On Monday, lifelong New Yorker Adrian Reyes will finally get the tattoo he has been envisioning during this historic Knicks playoff run: a pigeon donning a Jalen Brunson jersey.
“There’s no better way to think about New York than, quite honestly, a pigeon,” Reyes says. “They’re everywhere.”
And they are persistent — like the Knicks. “They’re resilient. They keep fighting,” Reyes says. “Just like Knicks fans, we’re always here. We flock out of anywhere and everywhere to every single game. Look at the Sixers series. We took over that stadium. Think of all those birds that were there chirping.
“There’s no way to better describe a New Yorker,” Reyes continues, “than guys that love to chirp.”
The tattoo will be on his thigh. “Not to be TMI,” he says, “but anytime you use the bathroom, shower, anything like that, you’ll always have this image to look at and remind you and make you smile.”
He isn’t alone. Knicks fans have been flocking to tattoo parlors all over New York City to commemorate this moment. From the standard Knicks logo to entire player sleeves, the tattoos have been in high demand — and are deeply meaningful to New Yorkers who have waited their entire lives to see their team in the sun.
Even before the finals, diehard fans had been getting Knicks tattoos. “By the time we swept the Cavs,” says Adam Korothy, a tattoo artist at Live By The Sword in Williamsburg, “it started reaching a fever pitch.” And it hasn’t relented. He’s gotten requests in recent days from two Knicks City Dancers. “Last night,” Korothy says, “a family of three all came in to get Knicks tattoos at the same time.”
Val Klimovich of Live By The Sword says, “One local gentleman stopped by to get a Knicks tattoo on his chest, right in the middle, during the lunch break and his wife texted him, ‘You don’t have to come home if you’ll get that ugly tattoo, I’m not looking at that every time I see you shirtless.’ He got it anyway. I hope they’re still together!”
The Knicks’ run is the biggest topic by far around the shop.
“I am still in shock from OG (Anunoby’s) phenomenal tip-in. We have definitely seen more and more interest in our Knicks flash after Game 4,” Korothy says. “We haven’t had one client, visitor or person not mention OG’s dagger of a tip-in since it happened. It’s pretty much all we talk about.” Korothy plans to get a Knicks tattoo as well.
Adrian Reyes designed this tattoo with Lina Valentina of a pigeon, a symbol of New York resilience in Reyes’ words, wearing a Jalen Brunson jersey. (Courtesy of Adrian Reyes)
Mikhail Andersson, owner of First Class Tattoo, has had his shop open for a decade. “This is the first time that any clients have been interested in getting Knicks tattoos,” Andersson says. “One guy in his 60s who got the logo tattooed on his arm was telling us how he is a very proud native New Yorker and comes from two New Yorker parents. He says being a Knicks fan has been a family tradition, and is a way to connect with his son now.”
Nikita Shoshensky, a lifelong New Yorker who focuses on large-scale Japanese tattoos, created a bunch of Knicks-Japanese-infused tattoos. “I thought probably it would be my usual clients,” he says. Until it began to take off. “I’ve seen lot of interest.”
Nikita Shoshensky has been making Japanese-inspired Knicks tattoos. (Courtesy of Nikita Shoshensky)
Some of the tattoos have been bold. Last Monday, Justin Chi, from the Upper East Side, got a tattoo on his right hand that said: KNICKS IN 4 25-26 NBA CHAMPIONS. He doesn’t regret being wrong about the first half of the tattoo — the Knicks lost Game 3 on Monday — because he is convinced the second part will be true.
“I know we’re gonna win,” Chi says.
And that’s why he got the tattoo. “I believe in destiny and I believe in the Knicks. It just felt right,” says Chi, whose voice is raspy from screaming at the top of his lungs with his father at Game 4.
He doesn’t have any regrets. “I think I’m just gonna cross out the four and put in a five,” Chi says. “It’s something I will remember for the rest of my life.”
The afternoon before Game 3, Rich Creavy got a large tattoo of skyscrapers, the Knicks logo and FINALS 2026 CHAMPIONS in big, bold lettering on his right arm. “I didn’t want to wait till it was over,” Creavy says. He, too, isn’t embarrassed to have it if the Knicks lose the title, because “If The Knicks Lose The Title” isn’t a sentence to be uttered. Some in his life have already accused him of jinxing the team. But he doesn’t care: “The Knicks are such a likable team that I’ll never regret the tattoo based on these guys.”
What these fans share is a deep-down desire to capture this once in a lifetime moment; this strange, sweet feeling of hope. More than ink, more than art, these tattoos are love letters on skin; a commemoration that they had the audacity to believe, even, that the Knicks who somehow always Knick and break their hearts can finally break through. It is connected to what it means to live in New York. The pain and agony and glory of living in the city that now feels like a small town, the way strangers are starting conversations about the game on the street.
And to showcase that community, that belief, in a permanent tattoo, before the championship even happens? That is evidence of unashamed, unbridled joy — joy that had been dormant for so long.
“I didn’t want to wait till it was over,” Creavy says of his Knicks championship tattoo. (Courtesy of Rich Creavy)
“This tattoo is a lifetime in the making,” says Yves Voltaire from Harlem, who got a Knicks logo on his left deltoid, above the bicep, seven hours before Wednesday’s Game 4. The appointment, however, was booked months in advance. “This is an exhalation for the city and for us fans,” Voltaire says. “We’re reveling. We’re spinning. We’re cheering, we’re cheesing. Because we’ve been through some stuff.”
Watching Anunoby’s play, arm in arm with his nearly 70-year-old neighbor, the two jumped up and down and screamed like kids on a hotel bed. “When you see us in the streets cheesing following another playoff win, what you’re really seeing is us punching the air with our smiles. Punching the air with joy, with bewilderment, with affirmation. Like, yo, this is really happening?!” Voltaire says.
Julia S. Dalton-Brush’s tattoo behind her ear. (Courtesy of Julia S. Dalton-Brush)
Julia S. Dalton-Brush, raised in Manhattan and the Bronx, got a Knicks logo tattoo right behind her left ear. “It’s close to where I hear this city every day, and I felt like the right place for something that’s been such a constant in my life,” she says. The Knicks have been her team since she started hooping at age 5: “They’re part of my city’s identity. … To me, the Knicks represent resilience, loyalty and hope.” Unity, too. “The city can be so divided,” Dalton-Brush says. “The Knicks bring people together.”
Queens resident Nolan Parr got a sleeve of Brunson with his iconic pose on his left leg. He went to the Knicks watch party, where his tattoo was featured on the Jumbotron. But the coolest part happened on the subway there. “I had a guy stop [and look at my tattoo] and he was like, ‘You’re the biggest diehard I’ve ever seen. That takes commitment.” There was no better compliment from a fellow New Yorker. He wants to add a portrait of possibly OG. “We’re going to keep probably adding players and basketball imagery,” says artist Josh Glasser, who did his tattoo.
Nolan Parr got Brunson’s iconic pose tattooed on his leg. (Courtesy of Nolan Parr)
Jimi Noel from Brooklyn got the Knicks logo tattoo on his right bicep the morning after Game 2, so inspired by Brunson’s clutch fadeaway shot. “That’s when I said, yeahhhh, this is different!” Noel says. “I’ve wanted to get this tattoo for a few years now so it was long overdue.”
Ricardo “Chico” Jimenez, a tattoo artist out of Hard Knox Tattoo in Yonkers, created a sleeve of Brunson praying. “If Jalen ran for mayor, he’d win,” Jimenez says. “That’s how much love New York has for him and the team.”
It is meaningful to the artists, too. “Personally, I have never felt more like a New Yorker, which means a lot to me as an immigrant and a recent citizen,” says Royal Jafarov of Royal Tattoo Art, an appointment-only studio based in the Lower East Side.
These artists know there are many more tattoos to come. “If they win, the city is gonna burn,” says Ivan Valladares Ramos, a tattoo artist at Magic Cobra Tattoo Society in Brooklyn. “If they lose, the city is definitely gonna burn.”
Manhattan-based tattoo artist Esteban Caasi of Caasi Tattoo Studio posted a photo of the Knicks tattoos he has done during this run. Someone commented: “What happens if they don’t win?” Without hesitation, Avalos wrote back: “You remain a fan.” People liking his comment warmed his heart.
“Seeing the joy these tattoos bring to people reminds me that tattooing is about more than ink, it’s about capturing a moment,” says Lina Valentina, the tattoo artist from Noble Art Tattoo Studio who created Reyes’ pigeon. “Being trusted to create something that commemorates a historic championship run is an honor, and it’s exciting to know that artists get to play a small part in preserving these memories for years to come.”
World’s Fair Tattoo in Astoria, Queens, has long been doing Mets tattoos. Now, Knicks ones are in demand, with people calling to book now “for when they win the championship,” says Sara Antoinette Martin, tattoo artist from World’s Fair.
“The energy is bigger than just the Knicks winning a championship,” Martin says. “It’s the underdog story that makes it so much more relatable. David vs Goliath. The Brunsons that have been grinding for years up against a literal giant golden boy from France who has so much support behind him. It’s the underdog story that unites New Yorkers and gives us so much pride to be here and be a part of it.”
