Knicks Morning News (2018.09.06)

I’m surely cautiously optimistic about Burke, for me he should start and play a lot of minutes without a doubt. It’s just quite a big jump from that to “he’ll be worth a 1st round pick from a playoff contender by the trade deadline”. Isaiah Thomas was playing probably better than what Burke showed for like 4 years and he got traded for nothing to the Suns, then finally traded for a super low first to the Celtics. Teams seem to be VERY conscious of their assets lately in the NBA.

the odds of us getting a 1 for burke are about the same as Kanter successfully recruiting Kevin Durant (does he realize if Durant is here, he won’t be)?

The sample size for Burke’s improved production is not just what we saw in the NBA last year. He got called up to the NBA because he was tearing up the G League by shooting way better than he had ever shot early in his NBA career. Of course I’m one of the people that argues that “who and how you are defended” has an impact on your stats. So all else being equal, shooting stats from the G League will not translate perfectly at the NBA level. But the point remains that there was already a reason to strongly suspect that he had a made a leap in his game before he was even called up. The fact that he maintained better play in the NBA added weight to what fans already suspected.

Does that mean it’s 100% he will continue to play at that level or better?

Of course not.

But the chances are darn good that he’s a better player now than he was in prior NBA years. That would translate into a terrific backup PG even if his shooting slips a little. I have no idea why anyone would want to trade a solid young backup PG if we can get him back at a fair price. We are going to need one eventually.

@5

I’m pretty sure it makes a big difference, yes. The only teams making moves are the ones who are desperate for any reason, either terrible front office situations with GMs trying to save their own skins or teams about to lose their most talented players if they don’t improve.

Even New Orleans had a pretty mild offseason, they signed Payton and Randle to pretty tame contracts and didn’t go crazy once Boogie left. Detroit is also done fucking around now that SVG finally got canned.

The time to build assets and try to get something for them has come and gone and the Knicks did not take advantage of it. Valuable starters, which is what I think Burke’s ideal scenario is, don’t move the needle against the Warriors, Rockets and whatever team LeBron assembles next year.

I just don’t want this team to make any moves outside of dumping Courtney Lee and testing the waters on moving THJ. I feel like I’ve said this a million times but this is the one season where there’s a clear, obvious plan to follow that should be really easy to execute. Play young dudes, lose games because they’re young, see what they are, get Porzingis back and see how he plays, end the year with a good pick and then decide what to do with Porzingis. They have to actually try to fuck this up.

When the time comes to make decision on Burke, it should be based on how he plays this year and the price and not on the fact that we are still years away from the goal.

Then we agree on the “fact” that the team is years away from contending and shouldn’t push any chips in on veterans who will take up significant cap space to lead the team to 35 wins.

Then we agree on the “fact” that the team is years away from contending and shouldn’t push any chips in on veterans who will take up significant cap space to lead the team to 35 wins.

It depends on the definition of veteran. But other than that, we are not tanking.

I think every contract that is attractive is an asset no matter how old the guy is. If other teams want my player at “x” price for “y” years, I’m happy to have him at that price too. I can always trade him later for a better fit. Generally though, since we are young and years away, we should only be trying to sign players long term when they are young enough to be highly productive for the duration of their contract.

Trey Burke is only 25 years old. I don’t care if we are going to win 10 or 55 games next year. If Trey Burke proves to be a highly productive player this year and we can get him on a good deal given the role he’s going to have long term, we should sign him. He figures to be productive for the duration of any long term contract and would generally be expected to continue being an excellent backup by the time we are peaking too. If we can do better later, we can trade him later.

You keep saying this in the same condescending way and I still don’t understand why. People wanting the team to tank does not mean anyone expects them to tank.

I don’t mean for it to come out as condescending, but I don’t see the point of having endless conversations on a strategy that has already been rejected by current management.

We are trying to get better both short and long term by stockpiling young players, trying to develop some young players that have disappointed other teams relative to expectations, making draft picks, and remaining flexible with our cap space.

Given that fact, what can we do to improve now that also makes sense long term?

a strategy that has already been rejected by current management

If that’s the case, the franchise is going to continue the trend of mid-lottery picks on a hamster wheel of mediocrity. Winning trades means relying on the stupidity of other FOs to make bad decisions. Signing players for below-market value means assuming that other FOs are too dumb to see value and have the requisite space to sign valuable players. Having a top-3 pick practically ensures that you’ll have access to the best ball handler, wing or big in that draft. Having the #1 overall pick means that you make your own destiny.

I don’t want to bank on the prospect that other teams will fail to spot Burke’s talent, should he have a solid year. That would be like me hanging a piece in a chess game to make an aggressive attack, praying that my opponent doesn’t spot it. It’s better to not rely on others’ errors.

trying to develop some young players that have disappointed other teams relative to expectations

This is the part of your strategy that I disagree with the most. Anthony Bennett, for example, wasn’t just a bad #1 overall pick — he was a bad basketball player, period. Expectations have nothing to do with his actual value on the floor once you uncouple his name from his draft position. And yes, there was a significant opportunity cost to picking him at #1, especially with guys like Giannis, Porter, Gobert, Adams and Oladipo behind him, but that’s not why Cleveland got rid of him. They got rid of him because he was terrible, just like Mudiay, Wroten, Derrick Rose, Beasley, Bargnani, and now Hezonja.

Kenyon Martin is a great example of a guy who did not live up to #1 overall pick expectations, but was solid enough to be a starter for a couple of Finals teams and then some good Nuggets teams. His draft position stopped mattering once he stepped onto the court.

Bruno, yes teams are very conscious of assets now, but I think that means late first round picks are overvalued in trades. The example of Demps was cited as a negative example, but he actually has developed a team that is probably regularly in the Western Conference playoffs. That’s not a horrible result, and many GMs would take that if they could get it.

The example of Demps was cited as a negative example, but he actually has developed a team that is probably regularly in the Western Conference playoffs. That’s not a horrible result, and many GMs would take that if they could get it.

Nah, I gotta break this one down.

1) Despite the half-assed tank in 2011-12, the Hornets managed to jump 3 slots, winning the draft lottery with a 13.7% chance to do so. They took Anthony Davis, who had the following accolades:

NCAA Champion
All-Tournament Team
Tourney MOP
All-Region
Consensus All-American
Wooden Award
Rupp Trophy
SEC POY
Naismith Award
#1 in NCAA in Win Shares
#1 in BPM
#1 in WS40
#1 in ORtg

He was the easiest #1 overall pick since LeBron. Hands down. There is no draft big board that had him falling past #1. If Demps doesn’t make this pick, there’s a good chance that he’s fired on the spot and submitted for a CAT scan for brain tumors or other neurological irregularities.

2) In the years since Davis was drafted, the Pelicans have never had an SRS above 1.48, despite having a player who has made 3 All-NBA teams, 3 All-Defensive teams, and has landed on the top-10 list for WS/BPM/VORP multiple times. And I should remind you that he began his career as a 19 year old. He just turned 25, so it’s very possible that the next two years are his best yet. Despite having a burgeoning MVP candidate, the Pels have made the playoffs just twice, with one playoff series win.

3) Demps inherited Chris Paul, whom he traded for Aminu, Eric Gordon and Chris Kaman. Read that one again, because it’s true.

4) It gets worse from there: Demps was the engineer behind the nixed Chris Paul LAL trade, which would have sent Pau Gasol, still a very good player, to HOU, while taking back Goran Dragic (good but not great), Luis Scola (lol), Kevin Martin (incredibly never a Knick) and Lamar Odom, best known as a living, breathing Kardashian accessory.

Well, you did expand a lot on the fact that Anthony Davis’ existence is the sole reason for Demps still having his job, so that was nice.

I don’t fault Demps so much on the CP3 trade as we’ll probably never know how much the league forced the situation, but just the fact that the Clippers probably got a better haul for him 6 years later (and him being 6 years older) tells us everything we need to know on the case to evaluate the trade for the Pelicans.

Specially on a small market that gets no chance at free agency, just whiffing on picks and trading them away is so bad. Since 2012, the Davis draft, the Pelicans have drafted exactly one starting caliber player (Buddy Hield), including trading Noel for Holiday just to overpay the hell out of him later.

Jowles,, you argued against points I didn’t make. You talked a lot about how the Pelicans had a number 4 pick and jumped to number 1 because of the lottery. But I agree, the top first round picks very valuable. I specifically said late first round picks were overvalued (i.e. non lottery picks) because I agree a top pick is very valuable. You didn’t comment on that point at all.

I don’t agree that because the Pelicans have Anthony Davis but didn’t make the playoffs every year, the GM necessarily did a bad job. Most teams with one superstar only and blah stuff around him have trouble making the playoffs, so the fact that Demps didn’t always make the playoffs is not proof he’s a horrible GM. I actually don’t think he’s a great GM at all. Clearly, the CP3 trade wasn’t a shining moment of his. But his trading of late first round picks is getting him reasonable value because such picks are overvalued in the market today. That’s the point I was making.

Bruno, you commented that the Cousins deal was a blunder, but part of that is hindsight because he had a severe injury and they let him go. If you trade for a good player and then he gets injured like that of course you can say the trade was a mistake, but that’s not really a fair grade for the trade. Anyone can get injured.

Well, I agree it looks worse now that Cousins is gone, but for all the reports we’ve had the Pelicans were interested in re-signing him and Stein reported they even offered him a 2 year 40 million deal. Cousins didn’t stay not so much because of the injury, but because he wanted to go to a better situation, and he took at least a 15 million paycut to do so.

I guess things could have been different if he was healthy and got a max offer from New Orleans, but then they would be paying almost two maxes to Cousins + Holiday, which… yikes.

Cousins not wanting to re-sign was a risk that was involved on the trade when it was made, and it’s New Orleans we’re talking about, they just don’t sign stars. I’m not willing to cut Demps some slack because at the moment of the trade people were already doubting Boogie would eventually re-sign there.

I just disagree with you that teams with superstars the caliber of Davis struggle often to put teams around them. We’re talking about a legitimate mega star, a top 5 talent, an unstoppable two way player who might end his career with multiple MVPs and was crazy good from his 2nd year on. Even Dallas, where Dirk was the solo superstar for such a long time, made the playoffs every year of his prime on very, very rough western conferences. I would agree with you if they missed the playoffs like twice when Davis had some injuries, but there’s no excuse for missing it so many times. Hell, even New Orleans themselves only missed the playoffs once in 4 seasons with Chris Paul once he made the leap, and that was when he played only 45 games.

So I say, first round picks are over valued now.

I agree with this assessment.

The way I value them may not be very precise, but I look at the pick number and try to gauge what kind of player you typically get in that range “on average”.

Previously one could argue that getting a similar quality player on a rookie deal was a much better value. That’s probably not true anymore. Now, teams are drafting teenagers. You may have that kid on the cheap for a few years, but by the time he actually reaches the productivity level you are projecting, you have to pay him. You may even have to pay him before you know. So I don’t see those rookie deals as such big bargains anymore.

On the flip side, we all know there’s more volatility in making draft picks. You could get a great player at #9 and you could get a bust at #1. So if you are desperate team trying to hit a home run because no stars will come to your city, you are probably better off swinging for the fences in the draft hoping for luck.