Isaiah Hartenstein is putting in work this summer to take another leap on the court after a breakout 2023-24 season with the New York Knicks. After a mixtape of Hartenstein offseason clips went viral on X, former Knicks teammate Josh Hart joked about Hartenstein’s ethnicity after watching him demolish opponents in these clips.
Isaiah Hartenstein… my goodness. pic.twitter.com/McSbk6c80i
— KnicksMuse (@KnicksMuse) September 19, 2024
Isaiah Hartenstein was one of the biggest winners of the 2024 offseason, signing a 3-year, $87 million contract with the Oklahoma City Thunder to add high-level center play to last year’s No. 1 seeds in the Western Conference.
He had a breakout season on the Knicks, averaging 7.8 points and 8.3 rebounds while forming a strong bond with players such as Josh Hart and Jalen Brunson.
Hartenstein has widely been assumed to be a White NBA player, but he went on Hart and Brunson’s podcast, ‘The Roommates Show’ where he publicly revealed that his father is Black jokingly calling his skin color bright skin.
“Some people are light skin, I am bright skin. I am above light skin. My dad is Black. Every time people find out, y’all know Key and Peele? When Barack Obama is going in and the white man’s handshake is different.”
Hartenstein will now play for a Western Conference contender, with many experts believing that the additions of Hartenstein and Alex Caruso this summer make the Thunder runaway favorites to win the Western Conference.
Can The Thunder Make It To Their First NBA Finals Since 2012?
It’s quite incredible to think that the Thunder haven’t made the NBA Finals since 2012 given all the talent they’ve had in the years since. They took a huge leap last season, jumping up to the No. 1 seed in the West, after ending the 22-23 season as a 10th seed who lost in the Play-In Tournament. This year, they’re bonafide contenders to win a title with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander as the team’s superstar point guard.
The Thunder could have been more competitive last season if they had more size to deal with the explosive Dallas Mavericks in the second round of the 2024 Playoffs. Signing Hartenstein gives them that size alongside Chet Holmgren, while a perimeter defender such as Alex Caruso gives them another option alongside Lu Dort to guard both Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving.
Hartenstein brings a versatile skill set to the Thunder, being able to play as an inside force while remaining competent on the perimeter. He isn’t a lights-out shooter like Chet but won’t shy away from taking threes when required. His intensity on the boards is what the team needed the most, as the Thunder struggled to outmuscle bigger opponents in the paint consistently last season.
If Gilgeous-Alexander continues playing at an MVP level with Jalen Williams and Holmgren being 20+-point scorers behind him, the thunder might be impossible to stop. Adding Hartenstein, even if for a bloated price, will be worth it for the franchise who are in full contention mode after a five-season rebuilding window from 2019 to 2024.
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