“I saw OG's quote the other day. He's like: ‘I'm kind of ready to move past it.' I know I said a while ago, I'm ready to kind of turn the page. We're getting to that point that we're saying the right things, but now it's time to, once we get there, can we do the right things? And so it's all about how our actions. But it ain’t going to be easy, 100% [it] ain't going to be easy.”

Camp competition

One thing that certainly will help the Knicks is that they return the same group — a group that is experienced and mature and now knows what it takes — nearly intact. Mitchell Robinson’s free-agent departure is the lone regular rotation piece gone, and the team moved to sign Andre Drummond to try to make up for that loss off the bench.

But there are spots to be earned, and the Knicks made a flurry of signings this past week to create camp competition for a roster spot.

Ideally, they will add a third center, and they will have Drew Eubanks, James Wiseman and Liam Robbins in camp to try to earn that spot. But the Knicks also brought a trio of established wings into camp — Bruce Brown, Ochai Agbaji and John Konchar — and could opt to keep one of them on the roster while crossing their fingers that Karl-Anthony Towns and Drummond stay healthy. If necessary, they can play small ball, with Anunoby taking minutes at center.

The Knicks technically have two roster spots open with 13 players under contract, but because of salary-cap constraints, they likely will add only one more player. They also have three two-way contract spots, one possibly for second-round pick Tyler Nickel, and also could bring back Kevin McCullar, who reportedly has been working out with Knicks players.