Near the end of the 20th century, futurist Faith Popcorn claimed people would shift from experiencing time to experiencing trends. Eight games into an NBA season isn’t much time, but it’s more than enough to pick at some early New York Knicks trends. Let’s see which are worth buying and which are best left on the shelf.

1. BUYING: The Knicks have struggled, but are good

New York lost their first three games before rebounding with four wins from five. Their four losses have been by four, five, six and nine points, continuing a trend that began in the 2026 playoffs, when their three losses were by one, one and four. The last time the Knicks lost a game they were playing to win by double-digits was last March.

Three of the four losses have come against Philadelphia and Boston, now a combined 15-4. The other was Orlando, the classic “team that can beat anyone on any night yet has no chance to win a playoff series." These are not losses to be ashamed of or worried about.

Some would point to the Knicks’ wins and be unconvinced. A good one over Detroit, their most-recent bugaboo, but otherwise just two conquests of Chicago and one against Brooklyn, who are a combined 3-13. 

The next 10 days should be illuminating: the Knicks play Cleveland twice, two straight in Toronto and visit Indiana, home of their pre-Pistons bugaboo. New York’s wins have been by six, 13, 14 and 30 points. 

In the simplest terms possible: the Knicks spent all summer celebrating, went back to work and have mostly lost games that went down to the wire while generally winning by double-digits. No, they're not "back" yet. But they were never really that far gone.

2. SELLING: The Knicks will finish last in two-point shooting

Last year the Knicks treated two-point shots like a young person who’s come to appreciate the benefits of the occasional vegetable. They were only 19th in attempts and 18th in makes, but finished 10th in two-point accuracy.

Shots from inside the arc brought them balance and buttressed their threat from three-point range—if you’re good inside the arc, defenses have to adjust, opening up the long-range game. That was one reason the Knicks were fourth in three-point accuracy a year ago. Twos are the roughage that makes the threes flow freely.

Eight games into this season, they’ve fallen to 12th. One reason: the Knicks have bottomed-out inside the arc, currently third-to-last in two-point tries and dead-last in two-point percentage.

Last season six Knick regulars were above the league average shooting twos: Mitchell Robinson, Karl-Anthony Towns, OG Anunoby, Mikal Bridges, Josh Hart and Landry Shamet. So far this year the only Knick to do so is KAT. Struggle enough inside the arc and defenses are more than happy to let you, as it has a deleterious effect on the three-point threat.

Adjusted two-point percentage measures how a player ranks shooting twos compared to a league-average shooter, with 100 meaning average. Look at how far how many Knicks have fallen. The first number is their 2025-2026 adjusted percentage, the second from 2026-2027 and parentheses shows their career percentage.

OG: 106 → 93 (104)
Hart: 104 → 88 (107)
Shamet: 101 → 87 (91)
Brunson: 95 → 83 (98)
Bridges: 106 → 68 (105)
McBride: 81 → 56 (85)

Shamet isn’t too far off from his usual efficiency. Brunson’s shot profile is as high in degree of difficulty as anyone in the league; couple that with late offseason wrist surgery and you can see him needing a little time to catch up. Bridges and McBride are the two biggest fallers. Thankfully, the Knicks have the guard depth—and enough time—to trust this trend reverses.

3. BUYING: Losing Mitchell Robinson hurts—but not where we thought it would

When the Knicks let Mitchell Robinson leave in free agency, it seemed an obvious misfortune. You don’t lose the best offensive rebounder in the game and not feel it. The Knicks said “Maybe,” then signed Andre Drummond. Last year they were sixth in offensive rebounds; this year they’re fifth. Don’t trust raw data? In 2025-26 the Knicks were fifth in offensive rebounding percentage. This year? Third.

Where the Knicks may miss Robinson the most is his ability to not get his shot blocked. One reason a team drops from 10th to 30th in two-point accuracy is they get rejected more often. Another is they take shots they can’t possible hope to make.

Whatever critiques fans may have of Mitch, one thing that man never did was take a shot outside his wheelhouse. He’s not a 70% career shooter by accident: he doesn’t try to write outside the margins. And when defenders are fool enough to test him, they don’t usually stop him. Especially compared to Drummond.

The numbers below show how many times each player had his shot blocked the past three seasons, including this one; the parentheses measures the rate of that stuffage.

• Mitch ‘27: blocked twice in 151 minutes (every 76 minutes)
• AD ‘27: six times in 106 (every 18)
• Mitch ‘26: 10 in 1175 (every 118)
• AD ‘26: 21 in 1231 (every 58)
• Mitch ‘25: once in 290 (every 290)
• AD ‘25: 29 in 751 (every 25)

Getting back to adjusted shooting, Robinson has been well-above average his whole career. Obviously a lot of that is him recognizing his limits and not testing them; less obvious is how impactful that can be on the rest of the offense.

Drummond finished below-average the prior two years and has dropped even from that level so far this season. He can't rise up and just go through other bigs to finish, and whereas Mitch would grab an offensive rebound and dish it straight away if he didn't have a follow-up available, Drummond—for better and worse—fancies his chances more to score with little hooks, turnarounds, etc. They're little misses, and he rebounds half of them anyway, but that adds up after a while.

Does that mean the Knicks are stuck? Doomed to diminished efficiency? Maybe not.

James Wiseman has a two-point adjusted rate of over 100 his entire (brief) career coming into 2026-2027. He’s off to a slow start, but the sample size is difficult to take a lot out of. But Wiseman is 25, not 33 like AD.

There will be games, or stretches in games, where the offense inside the arc is struggling. The Knicks might still benefit from adding another young, athletic big man to the roster. For now, their best chance at replacing what was lost when losing Robinson may not be their new backup. It might be the backup’s backup. 

4. BUYING: The Knicks will play at a glacial pace for the rest of all of our lives

You. The person reading is. How old are you? How long have you followed the Knicks?

It doesn’t really matter. However old you are, now that the Knicks are champions there’s only really one constant left that their fans can bond over. For 15 years in a row, a span covering six different head coaches, two interim head coaches, four lead executives, 13 first-round picks and hundreds of different players, there is one thing that never changes.

This year, they’re 27th in pace. They were 27th in 2025-26, too. Before that, they ranked 26th, last, 25th, second-to-last, last, 26th, 17th, 15th, 17th, 26th, 28th, 28th and 26th. The last time the Knicks finished in the top-10 in pace was the year of Linsanity, a.k.a. Renaldo Balkman’s last dance.

In the city that never sleeps, the Knicks are always sleepwalking.