Kristaps Porzingis’ torn ACL is a franchise-altering event for the Knicks

Welp.

We should not expect to see Kristaps Porzingis for quite some time. The New York Knicks have not yet announced that Porzingis is done for the year; but with the diagnosis of a torn ACL, that’s a mere formality. His season is over, and he is likely to miss much of next season as well.

Because Porzingis’ surgery hasn’t yet been scheduled, there is still no official timetable for his return, but ACL injuries generally take 9-12 months to come back from these days. By way of example, the Bucks’ Jabari Parker (who was on the floor at the time Porzingis hit the deck) tore his ACL on Feb. 8, 2017. He did not return until last Friday — Feb. 2, 2018. That was Parker’s second ACL tear of his career, but Zach LaVine, who tore his ACL on Feb. 3, 2017, took nearly as long to return: he came back on Jan. 13, 2018.

Given his age, size, injury history (more on this later), and importance to the team’s future, the Knicks would be wise to be extremely cautious with Porzingis’ rehab and return. It would not at all be surprising if we did not see him on the floor until sometime around next year’s All-Star break. Even if he manages to make it back before then, however, this injury should dramatically alter the team’s plans in the interim.

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There is only one day left until the trade deadline, but with their already-fading playoff hopes definitively destroyed, the Knicks should move firmly into full-on sell mode over the next 24 hours. Steve Mills and Scott Perry have to know that players like Courtney Lee, Kyle O’Quinn, and Lance Thomas now hold far more value to non-Knicks teams than they do to the Knicks. It’s extremely unlikely any of them would still be on the roster of the next Knicks team that becomes a playoff contender, and each of them has skills that should be worth at least a second-rounder or two on the market.

There is something to be said for refusing to tank out and trying to build a winning culture, which Mills and Perry have maintained is important to them, but the Knicks are not going to win without Porzingis anyway. They have the NBA’s worst record since Christmas, and that’s with KP on the floor. Things are going to get ugly without him. They just are. They would for any team that lost its best player for the balance of the season, and there’s no shame in acknowledging reality and pivoting accordingly.

The team seems exceedingly likely to plunge in the standings over the next couple months, which should allow them to add another high-lottery pick to their core of Porzingis, Frank Ntilikina, and Tim Hardaway Jr. The Knicks are unlikely to have much in the way of cap space this summer and thus do not figure to add any difference-making talent prior to next season (more on that in a second), which means they will probably be a mid-to-high lottery team again in 2019.

But while they will almost certainly get a couple high-value picks out of this disaster, building out their future core also becomes more complicated in the wake of Porzingis’ injury. Now done with his third year in the league, Porzingis is extension-eligible this offseason. All but guaranteed to get a max extension offer prior to this injury, it remains to be seen if Porzingis garners the same offer now.

The Knicks can elect to play out next season, try to shed some salary, and keep his cap hold for the summer of 2019 at a lower number than the starting salary for a max deal in order to chase an impact free-agent; holding out on offering Porzingis such an extension risks alienating him (not a smart idea after the Phil Jackson Debacle of 2017), but offering it anyway despite the fact that he’s rehabbing from a serious injury is arguably just as big a risk. Porzingis will probably get the max offer, given his production to date. Because it will be almost impossible for him to make an All-NBA team next season, he’s going to get a starting salary at 25 percent of the cap rather than the 30 percent he might have been eligible for had to satisfied the Rose Rule criteria, which should help the Knicks save a little bit of room.

However, they already have over $50 million committed to Hardaway, Lee, and Joakim Noah for the 2019-20 season, and they have an additional $8 million allotted for Ntilikina, Willy Hernangomez, and second-rounder Damyean Dotson. Add in their 2018 and 2019 first-round picks, plus cap holds for empty roster spots, and you’re looking $70 million or more in committed salary two years out — before accounting for Porzingis’ potential extension. Keeping Porzingis’ cap number around $17 million rather than pushing it into the high-20s or low-30s could be the difference between being able to land a difference-making free agent and not even being able to get in the neighborhood of a legitimate offer. Shedding the contracts of Lee and/or Noah between now and then makes things less complicated, but it’s not guarantee the Knicks can or even want to do so. (At least in the case of Lee. We know they want Noah gone. If they can’t manage to jettison Noah by the deadline or over the summer, they can stretch his contract after next season in order to create more space in the summer of 2019.)

Before even considering how to build out the roster around Porzingis, the Knicks have to reckon with his suddenly very troublesome injury history. The 2017-18 season was the third straight year that Porzingis started out on fire, only to suffer a seemingly minor injury in December or January that knocked him off course and led to his numbers taking a steep drop. He proved himself capable of handling the role of No. 1 offensive option this season, but he has yet to prove that he can stay both fully healthy and at the top of his game for an extended period of time.

Also concerning is the fact that Porzingis has had a series of ailments on the left side of his body, culminating in a major injury that necessitates season-ending surgery. This is something I raised with him in February of his rookie season, when he’d sustained a few minor nicks and bruises to the lower left side of his body. None of those injuries had kept him out of the lineup, so Porzingis himself said he was unconcerned; but a conversation I had with Jeff Stotts of the NBA injury blog In Street Clothes proved to be almost eerily prescient. The last paragraph in particular should be of interest:

"Stotts says the Knicks would be wise to gather information on Porzingis’ biomechanics in order to develop a go-forward plan.“Is there a connectedness and smoothness to the ankle, the hip? Take that systematic approach to his body,” Stotts said. “If there is something very simple like he’s got tight glutes and that’s putting undue stress on his knee, you want to address that first before you start adding muscle mass. There’s plenty of ways that you can do that — whether it’s range-of-motion activities, strength-training exercises. Some guys do plyometrics — depending on what exactly that weak link in the chain is.“Then if there’s not any areas of concern and you feel that his overall biomechanical rhythm is good, then you start working on some strength training. But also, you want to start doing basketball-related activities.”An accumulation of minor injuries isn’t necessarily a cause for concern in and of itself, but that changes when the injuries are all to the same side of the body, which is true of Porzingis.“It would be irresponsible to ignore the fact that he’s had a left quad injury, a left hip injury, a left IT band injury, all these things in the left,” Stotts said. “Maybe there is something going on with that left kinetic chain. What you really need to do is address the weakest link in that chain if there is something that’s causing him to have a problem in that left side. You got to make sure that these seemingly minor things aren’t all connected and result in something major.”"

It took two years, but “something major” has indeed happened, and the Knicks absolutely need to address whatever is going on with the left side of Porzingis’ body as part of his rehab program. Yes, the actual ACL tear occurred on a play where he landed awkwardly on a dunk attempt and it could be considered a fluke; but it would be negligent to ignore the trend of left-side injuries and not attempt to balance out his body as best as possible.

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Even if he eventually recovers to the point where the injury is not a career-long concern, Porzingis’ style of play figures to be affected. His days of crashing the offensive glass for tip-dunks may not be completely caput and he seems likely to remain a good rim-protector (he’s never going to stop being 7-foot-3), but his ability to defend in space could be compromised and the athletic burst that has made him such a tough cover offensively could diminish as well. He may have to play a slightly more ground-bound offensive game and make the transition to full-time center sooner rather than later because he’s likely to be even more of a defensive liability on the perimeter than he already is, and his size will do the Knicks’ defense much more good if he’s as close to the rim as possible.

Porzingis is so talented and so unique that he still seems likely to tap into much of the all-world potential he showcased on a near-nightly basis over the last three seasons, assuming he makes it back from this injury without any lingering effects. But whatever ceiling existed for his talent is a bit lower now than it was 24 hours ago, and the same is true for the Knicks organization.