Another thing that s brothering me is the fact that people are assuming had they not pulled the trigger on curry they would’ve had roy, or tyus Thomas. This is the same team who made first round draft selection of fredick weis, mardy Collins, danilo and balkman. Horrible picks so my guess is they would’ve wasted that pick on selden williams.

You really are beginning to annoy me with your Eddy Curry comments. First stop saying Curry averaged over 20 pts/g, his best season with the Knicks he averaged 19.5 pts/g. In his other 3 seasons he hasnt averaged over 13.6 pts/g. Even if he did somehow manage to average over 20 pts/g, which again he never has come close to doing, a Center needs to you know rebound and block shots, something which Curry is among the worst, if not the worst, Center in the NBA in doing so.

Also how can you talk about the Knicks wouldnt have drafted well in those picks they gave to the Bulls when they were picks #2 and 9 and you are talking about Frederick Weis who was #15 and was made back in 19freaking99 when Isiah (thankfully) was nowhere near this franchise, then talk about actual Isiah Thomas picks who were made late in the 1st round. Also lumping in Gallinari in that group, really????

Giving up 2 1st round picks and not lottery protecting them for a Center who only scores and showed even in his best days in Chicago where his best scoring avg was 16.1 pts/g, again nowhere near being over 20, that he couldnt rebound or block was easily one of the worst trades this franchise has ever made.

The Curry trade was bad then, too.
In fact, the Knicks were “lucky” enough that the only thing of value that they lost were the two picks (which were quite valuable). Sweetney, at the time, looked like a decent player, while Curry, well, did not.
Curry just looked like a guy with massive physical capabilities, and not much to go with said physical skills.

You are on crack! sweetney didnt look anywhere near a decent player. Curry put up numbers while he was with the bulls and the knicks (int he begining). He helped lead the bulls to the playoffs for the first time in years..My main qustion here is why are you all ignoring the fact that he averaged 20 points a freakin game for the 06-07 season? led the team in scoring and proved that he was worth the risk. Curry was no bum. I could think of many trades worst then this where the knicks gave away big time talent and got nothing in return. in this scenerio they got someone who gets you 20 plus a night.

Carlos Cabezas? My gut is no way. He’s a solid but unspectacular player in Spain and the Euroleague, I have a feeling he would be next season’s Anthony Robertson (the guy the Knicks committed to prematurely who never plays). There are forwards on his own team who pass the ball better than he does, he’s used primarily for defense and ball control on Spain’s national team. Scores the ball efficiently in the Spanish league, but he’s pretty slow. I don’t think his game would translate at all, but maybe I’m wrong. (Check out easyasacb.wordpress.com for some advanced stats on the 06-07 season of Spain’s ACB league and 7 games of 07-08). There are a decent sized list of guards I would sign from the ACB before Cabezas, but I don’t know what their contract statuses are.

I’ll take all of the above as far as which move hurt the Knicks most: Ariza, Curry, Rondo/Bynum… Any one of those moves/non-moves would make the Knicks a better team right now.

I would put Chandler in the same league with Ariza and Balkman athletically. However, the athleticism that matters isn’t the ability to make one or two highlight reel plays a game, but the ability to lock-down a player every possession. Ariza and Balkman have shown a lot more of that than Chandler.

Chandler is a very mediocre player on both sides of the ball. Blocking a shot a game alone doesn’t make you a good defender just as shooting 33% on 3s alone doesn’t make you a good scorer, let alone a good offensive player. Chandler’s still got upside, but his improvement from last season was nothing exceptional. To call him a scorer at this point is ridiculous: 15.6 pts/36 on the 2nd fastest team in the NBA at a TS% of .515… Check out Ariza’s 06-07 season and tell me he can’t score like Chandler.

The 2nd round of every draft and all major European leagues are full of players who can make the amazing play or explode for a 30 point night at the NBA level. Being able to do it consistently is what separates good NBA players. Chandler is certainly capable, but we’ll have to see if he can put it together.

I don’t really want to get into another Balkman debate, but he had a good season in limited minutes while Chandler had a bad season is extensive minutes… my opinion on the matter hasn’t really changed.

The Curry trade was bad then, too.
In fact, the Knicks were “lucky” enough that the only thing of value that they lost were the two picks (which were quite valuable). Sweetney, at the time, looked like a decent player, while Curry, well, did not.
Curry just looked like a guy with massive physical capabilities, and not much to go with said physical skills.

You know, my instinct was to be very anti-Curry trade, but when you look back to the 04-05 season, a 22 yr old Eddy Curry helped the Bulls get a 4th seed and 47 wins. They lost to the Wiz in the playoffs, and it seemed that was due to Eddy being out w/ injury.
While I do think not lottery protecting those picks (couldn’t he have protected 1 at least?) was the major flaw of that trade, a lot of the onus has to be on Eddy just being way out of shape and not listening to coaches. It’s too bad Larry Brown didn’t work out because his strict discipline seems like it would’ve been a good fit for Eddy. I think if Steph was never on that team, things could’ve worked out better for Larry and Curry. He really does have a lot of physical talent under all that flab. Don’t underestimate how his screwed up home situation has probably hurt him too. Maybe he can work out some stuff this offseason?

Mortgaging the future to contend is one thing. Larry Brown made winning hard, of course, but even without Brown, Eddy “The Untouchable Franchise Player” Curry average less than 30 wins.

Brian and Owen are right. It was a bad trade at the time and even worse in retrospect.

But the Ewing trade, Brian, was the one that set us on the path to destruction salary cap wise. The trade that made Curry, Marbury, Crawford, and Randolph possible. It all started with Ewing and it has taken over a decade to fix and we’re still not there yet– winning 32 games, not winning a playoff game since the year he left, and still way over the cap…

In fact, the Knicks were “lucky” enough that the only thing of value that they lost were the two picks (which were quite valuable). Sweetney, at the time, looked like a decent player, while Curry, well, did not.

Curry just looked like a guy with massive physical capabilities, and not much to go with said physical skills.

Are you serious? curry averaged over 20 points a game!!!!! when is the last time the knicks had someone who could score in the paint? sweetney was useless on offense and basically someone who took up space. His production was non existant. At least curry could score. Yeah curry wasnt a good rebounder but neither was ewing early in his career. Ill tell you what curry could give you numbers when it came to scoring.

is this thread from 2007? did you miss this season where he was too fat to get on the court, or last season where he sucked every time he got on it? even when he was a great post scorer, he was arguably a liability overall (something Owen helped me see the light on).

jon abbey my point is the trade wasnt a bad idea at the time. Everyone’s saying that was the worst trade, and that thomas was stupid for giving up draft picks. What people are forgetting is Curry was a proven low post presence at the time of the trade. You rarely see big men score 20 plus and the ones that do are considered all stars. The only big men (im talking centers) doing that now are ming, howard and duncan, thats it. Of course we can all say now that it didnt work out for us but I thought it was a good decision at the time it was made. I also thought it was a good decision when he got to NY and got us 19 a game and then 20 the next season all the while playing in every game except one. No knick big man has ever averaged over 19 over a entire season since patrick ewing in 1996-97. So please stop with the worst trade in history nonsense.

People can come on here and take all the trash they want about curry but the facts Contradict all that. Curry came in and averaged more points then any knick center not name patrick ewing in almost three decades.

“Ariza improved more than 95 percent of the players in the league ever do”…Why that happened I don’t know.

Maybe it was because of his teammates.

Yeah but who on the Magic made him such a better player, and how? He got limited playing time and isn’t the type of 3 point specialist that could thrive in of an offense predicated off of Howard drawing double teams and kicking it out to open shooters. But this is when he made the majority of his improvement – his rebounding rate, usage, and TS% all went up that year (his TS% jumped from 46% to 56%!) while his turnover % decreased.

And it’s not like the Magic have a great veteran superstar or an experienced bench. And although they do have a superstar in Howard, he is currently under fire in some quarters for being too “nice” (read soft) to lead a team in the playoffs, ie. David Robinson, so its doubtful he was the one to lite a fire under Ariza and cause this dramatic change in his game.