What If Kristaps Porzingis Was Actually Good?

In the NBA Summer League, developments can later appear distorted, especially so in Las Vegas, where the afternoon heat bouncing off the pavement outside UNLV's Thomas and Mack Center provides sort of an odd sensation when you step into the blinking light of day. Here, things can appear to be something of a mirage.

No wonder it's hard for New York Knicks fans to trust anything that happens in Las Vegas. Last year, brand new head coach Derek Fisher and the Knicks rolled along quite nicely in the summer league, only to be obliterated once the real hoops began with the regular season.

But this year genuine excitement hovers over the Knicks organization. There are lots of good vibrations.

Last season brought 65 losses, 65 godawful nights of having to sit there and endure being ridiculed by opponents and the media alike, a revolting spasm of ineptitude that rocked the already fragile psyche of New York basketball. The outcomes weren't even close enough for the first-year coach Fisher to get a clean sense of game management. So he's back here for a second year in Las Vegas to coach the Knicks' summer league team, a task just about always left to an assistant.

The reward for that has been a close-up view of the team's "Zinger" moment. The franchise's much-maligned rookie, 7-foot-3 Latvian Kristaps Porzingis, a 19-year-old who was taken fourth overall in last month's draft, has turned in a sweet week of work, doing all sorts of things that critics said he couldn't do.

He has run the floor like some sort of sleek hovercraft. He has made plays of every fashion, dishing like a point guard, smothering shots defensively, displaying dandy footwork and superb skills at nearly every turn. He has stood tall behind the defense, keenly observing the floor and talking to his teammates. He's tossed in soft jump shots that begin so high most defenders have no chance to alter them.

He's laughed easily with his teammates and thoroughly charmed them and the thousands of fans who crowded into the building here each time the Knicks have played. Most importantly, he's tickled the bespectacled old Zen dog sitting courtside right under the basket intensely focused on every single move that the kid has made.

Talk about pressure.

Porzingis is the item upon which Phil Jackson has staked the final, critical shreds of his career. Yes, Big Chief Triangle, as former Knicks coach Jeff Van Gundy used to call Jackson, has won 11 NBA championships by coaching a parade of Hall of Famers with the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers. But this is Jackson's first gig as a team executive. And it's been nothing short of bizarre, marked by his foggy twitter comments and enough controversy to feed a decade of New York news cycles.

Did we mention the losing?

It was a season that sucked like no other for two immensely and deceptively proud men in Fisher and Jackson. Unfortunately, their public shaming didn't end with the season, which was followed immediately by the draft and the free agency period.

It got ugly.

The long-running war between Knicks chairman James Dolan and the New York Daily News set the tenor for how the media interpreted events for the team. Knicks fans booed Jackson's selection of Porzingis at the draft, with ESPN's Stephen A. Smith wiggin' out on air over the pick. This was followed by a Greek chorus over New York's supposed failure in the much-hyped free agency period. It seemed for a time in June that the whole organization might just founder right there and combust.

The implication was that Jackson, who will turn 70 in September, was a zoned-out, doddering old fool who had lost interest.

But just when it seemed the next tabloid headlines couldn't scream any louder, the whole fever broke. If nothing else, Stephen A's epic stroke-inducing rant about Porzingis and how Knicks star Carmelo Anthony had been lied to probably did the cathartic trick. Seemingly almost overnight, the whole atmosphere calmed as the New York media regained their composure, looked at everything, and decided, "Hey, Jackson's offseason efforts and his running of the franchise are maybe OK."

So while everyone was blown away by the Zinger's physical performance, his mental composure, his unsinkable nature in the face of so much crap, was nothing short of extraordinary. Did we mention he's just 19? Did we mention that he was selected following a string of disappointing draft picks from Europe?

His aplomb has turned what seemed sure to be another ugly NBA New York kind of moment into something much better.

We're not quite sure what they sprinkle on the oatmeal in Latvia to get their day started, but you get the distinct impression that New Yorkers are going to find out that and a whole lot more about Porzingis' home country in the coming years. Prudence demands that we hold off on the Hall of Fame nominations just yet, but the dude is a keeper.

"Well, he's 19 years old. That's what I've thought about him so far," Jackson slyly told reporters with a chuckle after Porzingis finished with nine points and three rebounds in 18 minutes in New York's second summer league game, a 76-66 victory over the Lakers. "The growth is going to be interesting to see. He looks like a he can hold his own a little bit out there. I think he's going to find a comfort zone."

Porzingis has unusual shoulders and arms that reach forever, both reminiscent of the "coat hanger" shoulders and dangling arms that Jackson rocked during his own days as a Knicks reserve forward back in the early '70s.

He is thin at 7-3, 233 pounds, but the Knicks note that 7-foot-1 Pau Gasol, a Jackson favorite in LA, weighed just four pounds more as a rookie.

But Porzingis is a better shooter and more fluid player than Gasol, with far more range and athleticism. The Knicks staff privately hopes he can one day display the favorable attributes of both Gasol and Dirk Nowitzki.

If he can weather the coming NBA storm—an IF every bit as large as Porzingis himself—he has a chance to bring to the game an unprecedented athleticism for a man his size. He'll just have to do it while facing a physical challenge every night. It won't happen right away, as he has done in the summer league.

The Knicks themselves are in for some changes. Fisher appears to be following Golden State coach Steve Kerr's lead in moving away from a strictly triangle approach. The game today is to push the ball, then spread the floor with 3-point shooters. Fans may see more of that from the Knicks this season, although, again, summer league is not always the best predictor.

As for Porzingis, he'll play just about all of his time at the power forward slot for the Knicks. He'll be 7-3 in a league that is rapidly moving toward deploying smaller, more athletic, playmakers like Golden State's Draymond Green at the position.

So it'll be interesting. But that's the point. New York hoop heads will be every bit as engrossed as Jackson was sitting under the basket. And that's a good thing for the game and for the Knicks.

You can be a lot of things in New York. Just don't be dull.