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It was on Dec. 21, 1891, that a 30-year-old physical education professor named Dr. James Naismith came up with a splendid idea. He nailed a peach basket to the lower rail of a balcony in the gymnasium at what is now called Springfield College. He came armed with 13 original rules of a new game, “basket ball.”
He used a soccer ball, because the sport came before the orb.
Exactly 130 years later, exactly 139 miles southeast of that sacred sporting place, the Knicks and the Pistons spent extended portions of a Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden undoubtedly making Dr. Naismith — assuming he gets MSG Network on his cable system in the great beyond — pondering if maybe he should’ve invented another game.
The Knicks won, 105-91, mostly because their gutted roster was a bit better than Detroit’s gutted roster, and also because a basketball player who until recently had been safely ensconced in the Witness Protection Program showed he still has a few old tricks to show the hometown fans when liberated from Bubble Wrap.
Yes, in some ways this was a second homecoming for Kemba Walker, who scored 21 points in 40 minutes, grabbed eight rebounds and handed out five assists, three of them alley-oops to Mitch Robinson who had his own monstrous 17-point, 14-rebound game off the bench. Robinson’s night was one of his regular tease-previews of what his future might hold.
Walker’s night, of course, was merely a reminder of what once was, and maybe what the Knicks brass hoped he might have been able to be this year. Coming on the heels of his 29-point explosion Saturday night in Boston, it has been a nice two-game renaissance for Walker.
“I love Kemba,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau, though it was Thibodeau who kept Walker in warm-ups for nine straight games. “My job is to do what’s best for the team.”
Walker literally needed half the Knicks’ roster to wind up in health and safety protocols, and for Derrick Rose’s ankle to start barking on him, to see the floor again. Madison Square Garden seemed happy to see him, and he certainly seemed happy to play in the big gym where he first gained so much attention as a high school junior.
“I had a lot of fun,” Walker said. “I’ll continue to have a lot of fun for as long as I’m out there.”
That, of course, becomes a lot stickier issue once the idle return. Rose is going to get his minutes back when he comes back. So will Immanuel Quickley. And it seems not only likely but essential that whenever Quentin Grimes and Miles McBride are reactivated, they’re going to start to see more regular time, too.
For Walker, that really is a most bittersweet irony. His original benching was clearly a message from Thibodeau, a cryptic one perhaps, aimed at either the player or the front office, maybe both. It seemed like some old-school Thibs stubbornness when he refused to budge even as the roster kept thinning.
But the truth is, both Grimes and McBride seized their opportunities, however brief they may have been, before the virus sent them away. And the larger truth is, both players are intriguing, and both may become significant parts of the Knicks’ future. It has become an imperative that Thibodeau figure out a way to use them when they’re eligible.
And there’s only 240 minutes per game for him to distribute.
Walker’s going to be the odd man out again soon, only this time it won’t be punitive, just practical and prudent.
“I’ve been trying to do my best to keep us upbeat, keep us positive,” Walker said postgame, sporting a red Yankees cap with a heart at the foot of the interlocking “NY.” “This is when you have to stay together the most.”
He has been a professional the whole way, the whole time, even if body-language experts tried to make something of his on-court laughter the past two games. Even if getting benched in his hometown was the last thing he, or anyone else, expected when so many of us (your humble narrator at the front of the line) embraced this sweet tale in the summer.
Even if it seems necessary for the old pro to be sacrificed in the name of the future when the kids are ready to come back.
“I’ve had a lot of fun these last two games,” he said.
That’s good for Kemba. What’s best for the Knicks, we’ll see when the troops come trickling back. It probably won’t include Walker. Truth is, it probably shouldn’t.
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