“You picked the wrong team.” That is what New York Knicks big man Karl-Anthony Towns told Stephen A. Smith. The Knicks clinched the series in six games to make it to their first Eastern Conference Finals since 2000. Well, to top it off, they did that by knocking out the defending champions. In Smith’s defense, the Celtics were everyone’s favorites ahead of the series. Boston came into the series after sweeping New York 4-0 in the regular season.

Nonetheless, they proved everyone wrong, and Karl-Anthony Towns played a huge role. While there’s no added motivation needed to perform in the playoffs, SAS believes the Knicks star had plenty.

The 29-year-old has been phenomenal this season. However, he proved why the Knicks paid big bucks for him in the summer during throughout the series. Towns was asked to defend All-Star wings Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum on switches, not an easy job by any means. However, he made sure that both wings got no easy looks. According to Smith, he had an extra bit of motivation to do so.

“I want to give kudos to Mr. Julius Randal of the Minnesota Timberwolves. I think Carl Anthony Towns was watching that, brother.” He said on First Take.

“I think he was watching that brother and seeing what he was doing, and he was like, “Yo, man, I got traded. I got traded here for that guy, let me make sure I show up too. Because he knows he knows New York well enough to know, look, we’ve you see that brother Julius Randle over there well, what you going to do cuz we we we we could have had him instead of you, you understand, and call Anthony Towns answer so I’m very appreciative.” He pointed out that Towns’ motivation might’ve been Julius Randle.

You might wonder why? Well, Randle was traded to the Wolves as part of the deal that landed KAT in New York.

So, seeing Randle ball out with Minnesota, Karl-Anthony Towns might have to be motivated to show the Knicks faithful that the franchise made the right choice. As we all know, the Knicks fanbase is well-known for its ruthless behavior, and had KAT performed poorly they surely would’ve let him know, according to Stephen A. Smith.

Instead, KAT decided to show up and play a huge role for the team by helping them knock out the defending champions. While Smith was impressed by how the 29-year-old Knicks star played, he was worried about something. This made him issue a warning to his beloved franchise.

Stephen A. Smith issues a major warning to Knicks before Conference Finals

Karl-Anthony Towns has been the New York Knicks‘ rock this season. The 29-year-old center has been phenomenal throughout the season and has carried that to the postseason. He’s averaging 19.8 points along with 11.3 rebounds and 1.1 assists in the playoffs. While his performances have been great, Knicks die-hard fan and analyst, Smith, thinks his new role might not be the best suited for him.

In case you’re not aware, Tom Thibodeau decided to tweak his tactics to confuse the Celtics, including positioning KAT under the post. While the big man showed he can adapt according to the team’s needs, Smith is worried about KAT’s fitness.

“I don’t like him in the post at all. I mean when he… even when he’s dunking and he comes down you’re always worried about him getting injured, because you always he always seems gimpy a lot of times.” Smith said on the show ‘First Take‘.

“When I’m watching him. When he’s just setting and shooting the brother’s straight fire, no question about that. Hasn’t been in this past series, and I get that, but he is arguably the best shooting big man in basketball. But coming into game six, what they said was “We’re going to let you be aggressive, we going to let you play bully ball, do what you got to do, just be in attack mode.” And he answered the call, and I got to give him a lot of love for that.”

The ESPN analyst pointed out that when Karl-Anthony Towns comes down after dunking, he’s always worried about him getting injured. Indeed, the Knicks star does have an unusual follow-through after dunking. That might increase the risk of him getting injured, something the team cannot afford with the Eastern Conference Finals just around the corner.

Instead, Stephen A. Smith urged that the Knicks should let him shoot buckets from a distance, something that’s more natural to him. Of course, he did give Karl-Anthony Towns his flowers for being up for the task of being under the post. However, it might be in his and the team’s best interest to let him play his own game.