Bridges’ streak to end

Mikal Bridges’ run of consecutive starts is set to stop at 637, but his consecutive games played streak will keep going after Knicks coach Mike Brown said Bridges would start Monday and come out right away. (x.com) The move comes one day after Bridges played 23 seconds in New York’s regular-season finale against Charlotte, pushing his games-played streak to 638 straight. The Knicks had already locked up the No. 3 seed in the Eastern Conference before that game. (nba.com 1) (nba.com 2) A player keeps a consecutive-starts streak only by being in the opening lineup, while a consecutive-games streak counts any appearance at all. Brown said the Knicks would use that distinction to manage Bridges’ minutes going forward. (x.com) Bridges has never missed a regular-season game in his National Basketball Association career. He recently moved past Andre Miller for the eighth-longest consecutive-games streak in league history, with A.C. Green’s 1,192-game record still far ahead. (nba.com) (wikipedia.org) The Knicks have already used this kind of workaround before. In the 2024-25 regular-season finale, Bridges started, played six seconds, committed a foul and checked out, which kept his games-played streak alive at 556. (sports.yahoo.com) That earlier cameo drew criticism from some fans and commentators who argued the streak had become technical rather than competitive. Others pointed to the league’s era of planned rest and treated Bridges’ availability as a legitimate accomplishment on its own. (si.com) (larrybrownsports.com) Brown is in his first season as New York’s coach after the Knicks hired him in July 2025 to replace Tom Thibodeau. His decision leaves Bridges’ games-played mark intact while formally ending a starts streak that had become a league record. (nba.com) (x.com)