{"id":806011,"date":"2026-08-07T19:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/806011\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T19:00:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:00:11","slug":"mikal-bridges-finally-got-the-monkey-off-his-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/806011\/","title":{"rendered":"Mikal Bridges Finally Got the Monkey Off His Back"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Mikal Bridges got the monkey off his back by turning the Knicks\u2019 2026 championship run into definitive proof that he was worth the five first-round picks New York traded for him. After a passive, 36%-shooting start against Atlanta got him benched, Mike Brown redeployed him as a motion weapon, cutter, and point-of-attack stopper alongside Karl-Anthony Towns\u2019 pinch-post hub. Bridges responded by shooting better than 62% from the field over his next eleven games, locking up an All-Star guard every round, and finishing the playoffs at 13.5 points per game on 55.9% shooting with a .620 effective field goal percentage. His signature moment \u2014 20 points on 8-of-13 shooting, 4-of-6 from three, in a Game 2 Finals road win \u2014 was when he told two years of critics \u201cfuck dem picks\u201d on the sport\u2019s biggest stage. The path to an even better, more efficient 2026-27 lies in leaning further into the Knicks\u2019 spray offense, 45-cut spacing, and Villanova-flavored \u201cNova\u201d ghost actions.<\/p>\n

Two days after the New York Knicks won their first title in 53 years, Mikal Bridges got hella drunk and went on Instagram Live. It was 11 a.m., and he said so himself, laughing at the absurdity of it: \u201cIt\u2019s 11:00 a.m., man. Lock in. No cap, bro. What the hell am I doing, bro?\u201d He knew exactly what he was doing.<\/p>\n

He put on \u201cLost\u201d by Coldplay and confessed on camera he might cry. \u201cI might shed a tear. No cap.\u201d He held up jerseys. He shouted out CP3 and half of New Orleans. He raved about his long-time friend and point guard, Jalen Brnsone: \u201cJB goat. Build a statue. Build that little bigheaded ass a statue, bro.\u201d And then, somewhere in the haze, he finally exhaled about being the most scrutinized role player in basketball.<\/p>\n

First, he thanked his tormentor. \u201cI appreciate Becky. No cap. Cuz the words she said about can\u2019t win with JB being a one-A, one-B, he too little \u2014 all that did is fuel it.\u201d He\u2019d taken an insult aimed at his teammate, turned it into rocket fuel.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Then, drunk and free and finally a champion, he couldn\u2019t help himself: \u201cF them pics. Be nice, man. We still got more to prove, man. We still could have been better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much truth is said in slurred sentences. The monkey on his back was dead \u2014 you could hear the release in his voice, the \u201ccount me out, I love when you count me out\u201d \u2014 and yet the competitor never once switched off. Weeks later, sober and reflective on the \u201c7 p.m. in Brooklyn<\/a>\u201d show, he got real. \u201cI\u2019m the ultimate competitor. Do you think I\u2019m happy? If I\u2019m not playing well, struggling in the system \u2014 I\u2019m a mental case with it. Every single day, what I eat, whatever I do, I\u2019m so mental about it.\u201d Host and former Knick Carmelo Anthony cosigned Bridges as the hardest-working man in the building, never misses a game, \u201cvery human.\u201d<\/p>\n

The monkey, it turns out, was never really about the picks. It was Mikal Bridges holding himself hostage to expectations. To understand how he broke free, you have to understand what the trade did to him in the first place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mikal Bridges got the monkey off his back by turning the Knicks\u2019 2026 championship run into definitive proof…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":806012,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99],"class_list":["post-806011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=806011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/806012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=806011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=806011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=806011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}