Tuesday Just Adds to Karl-Anthony Towns’ Growing Positive Knicks Outlook

Sometimes numbers lie. But 27 points and 20 rebounds speak for themselves. There’s no room for an untruth to hide in 27 and 20. Karl-Anthony Towns has been the Knicks’ best player in the season’s opening weeks; his best performance so far, against the Pistons, led the Knicks to theirs, to victory. At three different levels, Towns is showing the positives he picked up in last year’s playoffs didn’t end with the trophy presentation.

Big numbers, smooth production

Coming into the Detroit game, Josh Hart and OG Anunoby were shooting just 41% from the field. Jalen Brunson was at 39%. Mikal Bridges? 22%.

KAT was at a smoldering 62%, a figure he hovered around while pouring points on the Pistons’ heads. The Knicks are 1-3 but not all that far from 3-1, even 4-0. That they’ve done so with sub-par shooting from four starters is a testament to the depth of their quality. It’s also a credit to Towns, who’s been consistently active and engaged while somehow surviving chronic foul woes.

The Knicks aren’t the kind of team who get themselves going by getting themselves going. They’re deliberate. Slow cooker, not microwave. Sundial, not smart watch. You can weaponize slow if it’s smooth enough. Right now, Towns is.

The calendar says KAT could be in for a big month

For the better part of the next month, Towns will not face a peer. Not that there are many at his size and skill level. It won’t be until the end of November that he collides with Giannis Antetokounmpo -- which should have a little extra juice, given what KAT won with New York a year ago and how often up until the trade deadline he was linked with Milwaukee in deals supposedly sending Giannis to the Knicks.

Before that game, it's a lot of Jalen Smith, Jarrett Allen and Jakob Poeltl on the horizon – good NBA players, not a one at or near the level Towns is. While Brunson works to get his shot back to where it was after undergoing offseason wrist surgery and the other starters vacillate from blistering to bricks, Towns is like a starting pitcher who throws a lot of innings over a stretch when the bullpen needs a break, a doubly-good deed: giving his team quality pitching while giving his teammates time to get themselves rested and ready for when they're needed.

The ceiling is the ground

In “A Wind in the Door,” the sequel to “A Wrinkle In Time,” creatures called farandolae take root inside a human cell once they reach a certain age. Their acceptance of their fate to become foundation allows the rest of the cell to orient, spread and grow, and allows the larger body it's a part of to thrive.

A good NBA player raises his team’s floor. A great one raises their ceiling. A star does both while also being foundational. Towns hasn’t been merely terrific. He’s been a safe harbor, a calming eye in the early-season storm that’s rained hard on the Knicks so far.

That matters. That’s the kind of player who wins his team a few games during the year they otherwise had no business winning, and those extra wins can make a big difference when playoff seeding comes.

KAT’s terrific play, juxtaposed with the Knicks’ imperfect start to the season, is a perfect storm of a negotiating nightmare for owner James Dolan. Towns, Knicks fans and most of the free world figured he'd have been locked into a new deal by now. Instead, he’s playing better than any of the other starters while the team's struggled. How does that affect the leverage game? If the other Knicks starters show signs of slippage while KAT keeps humming along, how could Dolan not give him what he wants? And what will the blowback be if he doesn't?