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No one should be mad at Isaiah Hartenstein for grabbing the bag, a sack that contains $87 million no less.

The 26-year-old center emerged as a key component for a Knicks team that finished this past NBA regular season 50-32, the No. 2 seed Eastern Conference and reached Game 7 of their conference semifinals match up against the Indiana Pacers before falling 130-109 at Madison Square Garden with a crew emotionally and physically decimated by injuries.

But Hartenstein had made around $22 million in career earnings, a modest sum by today's NBA measure, including the two-year, $16 million deal he signed with the Knicks in July 2022. So the contract offered by the Oklahoma City Thunder, a rising championship contender, on Sunday night, the official start of NBA free-agency, was hard to refuse.

Upon announcing the acquisition of the 7-footer 24 months ago, Knicks team president Leon Rose said this:

"We are very excited to welcome Isaiah Hartenstein to the Knicks' family," he expressed to open his comments. "He's a versatile big man who impacts the game on both ends of the floor and who plays with a passion and energy that is contagious."

Rose's words proved to be prescient. With starting center Mitch Robinson finding consistently stable health elusive, undergoing left ankle surgery in May following his exit from Game 1 versus the Pacers, the same ankle on which he had surgery in December that kept him out until his brief return for the playoffs, Hartenstein's quantifiable and intangible effect on the Knicks' success was considerable.

This past season, Hartenstein, who was born in Eugene, Oregon, and moved to Germany in 2008 with his family, where his father, Florian Hartenstein, was playing basketball professionally, appeared in 75 of the Knicks' 82 regular season games, starting 49, and averaged 7.8 points and 8.3 rebounds. He then started all 13 of their postseason games, posting 8.5 points and 7.8 rebounds in 29.8 minutes. Hartenstein played youth and pro basketball in Europe prior to making his NBA debut with the Houston Rockets in 2018 and also spent time with the Denver Nuggets, Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Clippers.

Now Rose and the Knicks front office staff will have to weigh options to fill the void left by his departure. Robinson's injury history makes him a liability and his offensive limitations necessitate the Knicks ultimately add a center that can be more than just a lob threat with the ability to effectively pass out of the low and high posts, and score from beyond the front of the rim, skills Hartenstein ably provided. Jericho Sims, heading into his fourth season with the Knicks, has not demonstrated the requisite offensive prowess.

Some of the names being mentioned as potential trade targets are Walker Kessler of the Utah Jazz and Nick Richards of the Charlotte Hornets. But for now these names are just conjecture. Rose and company have demonstrated they have a clear direction and executable plan. Fans of the team are anxiously waiting for the next chess move.