Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Good morning and welcome to the NBA Daily presented by Amazon Prime for January 20th, 2026. Coming up, Jimmy Butler got hurt. We're going to talk about what it means for the Warriors. The Knicks got booed. We're going to talk about some potential cat trades. And we got Hunter Patterson after the Detroit Pistons beat the Celtics. Good morning, everybody.
Hey, Zena, how's it going out there in the Bay?
It's going well, you know, but that's that's only if you speak to me who was not at the game.
It's going well for you. Yeah. Yeah. Not so great for the Warriors in spite of a nice win over the Miami Heat and some better play recently. We're only going to talk about Jimmy Butler. Jimmy Butler left last night's game with against the Miami Heat.
Midway through the third quarter, when he landed awkwardly on one leg and his knee kind of buckled beneath him, he had to be helped off the court by a couple of guys. Did not look good. Did not sound good on the audio. Zena, this team needs Jimmy Butler. In order to win, I mean, he is the number two guy on this team. Yep. It's not going to be good if he has to miss any time whatsoever.
If he has to miss the rest of the season or something like that, their season's done. Right. But what are they going to do without Jimmy Butler? Let's just think short term for now because, again, we don't know ā Anything about it yet? There's been no reporting and no medical tests done as of the time of this recording.
But what do you see them doing in the short term to make up for his absence?
I think they're going to do what they've had to do all season long when someone's gone out or been inconsistent with their minutes because of injury or coming back from injury. And that's just going to be fill the void. I mean, the bench for the Warriors has been their saving grace this season. They're third in points per game right now.
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Chapter 2: What happened in the Knicks' recent loss to the Mavericks?
They have been able to find gems to come in and play defense and to keep the ball moving in their high motion offense that they like to do without anyone needing to be on the ball and sticking to the ball. Funny thing is that that's what Jimmy does. Jimmy does that very well.
He is a connector between the starters and the bench because he has that capability to switch from the high motion offense to the ISO offense. Now, without him, that means that not only will they have to find about 20 points per game, on just under 52% shooting out of this new starting lineup. But they're going to also have to find who is going to translate the defense that Jimmy also provides.
The number one thought that comes to mind is D'Anthony Melton. He's been phenomenal for them, but that's the whole issue with the Warriors. D'Anthony Melton is just coming off an ACL tear. He's working his way up to playing 26 minutes a game. That's going to be difficult to try and figure out
How can you ramp him up to fit the very big shoes that Jimmy is potentially leaving while also not accelerating his path to help and, you know, just trying to get better without hurting him.
Right.
There's another aspect of, you know, Brandon Pajewski could step up. He's been playing phenomenally as well, making the right decisions, playing well in defense, playmaking, shooting 63% from the floor. Like this is great. Overall, the Warriors are going to have to look down the bench. And I don't know, Dave. It looks like there might be somebody on the bench that could also get 20 points.
They got a big minute guy, right?
Yeah, they got someone that could probably put 20 points up in a game that has done it before and is just sitting there not being utilized.
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Chapter 3: How significant is Jimmy Butler's injury for the Warriors?
Do you have an idea?
Listen, Jonathan Kuminga, if we could go back to the start of the year, the start of the season, and if he could come in and he can be that Jonathan Kuminga from the first three weeks of the season, You see the vision. Great. I just think that that ship has probably sailed at this point, Zena. Yeah. I mean, you know, there's a there's a 20 point blowout against the Miami Heat.
You lose Jimmy Butler and the one guy who doesn't play DNP coach's decision is Jonathan Kaminga. Right. It seems to me this could maybe speed up a trade. potentially, of Jonathan Kaminga? Maybe instead of waiting a few weeks for the deadline, this is something that needs to happen here in the next week. I don't know.
But I'm just going to say, Zena, I don't see the Jonathan Kaminga thing happening.
I don't think it's going to happen. I'm wishful thinking that we could potentially see Jonathan Kaminga in a Warriors jersey on the court once before he ends up wherever he ends up. But the thing about it is, as Marcus Thompson, Sam Amick, and Nick Friedle have reported for The Athletic, there is a possibility that Jonathan Kaminga stays on this team past the February 5th trade deadline.
And at that point, once we figure out what's happening with Jimmy Buckets, I mean, that is his nickname. Whenever we figure out what happens with Jimmy Butler, Who maybe has a change of heart? I don't know. But either way, the Warriors are going to have to buckle in and get on their bench to be able to step up. And they've been capable of doing that.
That's what's led to their 7-3 record in their last 10. And we'll see what happens with the Warriors.
Yeah, right back to just Steph Curry and a lot of guys. And that's, you know, not been a winning formula here lately. Also not... winning lately. The Knicks, they're 2-9 now in their last 11. After losing to the Mavericks at MSG and getting booed, they didn't just lose to the Mavericks. I mean, they got stomped by the Mavericks.
The final score was 114-97, and it got a little closer in the second half, but the game was really over at halftime, Zena. Getting booed at Madison Square Garden, I would never want to experience that. It doesn't seem like a fun thing. But this team has been in a funk. Like we mentioned, 2-9 in their last 11. When Brunson was out, they were a mess. This team, they had everyone.
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Chapter 4: What strategies will the Warriors use to cope without Jimmy Butler?
I just don't think this is tenable. Something has to change.
Something absolutely has to change. And, you know, I was watching the NBC Peacock pregame halftime, et cetera, and, you know, Tracy McGrady, Melo, Vince Carter talking about this situation. Melo, you know, referring to the fact that, yeah, something has to give, something has to change. And I believe Tracy and Melo were on opposite sides of this.
Is it the system that needs to change or does someone need to move? And Tracy was more on the side of he doesn't like the system. He thinks there's something wrong with that. But let's talk about the system for a second, Dave, because this is where the whole Carl Anthony Towns issue is glaring. Mike Brown has come in to create this high motion offense.
OK, in the last 10 games where this free fall has happened, the Knicks have been 25th in offensive rating. OK, last five games, 27th. They've not been great all season defensively, but they have been great offensively. They were fourth and they still are overall fourth. So for them to be this bad offensively, you got to start looking at what's changed in the last five or 10 games.
Of course, the Jalen Brunson injuries, right? So if you don't have Jalen Brunson, you got to look at, okay, who's your next best scorer? It's Carl Anthony Towns. And I'm just going to keep talking about guys that have done this. I've not been in the NBA, so I can't speak for the NBA. I play basketball, but I'm going to just use the greats and what they've said.
Reggie Miller said, and I'm paraphrasing, It doesn't matter if it's a high motion offense or you're running ISO, you're running whatever you're running offensively. If you're a true baller, you got to go out there and figure it out. And right now, Carl Anthony Towns has not been figuring it out in this high motion offense. He's got a bad assist to turnover ratio. He's turning the ball over.
He's also being kind of parked. Not utilized, I think, or not finding himself in positions to be utilized, kind of going away to the corner, passing up opportunities to go one-on-one in the post sometimes. It is clear that he is not figuring it out in this offense. And this goes back to the system or the player. I don't know what the answer is here, but I do know.
Well, they made a coaching change, Zena. I know. With this in mind, I can't imagine that when they were talking to Mike Brown about coming in and coaching this team, that their goal wasn't to maximize the Jalen Brunson-Carl Anthony Towns pairing. And to your point, this is now year two of these guys not really playing together. The coach changed. Right. The players did not.
There's a roster construction issue here. Also, I mean, this team doesn't have the defensive center anchor that you really have to tie to Carl Anthony Towns like Rudy Gobert. I mean, you know, Mitchell Robinson's been good, but largely unavailable. And I think I think where I start first is I look back at last year's team and what Tom Thibodeau was able to do with it.
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Chapter 5: What are the implications of potential trades involving Carl Anthony Towns?
They are really honest in saying we haven't done anything yet. Earlier this year, I asked Cade, when they were on that winning streak, how they've kind of changed in a sense. And he said, this is our first time not being losers in the NBA pretty consistently. Like, we all came into the NBA with high expectations. We've all been winners. We built winning habits before we got here to the league.
And for us now to be in this position, we... I think they have so much of the losing streak in the back of their head that they never feel quite like they've made it. It's not imposter syndrome because they know that they're worthy of being where they are, but they have those experiences of, man, we have not won a game in 28 straight games. So like we can't get comfortable anywhere we are.
And I think that's constantly something that the guys who were there during that losing streak are very much aware of. Yeah.
Well, guys, go and check out Hunter's story over at The Athletic. Follow along. Again, he's covering the best team in the East. And thank you, Hunter, for hanging out in spite of the fact that they're converting the arena into what sounds like an Acme dynamite factory. In real time. Hopefully our super producer, Alex, can clean up that audio.
But I appreciate you hanging out with us after the game. Thanks, as always, to Zena Keita. I'm Dave DuFour, and this has been the NBA Daily. Thanks for hanging out with us.
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