Knicks president Steve Mills won’t acknowledge how badly Kristaps Porzingis wants to be on the court, but Lance Thomas, the longest-tenured Knick, will.
Thomas said Porzingis has “the itch.’’ On Friday, the Knicks released a statement that Porzingis, after the latest round of strength tests, will be reevaluated in mid-February. As such, he won’t return until after the All-Star Break in late February, at earliest.
“He’s working really hard, man,’’ Thomas told The Post after Mills’ meeting with the media. “He’s in there before everybody. He’s there when everybody leaves. While we practice, he just has that itch. You can just tell — seeing us compete so hard in practice. He comes to me and says, ‘Man, I can’t wait. I got the itch.’ He grabs a basketball on the side and starts dribbling it. He’s working really hard. I know he’s very anxious getting back on the court.”
In Friday’s sitdown with Knicks writers at his Garden offices, Mills stated Porzingis has progressed to doing 45-minute, 1-on-1 on-court activities with the coaches. Those sessions will progress to when he eventually will be cleared for full-blown practice, possibly before his mid-February deadline.
“I would love to [play with him this season],’’ Thomas said. “He’s been [my] teammate since he’s been in the NBA. I would love nothing more than to be able to lace it up with him again. He also needs to do what’s best for him. It’s an injury you don’t want to mess around with, especially the type of year he had right before it, an All-Star caliber year. We want to make sure he comes back and he’s confident with all his movements and mentally carefree.”
Porzingis tore his ACL against the Bucks last February. So when the Knicks were scheduled as one of the 10 teams on the Christmas slate in August to battle Milwaukee, there was hope from the national networks a Merry Kristaps would ensue.
No such luck. The Knicks (9-25) are the lone club on the marque Christmas slate — other than LeBron James’ Lakers — that didn’t make the playoffs in 2017-18.
Even when Porzingis is back, he is expected to be on a 20-minute restriction and coated in rust.
“He hasn’t played a game since February,’’ Thomas said. “There’s going to be some rust. But rust from KP is better than a lot of guys in this league.”I’m pretty sure he’ll close that gap pretty quickly.
It’s clear Mills is putting no pressure on Porzingis to suit up this season.
When asked if he’s aware if Porzingis wants to play, Mills said, “We really haven’t talk about — we’ve always left this in the context of whenever we feel like he’s ready to play and he feels like he’s ready to play.”
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