2019-20 Game Thread: Knicks vs. Pacers

Headband Knilikina…love this kid!!

Who the hell just sang the anthem?

Is lovely Rebecca into anti-freeze?
I mean that hair today.
Gorgeous woman, imho, but that crazy hair was surprising

Barrett…laying bricks

Frank would be a better basketball player if he grew a ‘stache.

Frank would be a better basketball player if he grew a ‘stache.

so few truly understand the proper purpose and focus when watching knick games…or, maybe life in general…

you grocer, you get it…

I see most people found better things to do with their friday night

WAtching Zion run through Carmelo for a fast break layup is pretty bittersweet…

Zion is really really something. No surprise but he’s a wow.

Lakers signing Markieff Morris after a buyout by the Pistons. For once, we got something right with the trade.

geo get’s it. For some folks a ‘stache is a multiplying power. Frank is part of those folks.

I like that KB has extensive threads for speculation, but everybody has checked out on the season.

the trier situation is maybe the most baffling…I can only guess he refused to go to the g league…

if that was true though, why wouldn’t they just cut/release him…doesn’t seem like he has much value with other teams…not sure what his minutes total is for the year, but, it’s got to be pretty low…

maybe it’s time for chris robinson to go…I get that we may not have drafted so great the last few years, but, our young guys development doesn’t look so great…

I didn’t get to watch but the box score looks tankerrific. 30 minutes and 9 shots for our #1 option?

I’m just talking shit. I heard that, but I didn’t actually check it. Whatever.

The Knicks are a win now team, not a developing team. Yes, that’s incredibly fucking stupid but that’s what Dolan wants and he pays the bills. Different coach won’t change that.

Ha!!! I was about to write that Strat should be taking a victory lap soon and he of course beat me to it.

Very nice game from him last night.

Is Lonzo Ball more productive than last season? I think the consensus would be yes. But when you look at WS/48 and BPM there’s no difference. However, his RPM improved from Minus .32 to Plus 1.48.

Lonzo’s 3FG% is 37% this season and his TS% is 51.5%. Why do I bring this up? Because many here were arguing that Frank could not a productive player at a 51.5 TS. I had argued he could if his TS were 52 to 53 so long as he were hitting 3’s at about 37% and defending at a very high level.

I don’t want to start an argument about whether Frank will be able to get to 51.5 TS. Time will tell. My question rather is whether posters here (JK47, Noble, Bruno, Jowles, etc) think Frank could be a plus player at a 520 TS in light of Lonzo’s stats. Note Frank’s TS, ORPM and DRPM are very similar to Lonzo’s in his 21yo season.

I think it’s really easy to find consistency and plug in roles once you have a star in place like Dallas does. The Knicks should certainly try that with RJ even though he’s clearly not as good as Doncic. Right now, they have spinning Julius as their #1 guy which is just absurd because he’s a turnover machine. They need to give RJ the keys to this shitmobile and just let him try and do his thing.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Mavericks/comments/f7o82s/slowmo_of_luka_stepback_3/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

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I don’t want to start an argument about whether Frank will be able to get to 51.5 TS. Time will tell. My question rather is whether posters here (JK47, Noble, Bruno, Jowles, etc) think Frank could be a plus player at a 520 TS in light of Lonzo’s stats. Note Frank’s TS, ORPM and DRPM are very similar to Lonzo’s in his 21yo season.

A few thoughts:

1) I think Lonzo is a promising player because he’s shown multiple legitimate skills throughout his career and has improved, but I wouldn’t argue with anyone who says he’s still not yet productive overall.

2) Lonzo brings you a 28.6 AST% and 9.9 TRB% with his .515 TS%, compared to 20.2% and 5.6% for Frank, so it’s not like giving Frank Lonzo’s TS% turns him into Lonzo.

3) League average TS% this year is .562, so if you’re putting up .515 you damn well better be bringing it in multiple other ways. Lonzo is approaching that, Frank…well, you know the story.

So no, I don’t think Frank with a .515 or so TS% is a productive player unless he makes improvements across the board. If I was convinced he was the all-world defender his fan club thinks he is that might be different, but I don’t, largely because the Knicks defense still sucks with him on floor (which is not his fault, but also wouldn’t be the case if the fan club was right).

When the ball is being dribbled, Lonzo and Frank look like they play two different sports. Frank would be a mid-major off-ball SG if he were in the NCAA right now.

Frank is not an NBA player; He should and will be playing in Europe soon. Knox cant play in neither league. Our best draft pick in decades is now playing in Texas. RJ is a mediocre talent that was maximized by hard work and growing up privileged in a basketball family. Leon Rose will not inherit a single player who is either now or has the talent to be a starter in contender. He doesn’t have obstacles like missing draft picks or a poor balanced roster with terrible contracts and by this organization’s standards, – this is considered a great situation.

Oh yeah Porzingis is definitely the reason the Mavs have the most efficient offense of the modern era

KP has had these hot streaks before, usually at the beginning of the season, which is why he’s a tantalizing player. Problem is the hot streaks are followed by him playing like ass.

This season he’s doing it backwards, he started out like ass and is having the hot streak in February. Maybe he sustains it this time, it’s not out of the question. But it’s also not out of the question that he just goes back to playing like ass.

so jk, wilder at 231 and fury at 273…yeah, this may not make it out of the 3rd…

I don’t know, I’m not sure fury can help but to dance and box…it would really surprise me to see wilder knocked out…

Keep squinting, and focusing on the last six games instead of the previous 30 or so. Make up reasons that you trust these six instead of the rest.

I’ll eat crow when he sustains this, not when I’m implicitly told to.

If you have a young KP on your team, how many other GMs in the NBA would not have given KP the max extension, – as soon as they were allowed to? Show a young player LOVE.

If we gave ATL Frank, #9 (Knox) and two other 1st rounders for Luka and went all in on those two with him, KP, Mitch, signed Butler, kept shooters/players like Kornet and Vonleh…and were sitting near the top of the eastern conference today….someone would still say that KP in too injury prone and Butler is a headcase…etc…

Rename KB to KP as in KP Blog. Newsflash – he’s gone. Let’s not forget how he trolled the Knicks Management last year when he posted a video of him running sprints, in direct conflict with the coach’s public statement about his progress. And despite the video, and the the trade, he still never played a game last year. So what was the point of the video? Maybe they didn’t maximize the return in the trade, but there was so much risk for the Knicks, and he clearly wanted out. KP’s behavior and knee were eroding Knick’s leverage by the minute.

So Adios, and we start over. I’m still not sold he doesn’t collapse the other knee….

harry giles looked ok against the clippers today. he’s an unrestricted free agent since the kings somewhat strangely (strangely if they were a normal team anyway) declined his team option. i don’t really have a take on giles but at 21 it seems like he should be added to the list of possible offseason value targets:

melton
wood
giles

anyone else? no mercenaries allowed.

There are now rumors that Guitar fucking Jimmy wants to buy SNY and also the Mets.

Have I not suffered enough

Hey, maybe Dolan’s attention would be diverted away from the Knicks and to the Mets. So the Knicks would be the new Rangers. That might be fine if you’re not a Mets fan but if you’re both, well, maybe it would be better to just spend your free time watching youtube cat videos.

Apparently he just wants SNY.

I think Dolan would have a harder time messing up a baseball team. There are so many more moving parts and so much less glitz.

What’s SNY? And would Dolan actually be a worse Mets owner than the recent Mets ownership? I ask because I don’t follow baseball, but what little I have read about the Mets here suggests they have not been managed well.

Wow, Fury just demolished Wilder.

That was a super interesting fight in terms of tactics. Fury, not known as a hard puncher, came out aggressively and had Wilder on the back foot the entire fight. It was the complete opposite of his tactics in the first fight. Fury is really long, 6’9″ with an 85″ reach, and he’s very nimble on his feet for a guy his size, so the conventional wisdom is that he’s best off boxing from outside and using space to his advantage. But in this fight he did the opposite, he closed the distance and smothered Wilder, and it was a rout. Wilder had no answer for the incoming offense.

What’s SNY? And would Dolan actually be a worse Mets owner than the recent Mets ownership? I ask because I don’t follow baseball, but what little I have read about the Mets here suggests they have not been managed well.

It is the Mets equivalent to MSG/YES.

>Despite his box scores lately are not very encouraging i watch him moving faster, shifting speeds, shooting with confidence, dribbling better, finding his sweet spots, driving decisively and Even making fancy moves seen for the very first time in his game so far. He’s not where he has to be yet to be a legit nba starter but i see him getting there sooner or later.<

100%

He has unquestionably made several significant improvements this year over the previous two years. As the critics will point out, he was starting from such a low level on the offensive side he still has a ways to go. But there's clearly progress and he's still very young. All he has to do is get to neutral on offense to be a plus player. If he could finish off the rest of the games hovering around a 50% TS% and 33% 3p% I'd consider it a successful year for him.

The bigger problem is where to play him. He's not a modern penetrating scoring PG.

I have no problem with the Frank/Barrett backcourt where they both handle the ball and share play making with other similarly talented ball movers. In fact, that's my preference over the modern PG dominant offense where if you shut that guy down the whole offense collapses. The problem is that both Frank and RJ are bricklayers and the biggest problem the team has now is spacing. None of Frank, RJ, Mitch, Payton, DSJr, or Randle can shoot and most of the rest are just mediocre/OK.

One of either Frank or RJ is going to have to break out as a shooter next year and we can worry about Mitch/Randle later.

Watching the games, the Knicks clearly miss Morris on offense. As noted above, the Knicks have very few shooters. I can see Frank getting better at shooting next year. I don’t know about Payton, RJ, DSJ or Randle though.

I’ll add that in the summer of 2021, Frank Ntilikina has an $18.5M cap hold so the question about his future will finally stop being purely theoretical. Until then, sure, play him as much as you want. I think there’s some opportunity cost to doing so, but it’s not even in the top 10 dumbest things we do in terms of opportunity cost so whatever.

it’s funny, most folks think it’s the chin that’s the most vulnerable part of the head…nope, right behind the ear is where the off switch is located…

>Once more: I will be delighted if I’m wrong.>

Don’t worry, you are.

If you can’t see that his handle is much improved, he can take the ball where he wants on the court better, is passing with his left hand better, and creating his own shot better, you can’t be watching games closely.

It used to be an adventure just to see if could bring the ball up the court without getting stripped.

He has a long way to go relative to a pure PG if that what he wants to be, but his skill level is way above where it was.

Also, when it comes to shot locations, sample sizes are small. You don’t pick the one that’s luckily coming up better than expected and eliminate it without also looking at the ones that are unluckily coming up worse than expected and expected and normalizing then also. He’s shooting horribly from 3-10 and 10-16 feet compared to last year and will probably do better from there long term even if he declines from 16-3p. He’s also been steadily improving from FT line which is a very good sign because there’s probably less noise.

We all know he has a long way to go to be “neutral” on offense, but he’s obviously better than he was.

He’s also been steadily improving from FT line which is a very good sign because there’s probably less noise.

OK, well he has a whopping 46 free throw attempts this season in 1041 minutes because he averages 1.6 FTA per 36, so you know. Small sample size and all.

>>OK, well he has a whopping 46 free throw attempts this season in 1041 minutes because he averages 1.6 FTA per 36, so you know. Small sample size and all.<<

I don't think this FT rate is sustainable either, but it's probably less noisy than jump shots and you don't get to eliminate it because it's positive evidence of shooting improvement and you are trying your best to argue he's not getting better when he obviously is.

you don’t get to eliminate it because it’s positive evidence of shooting improvement and you are trying your best to argue he’s not getting better when he obviously is.

Yeah, okay, there’s some glacial shooting improvement. That’s typical improvement you’d see from just about any player of that age. What I see is a horrible offensive player getting verrry slightly less horrible. There’s nothing special or exciting about Frank’s development curve. It would be weird if he didn’t get at least a LITTLE better than he was as a 19-year old. It’s still not a lot to get excited about unless you really want to squint your eyes at it.

I fucking hate Jayson Tatum

For every great performance like today’s, Tatum puts up a 6-18 clunker.

But those pretty much get ignored by the hype machine

Stats are there for all so anybody can see & study them.
Games are also there for those with more free time who enjoy watching the game and check players with their own eyes.
What’s Not there is the comparison/analysis of those two and the finding of the hidden gems and the busts of the future.
That’s where the true valuable scouting lies imho.

It was a really good scrap before the illegal punch.

Fury was getting the better of the exchanges, but Wilder was juuust missing with some of those right hand bombs. That would have been a risky strategy for Fury to pursue, but with Wilder compromised because of the ear it was, well, a lot less risky.

I don’t think the gap in ability between them is as large as it appeared last night.

Yeah I don’t think Wilder has ever been hurt that badly. It’s a testament to his strength that he could hang in there with a top fighter for that long after getting hurt in that way.

The punch to the back of the head was definitely not intentional In my opinion. Fury isn’t a dirty fighter. Wilder just turned his head in the wrong way and that’s the kind of stuff that can happen in a boxing ring. Wilder does have ragged defensive technique. A more schooled defensive fighter probably wouldn’t have taken that blow to the back of the head.

How ironic is it that as bad as Frank is, he’s not even the worst PG from that draft on our team?

the t-wolves, the hawks and maybe the pistons are biggest disappointments this season…

I’m surprised the NBA didn’t reschedule tonight’s games. I think it’s safe to say I’m an empath lol..I actually cried when Pac died, and when Kobe died the way he did- I felt that shit in my soul. Still tough to think about

Totes McGoats as Totes McGoats:
I’m surprised the NBA didn’t reschedule tonight’s games. I think it’s safe to say I’m an empath lol..I actually cried when Pac died, and when Kobe died the way he did- I felt that shit in my soul. Still tough to think about

Did I miss something? Why would tonight’s games be rescheduled?

So Macri is really pushing that Thibodeau to the Knicks is all but a done deal. So here’s to an outdated offense and playing Taj 40 minutes.

Does Macri have a decent track record of being well sourced? I’ve said my anti-Thibs piece, but leaving that aside, it’s so dumb to be 90% settled on a coaching hire before you’ve even started the process. Particularly for a young team where development should be the goal they could definitely go with a less experienced hire which really opens up some options. But instead they’re just going to settle on a totally expected, totally mediocre retread without even considering other possibilities. Why am I not surprised?

In honor of Kobe’s 24.

Like… because of the date? Dudes are getting real sentimental right now.

The only hope for a Thibs regime is that he learned from his miserable failure in Minnesota. Can’t say I’m optimistic

Thibs isn’t Mark Jackson so that’s cool at least

Player relationships are as big a problem as the fear that the game passed Thibs by. It seems to come down to personality. Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler swore by the guy. They’re both pretty fierce competitors. Maybe Mitch and Barrett have similar internal makeups but they seem a lot more like KAT and Wiggins.

It doesn’t bode well for Frank and Knox, but nothing else does, either.

Defense (although with Towns and Wiggins, what could you do) was terrible by all counts.

It’s always hard to separate out exactly what is coaching and what is due to the players, but I do think it’s worth noting that both Towns and Wiggins were supposed to be pretty elite defensive prospects coming into the league and clearly have some talent on that end. Admittedly no other coach has been able to get those guys to defend either so I definitely can’t put that all on Thibs by any means, but I don’t see them as no-hopers like Trae Young. At least in theory it should be possible to get those guys to defend so for a supposedly elite defensive coach I have to put that as at least a small demerit. I still think the bigger issue is that his standout Ds were built around walling off the paint at all costs and I’m just not sure that works in a league that’s way, way more 3-point focused (his first season in Boston the average team took 18 3s a game; that’s up to 34 per game this year).

Offensively, he’s just going to provide more awful “eat what you kill” BS. I can’t get past the fact that even on his one decent TWolves team, Derrick Rose (.463 TS%), Jamal Crawford (.519) and Andrew Wiggins (.505) all had higher usage than Towns (.646). That’s coaching malpractice.

so houston is favored by 14 tonight…I’m pretty doubtful we can cover…randall and mitch should have good games though…

My biggest concern with Thibs is that he runs his stars into the ground, but since we don’t have any stars, nothing to worry about!

>>>That is a big challenge for Thibs and I doubt he can overcome it.<<<

I think we have an offense that's a reasonable expectation for the players on the court. Trying to find a coach who draw water from a stone is pointless. This is a challenge for the front office.

I don’t know how I feel about Thibs. When we had Melo, I was all for it. Dunno about now. Fantastic coach but I just worry that he runs RJ and Mitch into the ground

I think the offense won’t be as hard to improve as it looks. We just need a few sensible basketball changes. IMO, several of our players would be more efficient in lineups with more spacing that allowed them to do what they are actually good at. The problem will be choosing who to keep, who to move, and what we can get for them given they look worse than they actually are playing in NY now.

I think they almost have to keep Robinson and RJ Barrett (not that RJ has been good, but he’s too young to give up on and does have some obvious skills), but almost everyone else should be on the table. The idea would be to bring in starter level players that can shoot (and at least hold their own on D) and draft picks that can shoot. Some of the other young players can remain as role players off the bench if they are especially good on one side or the other and still have some upside.

Actually, I think many of the young players have personalities well suited for Thibs. Frank, for one, would probably like working in any kind of system, but probably would be appreciated by Thibs for his defense. RJ sounds like a guy who would like getting pushed to be better (disclaimer that he could have been talking out of his ass), and Mitch is a rim protecting big who may do well with him as well. Dotson too. I just don’t see the Dennis Smith Jr’s of the team getting any appreciation from him– good.

yeah, that NBA league pass ain’t looking like such a great investment at the moment…

not sure how much more knick “basketball” I’ll even watch this year….

Anyone else think the Bucks are going to be the next 70-win team? They have a remarkably easy schedule in their final four (less likely to lose if Giannis is on a rest rotation), but a rough run of @DAL, TOR, @TOR, @BOS and @PHI leading up to that, and I’d guess they’re going to approach those games like playoff contests.

I don’t see any reason why rest should be the defining issue – they’ve been dynamite when Giannis has rested all year, and resting up for the playoffs is less of an issue when you’re going to be favored by like 20 points in every game of your first round series. They need to go 22-4 or better to get to 70 (.846 win percentage) which is just slightly under their pace for the year (.857). The smart bet whenever you’re looking at crazy outliers is typically regression to the mean so I’d bet againt them getting there, but I certainly wouldn’t be shocked if they did. It’s interesting that there really hasn’t been much talk about indisputably one of the greatest regular seasons of all time. I guess due to the combined effect of 73-9 having been so recent (and not ending in a title) combined with the perception at this point that the Bucks are more of a regular season team (unfair in my mind). Still they definitely deserve to be getting more press.

I don’t see any reason why rest should be the defining issue – they’ve been dynamite when Giannis has rested all year, and resting up for the playoffs is less of an issue when you’re going to be favored by like 20 points in every game of your first round series.

He rested in games 77, 80 and 82 of last year, and played limited minutes (24:36) in game 81, so I don’t think the first round matchup matters at all (and yeah, they should sweep the first round easily). It’s true that they have been very good when he rests (5-1, MOV 12.8) but their wins have come against SAC, WAS, ORL, @ATL and NOP (while they were 6-18).

I’m not saying that they can’t beat those teams handily, but it’s also categorically true that having Giannis for any amount of time in those games would increase the odds of winning.

the backside of geo’s hand must be throbbing rn, I love it

There’s a mild cold-type virus ripping through Portland right now. Half of the people I know are sick or coming out of it. I’ve known Lady Jowles for going on five years and this is the first time she’s been sick.

it was funny, was trying to explain to the youngest god-child (age 6) about germs…asked him if he knew what they looked like – explained to him that we can’t even see them with our eyes…

i asked him then if he knew what the purpose of germs was – i’ll tell ya, kids never cease to amaze – he nailed it: to make us sick and kill us…

yes it would seem these nasty viruses truly are on our planet’s side in trying to control this very deadly human infestation it is fighting against…

sounds like you have some super important work at the home to take care of mister jowles…learned a long time ago that it is impossible to make ourselves happy over a sustained period of time…the only way happiness can be achieved is through serving others (i imagine the same can also be achieved through the care of animals or nature)…it makes me smile to think that you’ve found your path to happiness so early in life…wishing both you and the missus the best…

>I agree you need new players to get a better offense We particularly need shooters. I just don’t see Thibs using them properly.<

That's a question in my mind also.

In Chicago he made defense the priority and didn't run a particularly fluid or efficient well spaced offense. But on some level that was the players. The offense was much better in Minnesota and it was the defense that was the problem. So who knows.

Can Mitch play PG? 🙂

Anyone else notice ESPN hasn’t been updating it’s NBA Real Plus Minus metric since the all star break?

What did I do to deserve having to watch the Knicks? 🙂

Stats Doomsday
The day the stats would not be free for everyone but you’ll have to pay to get an access to them it’s the day the 3rd World War would start.