After the New York Post reported Mikal Bridges told his coach Tom Thibodeau to give the Knicks starters less minutes, the coach denied it ever happened.
“Well we never had a conversation about it,” Thibodeau told the media. “The facts are the facts.”
He went on to explain how wing players play longer minutes and people questioning his system just ‘don’t understand the how the team works’, adding that the stars of the league like Kevin Durant and Jayson Tataum play 36-37 minutes per night.
He later added that Mikal’s minites have “gone down.”
In case you missed it, Bridges comments are below.
“Sometimes it’s not fun on the body,” Bridges said, via New York Post. “But you want that as a coach, and also talked to him a little bit knowing that we’ve got a good enough team where our bench guys can come in and we don’t need to play 48 [minutes], 47.
“We’ve got a lot of good guys on this team that can take away minutes. Which helps the defense, helps the offense, helps tired bodies being out there and giving up all these points. It helps just keeping fresh bodies out there.”
Bridges also Thibodeau was receptive coach but “sometimes I think he just gets in his ways.”
“I think he’s not arguing about it. Sometimes I think he just gets in his ways and he gets locked in. He just wants to keep the guy out there,” Bridges said. “Sometimes you’ve got to tell him, like Landry [Shamet], for example, or somebody, keep him out there, they’re playing well.”
Bridges has the NBA’s longest consecutive games streak and this is season’s leader in total minutes, averaging a career-high 37.8 minutes per game, but it’s no easy feat.
“I think it’s something you never really get used to,” Bridges said. “Your body is going to feel how it is every year. But I’ve been a part of it for a while, knowing how to take care of my body through those situations and just trying to do as much as I can.”
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