The NBA’s new In-Season Tournament has taken some getting used to — from players, coaches and fans alike — but it’s gotten off to a promising start, adding a bit more juice to what would normally be regular season games without much interest.
We’ll soon have a better idea if it’s going to turn into something more beginning this week, with the quarterfinals having begun Monday and the NBA Cup title game happening Saturday in Las Vegas.
Most people around the NBA have gotten over the initial confusion and apathy surrounding the tournament and have paid attention to the results — with players, obviously, most interested in the $500,000 prize for each member of the NBA Cup-winning team.
It’s also up for debate whether every team is going to take NBA commissioner Adam Silver’s brainchild as seriously as others.
Tuesday’s Knicks-Bucks matchup in Milwaukee is a prime example.
For the Knicks, Tuesday represents not just a game in Milwaukee against a formidable rival, but also perhaps a chance to begin showing that they can be a contender in the Eastern Conference.
Their playoff series win over Cleveland last season was the Knicks’ first in a decade, and while this manufactured mid-season tournament is far from playoff-like importance, it’s clear players are taking it seriously.
If the Knicks can find a way to knock off Giannis Antetokounmpo and new teammate and fellow superstar Damian Lillard and move on to Vegas, they would face the winner of Monday’s Pacers-Celtics quarterfinal game.
And with the Knicks looking to add as many significant wins to their résumé as possible, it’s easy to see why they’d take Tuesday’s game seriously.
Milwaukee, meanwhile, has been among the top teams in the Eastern Conference for the past six years, and a long stay in the postseason is a must — especially with the addition of Lillard.
An upset loss in the first round of the playoffs last year cost head coach Mike Budenholzer his job just two years removed from guiding the Bucks to an NBA title.
His replacement, Adrian Griffin, has said he’ll use this tournament as a test for his team. Antetokounmpo, an NBA champion, was asked Sunday about Tuesday’s game and acknowledged its importance to the Bucks.
“I’m excited, [it’s a] big game on Tuesday,’’ Antetokounmpo said. “Hopefully, we can win the game and hopefully go to Vegas and try to fight for an opportunity to win a trophy.”
Asked if it felt like a European soccer cup tournament — which was the idea when the NBA Cup competition was created — the Greek native said it did.
“I feel like there’s a lot of excitement, a lot of hype behind it,” he said. “You’ll probably see on Tuesday, there’s going to be a lot of owners here, a lot of people come to watch, maybe some celebrities.”
The Bucks can afford to have that attitude, even as Antetokounmpo and Lillard have taken longer to adapt to playing alongside each other than many anticipated.
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The Knicks, though, are among the teams that could use some seasoning. Perhaps they’ll find it in early December, as unlikely as that may seem.
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A new thorn in the Mets’ side?
One of the biggest moves as baseball’s winter meetings got underway in Nashville came late Sunday night, when Jarred Kelenic was traded from Seattle to Atlanta, bringing the former Mets prospect back to the NL East.
The transaction also brought to mind the trade from five years ago that sent Kelenic to the Mariners in the first place, a much-scrutinized deal made by Brodie Van Wagenen, in his first major transaction as Mets general manager.
Kelenic was the key part of the package traded by the Mets in exchange for Robinson Cano and Edwin Diaz in 2018.
The first-round pick (sixth overall) by the Mets in 2018 has so far been a disappointment, but Kelenic is still only 24 and had his most productive season at the plate this past season.
Now with the Braves, who typically get the best of these types of moves, Kelenic can prove to be a thorn in the Mets’ side on a regular basis.
The trade also included lefty Marco Gonzalez and first baseman Evan White going to Atlanta in exchange for a pair of young right-handed pitchers, Jackson Kowar and Cole Phillips.
Kelenic is expected to compete for the starting job in left field, and unlike in Seattle, won’t come with outsized expectations to the Braves.
But if the Mets’ new president of baseball of operations, David Stearns, is able to spend Steve Cohen’s vast resources wisely — and Diaz returns to form after missing all of last season with a torn patella suffered during the World Baseball Classic — seeing Kelenic succeed with Atlanta probably won’t bother Mets’ fans all that much.
Change of plans
For the second time in three years, it seems the Jets and Giants are in the wrong kind of competition. In 2022, the Jets picked fourth overall; the Giants picked fifth.
As of Monday, the free-falling Jets were headed for the sixth pick, with the Giants again slated to get the following selection, according to Tankathon.com.
This was hardly the plan when the Jets opened the season with Aaron Rodgers as their quarterback and the Giants looked to follow-up on a season in which they’d won a playoff game and later signed Daniel Jones to an expensive new deal.
While both teams are technically still alive for the playoffs, they both would benefit from a better draft choice — although the Giants, who at one point seemed on their way to a top-two pick that could have netted them one of the premier quarterbacks — USC’s Caleb Williams or North Carolina’s Drake Maye — in this year’s draft, might now be out of that race.
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Pro Football Focus has the Giants picking sixth overall and picking up LSU WR Malik Nabers to provide Jones — or whoever the QB is next season — another weapon.
And PFF has the Jets at seventh going with Notre Dame offensive tackle Joe Alt to shore up an underperforming offensive line.
What we’re reading 📰
⚾ Mookie Betts to play second base? Could Shohei Ohtani be nearing a decision? Check in on all the latest rumblings from Nashville in The Post’s Winter Meetings tracker.
⚾ The Yankees’ offseason not only will reveal if they will be a better team in 2024 but also if they still maintain the draw that has won them so many star free agents in the past, Joel Sherman writes.
⚾ Steve Cohen invested three years waiting for David Stearns to run the Mets. And now that he’s here, the new team president has a tough balancing act, Mike Vaccaro notes. On one hand, there is patiently and prudently building the kind of club he won with in Milwaukee. On the other is an impetus to utilize the financial advantages Cohen’s riches afford him.
🏈 Zach Wilson may have lost his starting job, but that doesn’t mean he has given up on the Jets. At least that’s what coach Robert Saleh said in the wake of a report in The Athletic that Wilson was reluctant to get back under center. “The young man wants the ball,” Saleh said, according to The Post’s Ryan Dunleavy. “He wants to start.”
🏈 Speaking of Wilson, Brian Costello notes that when the Jets face the Texans this week, they’ll face a team that got the No. 2 pick right in C.J. Stroud. It’ll be yet another hard pill to swallow. “When a team gets it right, the coach looks like a genius. When the team gets it wrong, the coach is heading for unemployment,” writes Costello.
🏒 The “plight of the fan steeped in franchise lore [is to] be forever on the lookout for the black cloud that will darken the sunniest of skies,” Larry Brooks writes of those rooting for the Rangers. But The Post’s legendary hockey scribe has a suggestion about how to view this year’s hot start: Enjoy it.
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