2017-18 Game Thread: Knicks @ Bulls

Tonight will be a fascinating game.

The Knicks have been really poor on the road, but they’re still a good deal better, overall, than the Bulls. However, the Bulls are playing extremely well since Nikola Mirotic has returned and basically said, “Eff y’all for taking Bobby Portis’ side in our fight. I’m going to play out of my mind and show you that I’m awesome.” I find it a bit odd that they’re doing so well, since so many of their players are still not particularly good, but hey, maybe it’s a synergy-type thing?

Anyhow, since the Knicks own the Bulls’ second round pick, then…

A. It would be nice to give them more losses and
B. The Knickiest thing would be for the Bulls to suddenly become good enough for that second round pick to not be worth all that much

Anyhow, let’s hope that Kristaps Porzingis has a good game. I like it when he has good games.

Let’s go, Knicks!

93 replies on “2017-18 Game Thread: Knicks @ Bulls”

I’m not rooting for losses per se, but losing enough so that we trade/dump/bench veterans and play the neophytes would not be the worst outcome.

Yeah, agreed. But since that won’t happen, I’m stuck rooting for them to win as much as possible so that they can maybe make the playoffs. Since they’re going to try to win no matter what, might as well hope for the playoffs! It’s been a while since we got to watch a playoff game.

considering how each team has played recently – even if you were rooting for a loss – i don’t think you’d need to root very hard z-man…

saw that we’re favored by 2 points…that’s odd…

A win makes that 2nd round pick we own of Chicago’s just a little more valuable.
No matter what happens tonight it helps the Knicks draft position incrementally

McBuckets starting in place of Thomas. Hopefully that will help KP because it should be tougher to help/double off McBuckets.

Thanks the heavens Hornacek finally realized the obvious and took Lance out, I thought he would stay glued to the starting lineup until Hardaway came back.

The Knicks should offer Lance Thomas a 2 year/$15 million coaching contract. Then he can retire as a player and they could get his cap space back. I know that that would never get approved by the league, but if it ever could work, it would be with Thomas, who everyone talks about highly as a person but everyone should know he is not really an NBA rotation player anymore.

His greatest benefit for years has been his ability to not embarrass himself out there. He never really adds anything, but nor does he embarrass himself, which is sadly an upgrade over some players.

IMO, Lance’s reputation as a defender exceeds the reality (or at least the evidence I have seen). There have been games where it seemed he had a huge impact on that end, but day to day I don’t think he’s as good as the reputation.

I do want losses. A losing streak. That way, we dump Lee, Lance, or Oq, lose some more, play guys like Dotson more, and get better odds of a good player in the draft.

I also want KP to be part of a play, pass more, and us to take more threes.

He definitely does embarrass himself Brian.

I dunno, he’s not good, but nor does he have games where he shoots 1-10, ya know? He tends to always minimize his suckiness.

IMO, Lance’s reputation as a defender exceeds the reality (or at least the evidence I have seen). There have been games where it seemed he had a huge impact on that end, but day to day I don’t think he’s as good as the reputation.

It’s totally an effort thing. He gives effort, hence he seems like a good defender. Even if his effort doesn’t really stop the other team from scoring all that much.

some interesting rotations tonight including the preseason underdog triple three lineup of lance, beas, and mcd.

Porzingis said the right things after the Christmas game and today he is doing the right things (for the most part). He’s making passes out of long range post positions that he would never make early in the season. Hopefully this becomes a habit and he can gauge whether a shot is a good or bad shot before he actually shoots it.

Yeah, agreed. But since that won’t happen, I’m stuck rooting for them to win as much as possible so that they can maybe make the playoffs. Since they’re going to try to win no matter what, might as well hope for the playoffs! It’s been a while since we got to watch a playoff game

Yeah this is where I am, too.

We’re a lot like the 2016 Yankees. Except I think we’re going to make the opposite decision at the trade deadline.

just got home, almost frightened to turn on the game…not sure i’m up for a discouraging knick loss tonight…

If they lose this game it would most definitely be a discouraging loss considering they were on their way to a blowout win with a few mins left in the 1st half.

at least there’s the cute chick on the vans’ commercial…jeez, I hope she’s at least 18…

yeah, this game has disappointment written all over it…

from what I’ve seen (six minutes left in the third), pretty even matchup…

beasley doesn’t appear to be having one of his game saving days today…think I’ve seen him turn it over 3 times already…

This is a pretty good, competitive game. Our main problem is that we can’t hit a three.

hard to win games when you get consistently outscored from behind the arc by double digits…

man, about 10 years ago we would really be kicking butt…

starting to think if we lose this lead – we may never get it back…

being a knick fan is most definitely not easy…

KP is so fucking overrated and our offensive scheme is a joke

This team fell apart due to offensive strategy. Too much mid range action

All the teams in the G-league have to have better PGs than Jack, Frank, Sessions and Baker.

Krischucks Pointzzingis with another stellar 23 pointz on 22 FGA.

This fella needs a megamax with a NTC

Fire Hornacek, waive Lee, undraft Frank, trade Porzingis. And throw James Dolan in the fucking East River with cement boots on.

KP has been figured out for this season. Maybe he evolves a little for next year.

Just in time for his $195M contract.

Just got in. Knicks are 4/23 from three?

not goink well tonight

So, uh, the young core of Porzingis, Ntilikina and Hernangomez does not look so impressive at the moment

This team just cannot shake the road blues and that’s a bad sign with this upcoming schedule.

For our own sanity we should all make a New Years resolution not to watch another Knicks game until Dolan sells the team.

hard to end a game any uglier than that. we spent four minutes not running any play at all so they wouldn’t see our big Enes Kanter three point set shot reveal coming.

Well, I guess I won’t watch the replay. Not interested in seeing the team miss 19 three point attempts. I see that McD got the start but did not shoot well.

Some of you shouldn’t watch the Spurs game tomorrow. By the way, this is what rebuilding looks like. Except with more 3s.

At least by not tanking this team gave me many amazing November memories! Thanks Mills and Perry, I’ll always have a special place in my heart for those Courtney Lee historic double doubles and KP’s patented early season run. They’ll surely compensate for not drafting Doncic.

Porzingis started well and I thought we might see November KP tonight. But he’s still Melo with blocked shots. Not as worried about Frank it’s way early in his nba career.

McD has a really rough game. The guy hustles all the time but if he’s not hitting he’s a huge negative. He and Kanter together are a defensive disaster. Noah would have been an improvement over our new move of playing three shitty threes together.

We need to convince Cleveland we deserve the Brooklyn pick, tank the season, and then draft Trae Young and Mikal Bridges. Problems solved

i never thought i’d say it but missing th2 kind of hurt during these last few games…. and i think that’s the source of kp overextending himself…. there just aren’t that any other capable offensive players on this team…. i mean lee has been doing yeoman’s work but he’s clearly stretched to the max of his abilities right now….

i wouldn’t get so worked up over it… it was a bad loss but we also aren’t very good…. esp on the road…

Beasley is a vet, and can score…and should probably be closing games until KP can figure out how to do it…

Down three -7 seconds left – getting close to 5 seconds on the inbound – Kanter gets in position to set a screen – McDermott basically runs away from him and the ball – KP gets out-muscled by noted strongman Lauri Markkanen – Lee barely moves – Kanter is left to take the shot. That wasn’t on Hornacek- KP can’t let Markkanen take him out of the play and McDermott at least has to try to get the inbounds pass.

Unless we’re stealth tanking not having Beasley inbound the ball on a crucial play seems pretty obvious

Why exactly is Kanter in the game with 7 seconds left and down 3?

s p a c i n g

Enes Kanter more often than not means extra possessions, and he kinda earned it after his showing on Christmas. Enes Kanter shooting a 3 with 7+ seconds left shows lack of awareness of the moment, and that my friends, is what losing is all about.

Also, this is a Bulls team that defeated Giannis and the Bucks last night on the road. They aren’t exactly what their record says they are at the moment.

71 that isn’t quite right Lauri actually switched off KP on that play and never touched him. Kanter was supposed to screen Nwaba if he switched on the McD curl (which he did), but really mistimed the screen and collided with KP. This gave Mirotic time to switch off Kanter onto KP, and Mirotic did muscle him (plus Beasley’s man backed up to double). Once the main play was blow up McD should have then come back to the ball but ran a wheel route like he was Shane Vereen for some reason.

I don’t know why Kanter is in the game there. I guess they wanted a body to set that screen but that’s not a good plan.

By the way, this is what rebuilding looks like.

No it isn’t. This exactly what steering your team into NBA No Man’s Land looks like. We’re on our way to 35 wins, no improvement, and a virtual guarantee that we’ll be back in the same exact position next year, only with less hope.

As I mentioned above, rebuilding doesn’t involve committing 30m in cap space to Noah, LT and Baker who were all signed to those contracts by the Knicks.

Just have to draft smarter, not higher. Jordan Bell and Kyle Kuzma could have been Knicks, but they were too Knicksy to make that happen. Bell was so obviously worth buying a pick for, and that’s exactly what happened.

bulls aren’t that terrible, but, neither are the knicks – pretty predictable outcome – but, very winnable game…

we need a playmaker so bad – it hurts, and, no still glad we have frank, wouldn’t have wanted to draft any one else…

what I really wish is that we had gone after the half dozen or so point guards that were available this off-season…

To say we have no hope going forward sounds like a hot take. Picking high in the draft is ideal but it’s not a necessity to put together a good ball club. We have all of our 1st round picks going forward, we’re young, and we compete on both ends of the court. If KP tops out at Melo on offense and an elite rim protector on defense, that’s a great basketball player to have on your team. It’s an incredibly bad bet to assume KP will never improve upon his age 22 season, but I digress.

The Knicks aren’t hopeless. Being mediocre only sucks when you’re an old team. Frank Ntilikina and Kristaps Porzingis still have a ton of time to improve their games, and by then we’d have added more youth to the team.

I didn’t say we’ll have no hope, I said we’ll have less hope. And I said that Bc I expect us to waste all our assets this year on a misguided attempt to make the playoffs.

The Knicks aren’t hopeless. Being mediocre only sucks when you’re an old team.

I don’t see a young team on the court

I don’ t think Perry is gonna make any short sighted win now moves.

I meant we’d waste assets we could trade, like KOQ, Lee, even Beasley could possibly net something useful.

We had a chance to do a complete teardown and collect assets, and we didn’t do it, we did Phil Jackson’s Triangulation MMM/NTC Two-Tiered How’s-It-Goink Extravaganza instead. And now, completely predictably, we’re in no-man’s land, not good enough to win anything and not bad enough to acquire the franchise players who could possibly lead us out of no-man’s land. It’s too late to do the teardown now, unless the team wants to roll the dice on a Porzingis trade. You could probably get back a nice pile of assets for Pointzzingis but whatever. Maybe it’s better to hold onto him, I don’t really know and I’m starting to not really care. This isn’t really like a temporary situation here, we’ve been miles away from true contention for almost two full decades. It’s pretty hard to give a shit about this team very much right now.

I expect us to waste all our assets this year on a misguided attempt to make the playoffs.

I guess that’s possible? But so far this year the FO is doing what it said it would. I don’t see any indications that would change. Just because you disagree with what they’re doing it doesn’t follow that they’ll make the dumbest possible moves.

I don’t see the front office being a buyer. Most likely they’ll just trudge through the season with the status quo, neither doing dumb win-now moves or trading away the vets. Then again, no one ever went broke betting on the stupidity of Knick management.

The next 5 games are going to be a real kick in the teeth. We’ll be lucky to go 1-4. That would put us at 18-21. Then the schedule gets lighter, with 8 winnable games — not easy, but winnable — in the next 12. That’s the turning point of the season. If we go 6-6 or better, management will have a good case for a late playoff push. I hope we go 3-9 and just tank this thing already.

Yeah this is just who they are, especially on the road. They really need a pg/penetrator, though, because Frank is still a liability on offense.
I’m all for a trade if it nets younger parts. I think it’s good to gamble on point guards under 24 who another team has given up on… point guards often take longer to ripen. But who is selling that right now?

hopefully the next month can nudge us into becoming sellers…. i mean we absolutely should be trying to get something / anything for lee and koq…. if they’re still on the team by the deadline that might be a failure of the season on it’s own….

When I hear “young”, I expect that to mean players with significant growth potential, and I expect the team not to have young players at the end of the bench but for them to be in the rotation.

The Knicks actual rotation of Hardaway, Porzingis, Kanter, O’Quinn, McDermott, Thomas, Jack, Ntilikina, Lee and Beasley has an average age of 26.8, and I imagine if you weighted by win shares, that number would go up some since Ntilikina has 0 win shares on the season.

So the actual team that’s doing the winning right now is very middle aged. Like, the Celtics’ top 10 in minutes played have an average age of 24.9. And they’re, you know, good.

So I don’t really see how you’re calling this a young, rebuilding team. It’s kinda reminiscent of like the Hornets from 4 or 5 years ago with a lot of decent mid-career vets lifting a couple of prospects up into the margins of the playoffs. In terms of players under 23 contributing, the 09/10 Knicks were much richer in that department than this team is even if KP is more promising than Gallinari was. That team had two sub 23 year old starters and several other young players in the rotation such as Jordan Hill, Toney Douglas and Bill Walker.

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