Marcus Morris was part of the underachieving Celtics last season and he wants to ensure the New York Knicks don’t fall into the same trap.
Part of the problem in Boston, as Marcus Morris notes, was that the team deferred to Kyrie Irving too much. That’s not something he sees as a problem with the New York Knicks.
“The teams are different. We don’t have that one guy where it’s like, okay, he’s first,” Morris said via Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News. “It’s a team thing. No knock on Ky, but obviously he’s a superstar, he’s first. Sometimes his emotions were put in front of the team. I think here, we’re all transparent with each other. We can all go up to each other and be honest with each other. That’s the biggest thing, when you can go out and speak to your brother.”
That’s a fair assessment that even Irving, now a Brooklyn Net, would agree with. At Nets media day, the star point guard took responsibility for not being the leader Boston needed.
However, it’s nice to have that superstar teams can lean on when times are tough. It’s not quite clear who will emerge as the bell cow the Knicks need to rely on when they need a timely bucket in a big spot. Julius Randle and RJ Barrett are the two most likely candidates.
Another major difference between the 2018-19 Celtics and the 2019-20 Knicks is that New York is coming into this season without many expectations.
“It’s a different team and a different situation and different guys,” Morris told ESNY at media day in September. “With this team it’s a lot of guys that want to prove something. We don’t have any expectations and I think that’s the best thing.”
