Jalen Brunson is an NBA champion at last after guiding the New York Knicks to glory in 2026. Brunson did it in some style, too, with a 45-point outing in the closeout Game 5, and he has now shot up on The Ringer’s Bill Simmons’ all-time rankings. On the latest episode of The Bill Simmons Show, Simmons placed Brunson above the likes of Luka Doncic, Steve Nash, James Harden, and Jason Kidd.
“I think he has to be one of the top 50 players of all time, though,” Simmons said. “He did something that a bunch of great guards were never able to do. He did something that James Harden, as a starter on his own team, never even made the Finals and fell short over and over again. Steve Nash, who was an unbelievable player, two-time MVP. Through no fault of his own, could never quite get the team there.
“Chris Paul finally did it in the 2021 Finals late in his career, but they lost,” Simmons stated. “Jason Kidd, two straight Finals, but he lost and then finally gets one later, as a role player starter on Dallas. What Brunson did was up there with Dwayne Wade in 2006. It was up there with [Bill] Walton in ’77… Just dragging a team to the Finals.
“And he is somebody that I never in a million years would have thought would make the pyramid,” Simmons continued. “He was the guy over and over again who could create the best offense for them. And he got better when it mattered. He never got tired. He played 39 minutes a game in the Finals.
“As a small guy, the stuff that he did was inconceivable,” Simmons added. “And what he did in Game 5, I’m just going to say it like the more I look at it and stare at it, I think is one of the great Finals games. I have him at 40. I have them above Nash, Kidd, Sam Jones, Harden, [George] Gervin, and Luka.”
Brunson was truly spectacular in the Knicks’ 94-90 Game 5 win. For much of these playoffs, the talk had been about the Knicks winning games as a team. You had different players stepping up at different points.
For the first two games of the Finals, it was Karl-Anthony Towns, and he was being talked about as Finals MVP. OG Anunoby then put in some special performances of his own, and it seemed like the award was going to be his.
By the time Game 5 ended, there was no doubt about Brunson winning Finals MVP. The 29-year-old finished the night with 45 points (14-27 FG), three rebounds, three assists, and two steals, as the Knicks ended their 53-year title drought.
Brunson averaged a whopping 37.7 points on 48.1% shooting from the field over the last three games of this series to get the Knicks across the finish line. He has now joined a very short list of small guards who have led teams to titles.
Stephen Curry and Isiah Thomas are the only ones to have done it in the last 40-odd years. You can maybe argue Dwyane Wade is a small guard, too, and that Chauncey Billups should be here as well, but that’s about it.
As Simmons pointed out, so many of those small guards have failed in their quest to lead a team to a title. It’s why Las Vegas Aces head coach Becky Hammon didn’t think Brunson could lead the Knicks to one. Hammon has been proven wrong, and so have many others.
Is 40 too high for Brunson, though? Well, there are only so many players who can claim to have led a team to a title. The rest of his resume doesn’t look all that great, however, and that is down to him being a bit of a late bloomer.
Brunson did win Clutch Player of the Year in 2025, but has made just three All-Star and three All-NBA teams. He probably needs a few more All-NBA selections to stamp his spot in the top 50.
