The 2021 NBA draft is widely regarded by experts as the greatest, most once-in-a-lifetime-draft since those same experts proclaimed the last greatest once-in-a-lifetime-draft all the way back in the year of our Lord 2014. A lot of Knicks fans have identified next summer’s draft plus the bevy of cap space New York will have as the franchise’s long-awaited jumping-off point, their most heralded jumping-off point since the summer of 2019 intoxicated us all with visions of Zion and KD before we woke up next to RJ Barrett and Julius Randle.
But what if the Knicks improved enough to make the playoffs?