OG plus Knicks equals points for, very few against

In the context of the NBA’s history, plus-minus is relatively new. It was first tracked in the 1996-97 season, and the king of the stat is Tim Duncan, who never stopped winning with the Spurs and finished with an exact plus-10,000 for his career.

It’s a good indicator of impact and addresses the important question: how much is the team outscoring, or getting outscored, with a specific player on the court?

With OG Anunoby, the answer is emphatically — very emphatically — on the plus side.

Since he arrived on the roster at the start of 2024, the Knicks have outscored teams by 239 points in Anunoby’s 467 minutes, according to NBA.com. It represents the best plus-minus for a player through his first 13 games with a new team since the tracking started, per Elias Sports Bureau.

Who ranks No. 2 on that list? Rasheed Wallace in 2004, when he was plus-172 with the Pistons after being traded in February from the Blazers. That turned into a championship for Detroit and one of the best historical in-season moves.

Anunoby’s plus-239 is also the best across any 13-game stretch in about two years, since Jayson Tatum finished a plus-240 run in February of 2022, according to Elias Sports Bureau.

“It’s pretty wild,” said Jalen Brunson, aware of the numbers. “I can’t really say anything besides he’s always doing the right things out there, doing the right things on both sides of the ball.”

The key to this success is defense, which has been elevated to one of the league’s best since Anunoby’s arrival. His defensive versatility and ability to switch onto all five positions has unlocked a Knicks shell difficult to penetrate.

The result is fewer points for the opposition and a record-breaking plus-minus for Anunoby.

“He makes life a lot easier,” Brunson said. “It looks effortless when he plays out there defensively. So what he’s been able to do has been special.”

Added Julius Randle: “He just always seems to be in the right place.”

The success has been felt throughout the roster, mostly with the starting lineup. Heading into Friday’s games, Anunoby’s plusminus was No. 1 in the NBA since the New Year. But Nos. 2, 3 and 5 belong to Brunson (plus-193), Isaiah Hartenstein (plus-159) and Randle (plus-148), respectively.

The Knicks are 11-2 with Anunoby with a five-game winning streak — the longest in the Eastern Conference — on the line against the Heat on Saturday.

“Well, I think it’s two-fold,” coach Tom Thibodeau said. “I think it’s what OG brings to the team but it’s also what the guys here are bringing to him. When you get everyone invested in each other, good things come from that.”

And there are few better things in basketball than outscoring the other team.

“I expected it,” Anunoby said. “I expected to make a difference.”