2019-20 Game Thread: Knicks @ Cavs

Of course Zion makes his debut against Ja, reminding us of what could have been.

not sure I’m such a big fan of each club having about 100 different jersey variations these days – it takes me like 10 minutes to figure out who the hell is even playing…

Some of these jersey variations are just a horrible affront to my sensibilities. The pixelated camo Spurs jerseys can suck my ass.

I like Lockervision, which tells you which unis teams will be wearing, so you can ignore them if you don’t like the duds.

Dr. King surely would have strenuously objected to the all-mercenary starting lineup.

Of course Zion makes his debut against Ja, reminding us of what could have been.

I think he’s not playing until Wednesday for some reason

@10 Yeah, I noticed that belatedly. Probably good for our hearts.

Miller really loves running PnR with the secondary ball handlers

I have a dream….that most of these players won’t be on the Knicks next season.

now that mitch is shuffling his feet a little better, learning to stay with his assignment and not roam the court at will, and, as clyde always preaches: ” don’t leave your feet man”…or something to that effect…

are mitch’s block numbers going down?

are mitch’s block numbers going down?

His block numbers are down a lot. Not sure it’s the shuffling his feet. Teams seem like they’ve figured it out. They challenge him less, but also run action to keep him off balance/away from the ball

In all fairness, the Knick draft picks all suck at shooting. I’m not sure we really want them taking more shots, except Mitch. Always Mitch.

Worst case scenario. Goddamn.

Time to fire Miller yet?

The Cavs announcers are the whiniest homers I have ever heard. To hear them, the Cavs are never responsible for any foul called on them, and their inability to score seems to go unnoticed.

What’s the point of all this? We get a win, probably, but it’s on the back of Morris, Randle, Payton, Bullock, Taj. Most of whom in all likelihood won’t be around long. Nice to see Dotson having a good game, and Robinson getting some blocks, but with Robinson, Knox, Ntilikina, Dotson getting 10-20 minutes so far…how does this win (assuming we win) help us? Mitch has gotten TWO shots so far??

That’s the hardest thing I find with this year. I was initially happy that all the most of the deals were 1+1 (or 2+1 for Randle). But it’s left me with zero ability to root for guys like Morris, Portis etc, because it feels like they’re barely Knicks.

I think you can celebrate good games from Bullock, since he likely has a future with the team due to his price tag.

And Morris, well, we can hope this will increase his trade value.

The only point is how well the non-mercenaries play. (Dot played well; Frank was all-world defensively again and I like the aggression on offense, let the kid play.) I don’t really “root” for the mercenaries in any real sense of the word. They’re wearing Knick uniforms, but they aren’t really Knicks. (And one of them is affirmatively chucking to try to get the dumb-ass Knick front office to pay him.) No NBA team puts together a roster like this. I doubt any team in the salary cap era has ever spent this much cap room this way.

If Payton could shoot he’d be a pretty good point guard ( and I understand that’s a huge “if”)

Randle is very frustrating. We know he can be a very efficient scorer around the basket, but on this team at PF he doesn’t have enough opportunities to operate in the paint with enough space to be as efficient as we need from him. He’s still running into brick walls on occasion and forcing up some bad ones. He would probably be more effective on offense playing C the way other teams have used him, but you give up too much on defense with him at C and we already have Mitch anyway.

Our offense sucks for a lot of reasons. Randle is NOT the most significant problem. All of our younger guys are. But at some point we have to make a decision on whether he’s either a good fit with Mitch (or any other C that can’t stretch the floor) and either trade him or one of either he/Mitch is going to have to stretch the floor out to 3 effectively.

If there would have been two expansion teams entering the league this year, Julius Randle would have been the first pick in the expansion draft. He’s the quintessential first option on an expansion team.

#8 pick here we come

Most likely, another mediocre 19 year old that’s several years away from being productive, some new lousy overpaid free agents to replace the ones we had this year, a couple of recycled draft busts, and another lottery next year here we come. Don’t worry though, some of these kids will start hitting their mid 20s and get really good eventually, I’m just not sure it will be before the 2024 presidential election. It’s either that or we get some competent basketball people in NY and start getting better.

rejoice, all hail to our mighty opponent the cleveland cavaliers…they fought valiantly in honor of their home court and community…they just really suck…even worse than us…

what are our odds at winning another game this month…

just checked the schedule, we got the lakers, raptors, nyets, hornets, and grizz…

yeah, we should be good for another win this month…

#8 pick here we come

C’mon Jowles, the Cavs missed like 80% of their shots in the 2nd half, and a lot of them were wide open.

All you can do is tip your cap to them and move on.

anytime one of the rentals did something half decent Breen would start talking about all the trades the Knicks could make at the deadline-you can tell he wants to stop watching these dudes

I think the question with Randle is whether or not you see him as a third or fourth option on a contender, assuming this team can sign a star or RJ or someone else develops. I’m just not sure that I do. Maybe a 6th man. He is at least the right age for this team.

Good points on Bullock, Dotson etc. I guess I’d just rather see a lineup of Mitch, Taj, RJ, Bullock, Frank/Elf, with Dot, the other of Frank/Elf of the bench, and have it win 18 games, rather than the bunch of strangers that we have win 26. I get the winning thing, need a winning culture etc. But Morris, Randle, Portis aren’t meaningfully doing that.

I mean, is there any benefit whatsoever to Portis getting 20 minutes on this team? Other than occasional lights out shooting, he seems a net negative to the team in literally every way? I seriously hope he’s the first deal, though no idea why anyone would bite. His only good stat is his age, but it’s hard to see much upside/development there.

C’mon Jowles, the Cavs missed like 80% of their shots in the 2nd half, and a lot of them were wide open.

It’s Dolan’s Razor, not some intentional choice on the part of the Knicks that I’m frustrated with. I can accept a 20-point win because it just means that the other team sucked that night. I just wish it came against the Heat, not the very team we’re jockeying for the #3 slot with.

We’re still only 4 games out of 9th in the East. If things break the right way we can really Dolan our draft position.

0 for 27, never forget

The amazing thing about these Dubs is how much they look like real NBA basketball players until the acrobatic layups or deep threes clank off the rim.

Which means Mills and Perry are paying attention to what Knicks fans are saying on social media…..