When the New York Knicks brought Jalen Brunson to the Big Apple in the summer of 2022, many people were scratching their heads.

Brunson was merely a role player with the Dallas Mavericks, but the Knicks gave him a four-year, $104 million contract anyway.

While it wasn’t viewed favorably at the time, Bleacher Report writer Dan Favale is changing his grade, giving the Knicks an “A+++++” for their work.

“Jalen Brunson’s contract with the New York Knicks incited everything from genuine concern and aggravation to full-scale troll jobs,” Favale writes. “The contract was too much for a non-star. Or the contract was fine, but the lengths to which the Knicks went to get him were not. His arrival was a harbinger of doubling-down on mediocrity, not a path to putting the franchise on the title-contention map. However, the deal has since aged into one of the NBA best bargains. After two years with the Knicks, Brunson has racked up an All-NBA second-team appearance, one All-Star selection and a top-five MVP finish. That is bonkers stuff.”

Since joining the Knicks, Brunson has led the franchise to a pair of playoff appearances and was just one win away from reaching the Eastern Conference Finals last season.

He has emerged into the star player that a team needs in order to compete for a championship, and he’s done that almost immediately and to the surprise of many.

Those who aren’t surprised with Brunson’s development? Brunson himself and the people who are in his camp.

He has worked hard to get to where he is as the Knicks star point guard and he knows he still has a long way to go to get the team to where they want to go. That being said, he’s more than capable and ready for the challenge ahead.

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