After surprisingly kicking the Bucks’ ass the other night, the Knicks head to Cleveland to take on the Cleveland Cavaliers, who have started the season a surprising 3-0.
We all thought that the Knicks would be 1-3 after tonight, but I think 1-3 would now be a disappointment. A .500 record through four games would be pretty freakin’ awesome, right?
The Knicks are without early season standout, Alec Burks, so either Thibs is going to play an 8-man rotation or we’re going to see some Iggy or some Pinson or Harper tonight.
Let’s go, .500 Knicks!
398 replies on “2020-21 Game Thread: Knicks @ Cavaliers”
Tank Tank
50%
In fact, I blame alcohol for a lot of things.
The above is the punchline from my last post in the previous thread. I didn’t want anyone to miss it…
Drinking this smoked one for the first time:
AECHT SCHLENKERLA RAUCHBIER MARZEN 0,5LT
Let’s see if it’s lucky
Allez, Frank.
Joinone, it turns out I can watch the Knicks streaming on tiantianzhibo.com for free. It all their feeds work, but usually one does.
Hmm. I’m eating smoked sausage jambalaya and sauerkraut. The Corona will suffice, but that beer looks interesting.
+1 To the Cavs for their mascot having the mask on.
Lot of Knicks banged up, hope they’ll be back soon.
I think Thibs’ll play Pinson over Iggy…
Which is less likely…the Cavs going 4-0 or the Knicks winning 2 in a row?
It’s the best way to get away with it! 😉
#Hmm. I’m eating smoked sausage jambalaya and sauerkraut. The Corona will suffice, but that beer looks interesting.#
Maaan! It’s VEEERY interesting!
Payton finally missed one of his shot putts.
payton looks to be back in his usual form
With only 3 games into the season there’s only 4 teams that remain undefeated? Can you guys believe it’s the powerhouses – Pacers, Magic, Hawks, and Cavaliers?? :O
Cavs shooting open threes like the Bucks.
I like the Knicks’ strategy of their opponents missing all of their threes.
Bullock on fire. Give him the ball.
Damn!
Wooohooo!!!
Randle’s decision making and passing this season has been unbelievable.
It’s the invisible sixth man closing out on 3’s. Thibs implemented in last game.
maybe randle is gonna be like lebron….
Because we’re the MIGHTY Knicks! 😉
Randle with 4 assists already.
Randle’s oozing confidence and Knox’s jumper is so sweet… when goes in
Knicks have had a brain transplant
Echoing what everyone else said but Randle has been incredible
Knicks D has been lucky lately with teams missing open 3pters but they do seem alot more active on D than in recent years especially with their hands and getting deflections.
MVP Randle!
And the Cavs look like they have no brains.
Guess what, Cleveland, you don’t get extra points for the pass looking cool.
Oh, very true.
Lebron Randle? Don’t you mean Julius James?
Julius Jokic
Oh for ten. Versus five for seven.
you can break the zone quite easily if your bigs pass….. you don’t have to shoot 3s….
someone start drafting the Randle extension
That one Knicks fan who bet $10 on Julius Randle winning MVP is going to be a billionaire soon
That is probably one of the best individual quarters in Knicks history
Julius Randle looks unstoppable.
Of those 10 missed 3’s, most were uncontested.
Ok I guess just build around Randle, MVP candidate
Randle = GOAT
So like if you were to vote on MVP right now…
Julius Curry!
So Randle is like an All-Star now yeah?
Yeah, I wouldn’t bring them up at all if the Knicks were forcing them into ugly shots. They’re really not. They’re good looks and just none of them are falling.
On the other side, though, the Knicks are getting good looks of their own, so it’s not like their threes are lucky shots. So that’s very good.
The fact that Randle is passing the ball has me in shock.
Cleveland is the only hotter team from 3 coming into the game, they’re regressing back to the mean. Clearly, we’re just a collection of 60% 3pt shooters.
Thibs may not be an offensive mastermind but this is way better than any offense I’ve seen since (insert year/coach)
Randle’s been so good the Knicks are going to have to rehire Steve Mills.
This is not a version of Julius Randle that has ever existed before
3 1sts is now the price for Randle
I love you point Randle
Magnificent first quarter by Randle.
Yes, the Cavs are 0-71 on threes, but the Knicks are working more in defense and they’re moving more on offense.
Unbelievable what kind of difference a coaching staff could make…
If we get less than Paul George or Holiday it’s a travesty
D’Antoni?
Knoxak is nice to have.
That was literally the best quarter a Knick has played since peak Melo. I mean that was amazing. Maybe even better than peak Melo.
Knoxsy
Spit take!
The Woodson accidental modern 2 PG Offense was phenomenal
Knox’s 3 is sick!!
Dr J with 14 pts, 6 reb, 5 ast in one quarter! :O
Thibs not happy with Knoxak. Rare angry hook for Thibs.
No, he’s just about to foul out
What’s the over/under for Randle’s minutes tonight?
Frank’s playing good D but needs to stop telegraphing his passes.
Remember that one good RJ game
Man those were crazy times
He looked pretty pissed while he was lecturing Knox after he pulled him.
It’s amazing how awful the offense looks when anyone but Randle tries to orchestrate something.
Missed that, must have been typing
Trade RJ, keep Randle.
Frank breaks out those nice p-n-r passes every once in a while
FRANK
The Cavs make the ugliest outlet passes.
It’s like a crapshoot who gets the ball.
In the midst of this Barrett’s shot is still MIA.
Randle is playing like an All-Star but doing so he only exacerbates the question: why Toppin over Haliburton?
What does Noel do out there? Seriously.
Barrett is not playing well.
rj needs to sit
Early on, yeah, he has not looked good. Maybe he’s still hurt?
Shouldn’t have turned it on. Wheels appear to be coming off
Payton’s reversing into a pumpkin under our eyes…
IQ winning the PG battle
We really need Burks
Cedi and RJ are having a brick competition. RJ is slightly ahead.
The Cavs bigs are utterly destroying the Knicks.
this offense looks familiar
Talk about the wheels falling off…
Garland, Sexton and Osman are 4 for 22. Wow.
We miss Burks.
The putridness of Payton and Barrett forced Randle to his a Mister Iso-Hyde version.
The Cavs’ centers are killing Robinson and Noel.
Drummond and McGee are killing us on both ends
It’s like a two-man team with Randle and Bullock. Will Randle sit again tonight?
Cavs have taken 11 more shots. too many turnovers and offensive rebounds
Mitch is definitely having problems, but Noel doesn’t even seem to be out there when he’s out there. It’s puzzling.
that and our starting backcourt is shooting 2-11 with 5 TOs
The Cavs are, like, “We make up on shooting with volume!”
I was about to say, Randle is going to play 44+ minutes tonight
we’re winning the 3pt battle but they’re killing us on the boards and turnovers… that’s the game in a nutshell….
At least he’s making his free throws!
8 assists and it is just the second!
Mitch is at least working against Drummond
Randle must have been getting double teamed since he was like 12 years old you’d think he’d have some idea what to do against it
Well Julius does have 6 turnovers. But….
Thankfully Osman sucks.
What a huge three by Bullock!
Randle looks exhausted out there already, can’t blame him
Randle going for the quadruple-double
Live ball turnovers are killing the Knicks but still up 7 at the half is pretty good.
You really have to give it up to Bickerstaff, this Cavs team is d-u-m dumb and he has them 3-0.
Some great , some terrible. Happy to be up.
23 minutes for randle… that’s a bit excessive….
Man, Clyde is in form. “Big apple turnovers.” Wow.
Bullock!!!
21 for Barrett. Thibs overworks his players for sure.
The Knicks are up 7 while shooting 10-16 from three while the Cavs shot 2 for 17.
I mean, it’s better to hit your threes while your opponent misses all of their threes, so, hey, sure, keep it up!
Hayes and Wiseman trying to out-bust each other…
Hope that Bullock keeps rolling and gives Randle a partner in scoring.
Not a great game for Mitch.
In the first half Frank and Knox have been better than Payton and RJ.
You guys forget, though, that this is Game 7 of the NBA Finals and thus Thibs has to desperately win this one.
Knicks definitely missing Burks tonight too.
drummond always eat mitch up….. there aren’t too many big dudes that are both strong and crafty enough to nullify mitch’s presence on both ends….
Frank didn’t play half bad for 8 minutes worth of work off the bench. 3 points, 2 assists, 2 rebs, 2 steals.
Why does RJ make terrible passes?
If we don’t get to 500% tonight we may not all season….
Mitch is a 12 and since that is the number that supports my opinion of him I am going to cite it.
But seriously, I think his D has been pretty ok. And only 1 foul.
I get taking Knox out to lecture him, but he shouldn’t have been benched the rest of the half
Can’t Mitch try a 3P when they leave him all alone?
The ORebs been killing us. Even when Noel or Robinson makes a good play, the Cavs are right there to score on the putback.
Come on guys…
if you’re coaching this game,
the 4th of the season (your first with the team), coming just after the drubbing of a title contender,
with a chance to go 2-2 and be at .500 probably for the only time in the year, with the bench shortened by injuries, do you really give a shit about resting guys under 27 years of age and risk losing the game?
It’ll be un-human to do so…
I don’t know what’s gotten into Randle this season, but I like it! If we decide to trade him, we will get a helluva haul if he can keep even close to this pace
Yeah, seemed excessive.
He has 3 fouls
I think Drummond and McGee have been doing better than they should, but yes, Mitch has been doing a much better job than Noel, who seems oddly listless.
But we’re rebuilding, giving time to young players and develop them is what we should do, so it’s a good game to check if Iggy can do more than challenge other team’s players to a fist fight.
I’m perfectly happy with Mitch letting Drummond get his 11 points in the first half if he only gets one foul (which was on a screen).
Yeah Mitch!
That was a bad foul, he had Drummond off balance…
Another dumb decision by RJ
Nobody’s rebuilding in the fourth game of the year, look at the boxscores of the other games,
you start to be disinterested in winning games and focus on development when you’re 5-22.
We’ll get to that point but now it’s too early…
And didn’t look like a foul.
Drummond has cleaned up a bunch of shots where Mitch has forced a miss. Like right there.
RJ is out of control
if our guards keep getting beat off the dribble and Mitch has to leak out to protect the basket Drummond is going to feast on the offensive boards all night long.
the celtics are the favorites out of the east if they grab drummond right? what are they waiting for?
We’re gonna see a lot of bad Randle tonight
I’m not saying to lose the game, i’m just saying that i don’t agree we need to play Randle for 46 mins.
We’re accustomed to RJ’s bad shooting but tonight he’s playing Low-IQ basketball and that’s sadly surprising.
Randle got out on that break really nicely
It’s not all MItch’s fault, but good Cs like Drummond really expose his limitations besides blocking shots on defense and dunking.
Drummond is Mitch kryptonite. Too much ass on that man.
They’re deciding who they want more – Drummond or Randle! 😉
Thibs’ll do everything to win this game, he’s asking the league to allow Randle to play even during timeouts 🙂
We’re shorthanded around what? 3 in our guys in our main rotation? This might be the game to do it.
RJ seems like he’s pressing again. There’s absolutely no reason for him to be pressing again given the way Randle is paying and even without Burks to help with the scoring. He just needs to settle down. He’s showing his age.
RJ is not defending well today, he left Garland all alone
To think that they could have had Turner for Hayward… Ainge is a dick
oh shit, been following the thread, that made me stop – that was funny Max…
Really liked the voice on the singer for Polica…
listening to: Radiohead in rainbows from the basement (’08)…wow, that’s just some perfection personified right there…
Now that was a smart play by RJ
Even the spin move is working for Randle!
The FT stroke continues to look good
Can’t remember the last time Mitch was 2-7
Yeah, never thought IND would do that offer, but Ainge trying to extract more was plainly stupid.
Knox to the mezzanine
we tried that like 5x and we finally got that mitch lob thru…..
Watch out for the hook, Knox!
Knox is tolerable until he begins to think he should be handling the ball as a shot creator.
I played 50 years of basketball and never made a pass that bad…
WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT KNOX???
Knox should never be allowed to dribble the ball up the court.
I’ll be encouraged about RJ’s growth as a long range shooter As long as he continues to stroke it well there behind the charity line.
There’s no bad Radiohead songs! 😉 Have you listened to Codex? Such a beautiful song, with only 3 or 4 verses! 🙂
Knox confusing passing with halfcourt shots
When you turn the ball over 18 times in 28 minutes, you better hope the other team is shooting like shit
That lob pass by Knox was hilarious. Talk about a lack of spatial awareness.
He had 3 fouls in the first half…not really a hook
Unreal how many wide open threes the Cavs are missing.
To the Knicks credit, every time the Cavs pull very close or even, the Knicks push back.
So far Mitch has 7 pts and 10 rebs. He’s not been totally dominated. But yeah, we don’t have a truck in the middle.
Twin towers for the Cavs
How are the Cavs still in this? They miss every shot!
Alley-Hoop mania is out of control…
Randle having a rough night from the line
If this game goes to the wire and Randle and Bullock don’t get a blow, they will be gassed at the end and unable to close out the game effectively.
that nick cave vid has me wanting to watch more “live” stuff lately…
i really like filmed studio performances, sound is great, plus get to see the musicians in a little more ‘natural” setting…
Good foul
Turned out to be a nice quarter
The Cavs are just such a dumb team. How are they 3-0? Just hot from three for a few games? They’re not even looking for Knox on defense, which should be obvious.
.500 is for the taking here …
Mitch and Noel with only 3 fouls combined…that’s a positive
I think we pissed off the Bucks, they’re beating the Heat by 32 at halftime
I think Randle is a bit gassed.
I realize Thibs played him heavy minutes because we don’t have Burks and RJ is not shooting well. We sort of need his scoring, but that won’t help if he’s gassed for the 4th quarter.
So far so good, let’s win this!
that’s a nice break there
Noel making his presence felt here!
Noel has been a major defensive force for us since coming off the bench this second half.
Excellent defense to open this Q. First Knox staying in front of Osman allowing Noel to block that shot, then the poke-away by Noel…
We’ve been forcing that play all pre season and regular season. There have been quite a few really bad ones to go along with the occasional good one.
Now this I Like!
I actually like Elf and Frank together in spurts, very good defensive backcourt.
One very active minute from Noel!
Noel picking it up!
I know, we’re the team with all the turnovers, but somehow they look way dumber than us
The W is guaranteed, going to bet on this game now! 😀
We could really use Frank at the wing with Burks out. It would be nice if he could string together some good minutes there
drummond elbowed noel in the head then shoved payton out of bounds and got mad when they finally whistled him for a foul
One more assist, Julius!
Cmon Frank, you have to make that
Knicks are competing hard.
Yeah, they’re a bunch of whiners!
nobody seems to look for knox for the three…especially Randle…he won’t pass to him
Garland, Sexton and Osman now 10 for 40. Wow.
THAT’s the guy who hits a three?
Here we go…
Our body must be rejecting the new brain..
If we don’t win this game it will really be a travesty for everything but the tank
We’re trying really, really hard to give this game away
running an offense through Randle is doomed…7 turnovers
OOF
We lived something similar in the Philly game with RJ, Payton, Bullock and DSJ… It hurts
i mean this is what you get when go through randle all the time… the turnovers will come…. it just hasn’t been as much to start….
lol Thibs is hot
I do sort of dig just how angry he gets at this stuff.
Me too. Don’t want him to be angry, play well and you’ll be fine. If not, you’ll get it…
Randle might average 40 minutes a night.
The last Randle offensive foul was Frank having no idea how to set up a screen.
Finally, RJ!
We need to start tanking ASAP just for the sake of Thibs’ life,
otherwise he’s gonna burst a vein (and kill Randle for exhaustion in the process)
Backbreaking three by Randle! Nice!
Stevius Randak?
Randleeeee
MVP Randle is back! Play him the 48 mins!
Triple double!
Knicks keep fending them off!
Triple Double threat every night!
Payton shoots free throws like Dwight Howard
There are few NBA starters I dislike more than Collin Sexton. He’s just the poster boy for wasted talent.
When do we start voting for all-stars?
Too easy
I feel like we’re the team we always use to play that lets us get close and then reasserts themselves to put the game out of reach.
“Payton is God”
L.Bird
Here’s where Mitch having those fouls to give come in handy…
Didn’t know Randle already has 6 triple doubles in his career… make it seven!
breen… “play making of Randle has been spectacular “
And I feel like Sexton is the guy I’d end up punching in the face in a pick up game…
So easy to hate that guy. I can’t imagine having to root for him.
Hack-a-Drummond till the end! 😀
The list of recent Knicks triple doubles is hilarious. How did Hezonja ever get one?
Quadruple double is in play
That was actually a good foul by Mitch putting Drummond on the line.
Why all the people in the gray long sleeve tops and black pants? It’s a little creepy.
The good thing about the lack of fans is that these road trips are lot less daunting.
I’m watching the gamecast and wow do we look dumb.
Anyone know how to look up the last team to commit 25 turnovers and win?
Mitch was saving those hacks for the last 2 minutes.
Holy heck — a Randle triple double now??
I feel like I am watching my high school team all of a sudden
Yeah, maybe strike that
this is embarrassing
We’re getting dumber
Randle with the icing!
Randle’s so hot, he might be capable of a double triple!
This game shall forever be known as Dumb and Dumber
Hey, a win is a win!
Lebron Randle.
I have no problem with Sexton.
Wow.
We just beat two of the best teams in the NBA in a row
The Knicks have 2 more wins than I would have though at this point in the season.
Especially on the road, even with empty arenas.
Even if it only last for a small stretch of games this level of performance by Randle is really fun.
.500
Knicks tried so, so hard to lose this game but Cleveland didn’t want it bad enough
And the D.
Held Cleveland to 86 points.
Thibs…
The team is being coached
Not pretty but I’ll take it
Winning streak? Checked!
I feel like we win these games for two basic reasons: Randle is playing like an All-Star point forward and Thib’s iron will to win doesn’t allow this team to slag off.
LOL I Rolled down the sofa 🙂
We’re at .500! Winning streak baby!
How about checking the Eastern Standings after a few years?
And back-to-back.
BTW, there were 300 fans in the stands.
All the extremely Knicksy buffoonery to close out this game has restored my faith in science.
How many times has a team gotten called for two 8-second violations? How many times has that happened and they won?
That was sheer awfulness. No idea how we won.
Despite being real ugly at times still a nice win for the Knicks.
7 for 32 from three.
Did the Knicks *ever* win two games in a row under Fiz?
We were out IQ, Burks, and Rivers. Is anyone here really surprised with the turnovers considering how many of our primary ballhandlers are out?
Also, Garland/Sexton/Osman scored 43 points on 47 shots.
Randle isn’t forcing stuff, distributing
Mitch isn’t fouling out
Payton seems…competent.
Noel is a bona fide defender on second team.
Is that real? This would kill me on the “Who wants to be a Millionaire?” :O
Knicks are currently sitting on the 8th seed.
Anyone buying Hahn’s argument that the Cavs poor 3 point shooting is the result of our team defense throwing their rhythm off?
I predicted Randle was going to get a few triple doubles this year after watching him play the other night. I didn’t think it would happen the very next game. Tonight was a night he had to do WAY too much in terms of minutes and because we were missing Burks who is a scorer and shot creator. When Burks is back he’ll make fewer mistakes because he’ll be less gassed and won’t be forced to do as much. One game like this fine. Everyone played well except RJ who seems to be pressing again.
I sort of can’t wait until Quickley is back because if he continues to look good at PG and shoots like we expect, we are actually not so bad.
We did. Two 2 game win streaks and one 3 game win streak. All in 2018-19. He only won 4 games total in 2019-20.
Three in a row in his first season!
The last 3 games RJ has been steady from 3P land… 0% !? 🙁
Cavs were the best shooting team coming into tonight, they were destined to cool off. Just lucky it happened against us.
I assume that we’re now the #1 shooting team.
RJ Barrett’s bad shooting from the field is going to come back to bite us sooner than later. Another Herculean effort from an imperfect Julius Randle, and the rest of our starters played decently. Our offense was ugly but we just kept the Cavs under 90 after they hung 118 on Philly two days ago. I think every assumption we made about these Knicks last year/this off-season needs to be thrown out of the window because Thibs is revealing just how poor a job Fizdale and Miller did. There’s clearly a script with Randle (and to a lesser extent Payton) in mind and he’s been a totally different player on both ends of the court. We’ll likely still be a 23-27 win team, but we’re going to compete most nights and that’s a huge step forward.
We’re missing our real starting point guard, the smooth shooting sixth man, our lottery pick, a sure rotation piece (Rivers), the real life Michelin’s Bibendum (Spellman), and someone named DSJ.
Thibs went to strict 8 men rotation.
Great game by Randle, Bullock plays his part, our PG’s went 0-5 on FTs,
Barrett didn’t play well, Mitch wasn’t brilliant and was often manhandled by Drummond and McGee,
I’ll take this win, we’re tied with the Nets.
that was a bit of a grind… randle obv played out of his mind but there are going to be nights where he’s not going to have a great matchup and the offense grinds to a halt…. we’re not there yet and so far it’s pretty fun to watch….
bad game for rj….. this was worse than the philly game in my eyes since he was falling to bad habits in forcing his drives…. some of them looked good and he was still looking for the pass but he could have easily done without at least 3 or 4 of those attempts as he was under heavy pressure… half of those drives had really low probability of success…. the good news is again the free throws though… the shots will fall eventually…
there’s going to be games like this where the starters are just going to log playoff minutes…. that’s just how thibs operates especially in close games…. and this wasn’t even that close! that aspect of thibs hasn’t changed in teh slightest it seems….
i will say the offense does look a lot better in these two games than the first two… lots of good secondary action…. and lots of varying randle looks…. probably took some time to install more of the offense cause of the preseason but it looks good… i mean it looks good cause randle looks like lebron out there but there’s less iso-ball which is a positive….
we may not be the worst team in the league if randle is truly breaking out which i’m beginning to think this could be his year…..
2017-18, the Knicks were .500 as late as Game 36! Wow! But yeah, this is the latest in the season that the Knicks have been .500 since that season. That’s hilarious.
As long as RJ nails his FTs there’s hope his shooting will catch up. The people who say that the team’s overall 3 pointing shooting has been flukey good should realize the same principle individually applies to RJ’s jumper in the reverse.
Man, we outrebounded the Hell out of Cleveland 55 to 43. Didn’t feel that way with all of the offensive rebounds and tip outs by Drummond and McGhee.
Barrett’s mean as a shooter is not great, right? So how would him shooting poorly suggest that he will revert to better shooting later?
If his FT% continues to stabilize as very good his other shooting metrics should follow, no?
Ah yes, November Porzingis keeping us afloat
We had 27 turnovers that lead to 27 points and we still managed to keep the 3-0 Cava to 86 for the game. The Thibs effect on D is real.
Sure, I’ll buy that, but that’s not the same principle as the team’s overall three point shooting being fluky good so far.
Craziness continue around the league:
Bucks beating the Heat by 40 something
Pacers melt in the fourth, lose with the F-Celtics
The Washington WestBealers are 0-4…
Our next game is versus the 0-3 Raptors.
We’re leading the league in 3PT% at 45,9%… OMG
The point is that some statistical flukiness is expected right now going both ways, good and bad.
Stop the count! 😀
RJ is playing so badly on O that his defense and rebounding are getting overlooked. He played 39 minutes of excellent D from my vantage point. He’s super strong and has excellent footwork, so that should continue. But chalk him up for like 7-8 bad decisions on O a game.
The two corner 3’s by Payton were huge…it makes up for some of the bunnies he missed in the paint and the clanked FTs.
Yessir! 🙂
The Bucks shot 7-38 from three against us,
tonight they set the all-time record for 3Pt Fg Made in a game…
Our “Invisible Sixth Man” (Copyright: Bo Nateman) is the best defender in the league.
Bucks were 7-38 from three against us, and 29-51 tonight (an NBA record for made 3’s)
Talk about the law of averages!
I thought our entire backcourt played strong defense and was a major difference maker in that respect. Payton, Bullock, Frank were solid there in making Garland, Sexton and company work for their points.
RJ’s 3pt shot has been awful this season and the decision making tonight was pretty poor but he still contributed 7 rebs and 2 stls plus made all 4 of his FT’s. For the season he’s averaging 7 rebs, 4 asts and shooting 14 for 18 from the FT line. He was so bad last season that any signs of improvement are nice to see and so far he’s done that.
Maybe Kenny Payne is even better than his reputation.
And/Or Fizdale’s coaching staff even worse than theirs.
I wouldn’t have guessed that Bullock played more minutes than RJ
I also wouldn’t have guessed that Knox let the team with a +14 +/-
Stat of the day!
I expect nothing less than Nerlens Noel triple-doubles by this time next year
I still have faith in RJ,
theimprovement on FTs is a good sign, the kid works at his craft,
tonight he made unusual bad decisions and went back to force on offense while playing solid D and rebounding with the usual intensity.
Hope his shots start to fall soon.
Miller did a reasonably good job in going 17-27, especially for a rookie coach taking over a terrible constructed team in mid-season.
I’m not worried about RJ.
You don’t go from being a bad shooter to a great shooter between the ages of 19 and 20 years old. You hope for some improvement and keep going. I’m more disappointed in a few of the decisions he made tonight. He was forcing a little. Maybe he felt he had to because we didn’t have enough scoring due to the injuries, but he has to weed that out of his game. There’s still not a lot of space and tonight was one of those nights where if he went inside either Drummond or McGee was waiting for him. So it wasn’t always easy to finish. He’ll be fine, As long as he’s doing 1-2 things better than last year I’ll be happy. So far I’m happy. Maybe by the end of the year he will improve another area or two.
These two wins were pretty weird so I wouldn’t come to any conclusions about Thibs yet
The New York Knicks (2-2) are at .500 for the first time in 3 years.The Kentucky Wildcats are 1-6 for the first time in 109 years. pic.twitter.com/1hLCslYQt4— Chris Bailey (@Kentuckyweather) December 30, 2020
The Bucks up 50 on Miami with Giannis scoring 9 points is really bizzare
What do you guys think of prime Lamar Odom as a comp for Randle?
Golden State Knicks!
So far we’ve played Indiana (Turner & Sabo), Philly (Embiid & Howard), Milwaukee (Freak & Lopez) and Cleveland (Drummond & McGee). The East is big, man!!
If memory serves me (and without looking at the stats, advanced or not), both lefty, streaky and usually mediocre 3Pt shooters,
lot of turnovers but lot of quantity in the boxscore too.
I think Odom has more creativity, Randle is a better rebounder, Odom’s a better, switchable defender when locked in.
There were talks about the comp when the Lakers pick Randle.
For me not a perfect match but a good one.
Also, Odom was “born” as a Point Forward, Randle looks like he’s “building” into it…
Rumor has it he’s working with Frank now or maybe I’m just making that up. 🙂
Speaking of Frank, I had mixed feeling about his game. His defense was stellar, he hit a 3 pointer, had a few assists and couple of steals, but he passed up 2 shots I thought he should have taken and pulled out once when I thought he should have attacked instead. He looks “better” to me handling the ball and shooting, but his instinct to pass first is still too strong for even me. When the shot is there or one dribble away, you have to take it. All in all, so far so good. But even though it should be easy to take the next step, he’s still not there mentally yet even in the 4th year. I wonder if he makes the first move on a date. 🙂
Trade?
I was thinking Zach Randolph for awhile, but Randle passes better.
So is this what “marginal wins on the backs of mercenary vets” looks like?
This year’s Julius Randle is like a less coordinated version of Chris Webber.
I think potentially trading Randle for a first rounder is worth the marginal wins in this screwed up lottery system where being the worst doesn’t guarantee anything. So I’ll just enjoy watchable basketball for a while, this game was certainly fairly watchable.
Thibs is going to will this team to at least the 10 team playoffs, if a miraculous top 8 seed.
I’ll regret these wins deeply when Cade, Suggs, and Mobley rotate MVP seasons between themselves for the next decade, but I’ve resigned myself to the fact that Rose & Thibs aren’t going to tank.
It’s still way too early in the season to think about this but at this point if Randle isn’t traded they have to pick up his option for next season no?
Of course, if only to trade him next season.
Skipping the tank hurts my heart, too, but the last time two clear cut franchise players were available in the draft they went New Orleans and Memphis. That year, both of those teams won > 30 games, so there’s always a chance. I also think Milwaukee, Toronto, Philly, Boston, Miami, Atlanta, Orlando, Brooklyn, Washington, and Indiana are easily the ten best teams in the conference. Maybe Thibs gets an All-Defense campaign out of Mitch and really can turn Julius Randle into Chris Webber, but I doubt we’re a play-in team this season.
I can’t see Randle getting moved- I think he’d need to continue to play at close to this level to get a team interested and if he does that I think the Knicks hang onto him. Plus, moving guys who make 20m can be tough. Burks is almost a guaranteed goner though.
Washington is 0-4 to start the season, I can easily see the Knicks in contention for the 10th seed deep into the season. Bulls, Pistons, Hornets and the Cavs will be awful and most likely all have worse records than the Knicks. That only leaves 1 other team the Knicks will have to be better than to get into the play-in tourney.
It’s only been four games but Julius Randle has been sustainably good, and, without last year’s abominable season stinking up the picture, it falls in line with the natural progression of his career. There’s no way his team option gets turned down.
I also don’t see a trade for him out there that makes any sense for us. We’re probably going to have two top 20 picks in the first round, so you’d probably be trading Julius Randle for a guy like Luke Kennard or Malik Beasley. All signs currently point to a 3rd year of Julius Randle while Obi Toppin gets his shit together.
Remind me again how the play-in tournament affects who does and doesn’t qualify for the lottery?
The Cavs could be frisky. They have a coach nobody should believe in but Garland, Sexton, Okoro, Drummond, and Love sounds like a 10th seed to me. I also think Beal, Westbrook, and Scott Brooks get it together enough to make the playoffs in the East.
Great question! No clue though lol. I would think the teams that lose in the play in tourney will be in the lottery because they still would’ve technically missed the playoffs. At that point you’re talking about the 11th-14th spots in the lottery so making the playoffs and getting 15th or 16th pick instead might be worth it just to see some playoff games.
I think we are getting way ahead of ourselves talking about the playoffs. We caught a top-5-6 team on an off night and beat one of the worst teams in the league missing its best player by going 14-25 from 3 on a night we committed 25 turnovers. No one has had a chance to game plan for us yet. It would be shocking if this team is not in the lottery after 72 games.
There’s pretty clearly a bottom 5 teams in the East. It only takes 1 more team underperforming to give us a decent shot. Orlando & Washington are a step down talent-wise compared to the others.
Yeah, we probably don’t make the playoffs but it doesn’t take much to fall into the 10 seed by default.
Thibs gonna Thibs: Randle is averaging nearly 38 mpg and Barrett a hair over 37.
Admittedly, he’s shown a willingness to play a 10-man rotation when guys are all healthy, and I imagine our two rookies will keep Thibs from completely grinding our two big guys’ minutes. But man, he’s gonna ride em like Secretariat, to quite Pringles on Linsanity.
I think as Payton goes, so goes the Knicks. If he plays well, we can hang with most teams, if he doesn’t, we probably get our asses kicked.
Quickley is the wild card though.
I’m starting to think tanking is a mild mental illness. smh
Randle can be frustrating at times and he’s not the perfect fit, but he’s 26, coming into his prime, in the best shape of his life, and playing at an all star level yet people want to trade him for a chance to draft some 18 year that probably won’t be good for another 5 years?
That’s masochist level thinking.
Do you hate winning that much?
If there’s a trade out there that makes us better now without sacrificing the long term or a sideways trade for a better fit or that fills a bigger need because Toppin looks so good, that makes some sense. But almost anything else would be a bad idea. You aren’t going to get an unprotected 1st round lottery pick from a bad team. Those picks are not available for almost anyone. You’ll get a pick likely to yield a player that’s not as good as Randle and you’ll have to wait 5 years for him to get that good.
His salary is not burdensome in any way and won’t be next year either. We have excess cap space. If anything we should hope he irons out the remaining mental errors and keeps hitting 3s well enough to not be an issue playing next to Mitch. Then we can keep him going forward. He’s a good young player that may be peaking to a new level. That’s exactly what we are looking for,
If his game falls apart or in 2-3 months Toppin looks better, we can revisit it. But right now Randle looks like he’s becoming the player people hoped he would become when he was drafted and Toppin looks miles away from being a starter.
Remember we’re talking about the 10th seed not the 8th seed. That’s a huge difference. I’ve stated all along I think this team will overperform expectations a bit and win in the high 20’s maybe at best push 30 wins. That’s still bad! But in the East less than 30 wins might still get you the 10th seed while in the West you might have to finish at .500 just to get to the 10th seed.
Locks to be better than us: Bucks, Nets, Celts, Raps, Heat, Pacers, Sixers, Hawks
Highly likely to be better than us: Magic
Probably slightly better than us: Hornets, Wizards
Same or worse than us: Cavs, Pistons, Bulls
So we’d probably have to beat out the Hornets or Wizards for the 10th spot, and I don’t think our chances are any better than the Cavs, Pistons or Bulls to do that.
They played a lot of minutes tonight because of all the injuries and the need to have players on the court that could create something. When Burkes and Quickley are back the minutes will shuffled and Randle and RJ won’t have to be on the court so long.
The key, though, as others have noted, is that the Knicks are going to be trying to win while those other teams might not be.
We had a rest day and a quick flight to the same time zone, so I have no problem with the minutes given the injuries. Cleveland did essentially the same thing for the same reasons. The dropoff to the next guy is prety steep…essentially G-Leagers.
I think Randle will continue to play a load of minutes, and RJ probably more than he should, but tonight seemed like an exception.
With Randle, I wonder where the line is between “good enough to be attractive to a trade partner” and “so good Rose thinks he’s one of the guys to build around.” I don’t really trust that he is, but if he keeps playing this way, he may make fools of a lot of us.
Oh, no doubt that Thibs is gonna play to win. Thing is, with the lottery flattening, new coaches at the bottom, and 10-deep playoffs, the other teams are likely going to play to win as well. And theoretically no one wants the 7-8 seed, so those teams will be trying to move up to #6. Who knows?
And if Randle tweaks something and misses a couple of weeks, this team is surely going on a bender.
Speaking of Randle, one benefit is that he makes a good role model for Obi, who seems to like passing and has some similarities in the way he plays. Much weaker in the lower body but he can probably work on that.
I would put it as “so good Rose thinks he’s part of the future. You’d have to be completely incompetent to view Randle as a “build around” kind of player, even at this level (don’t forget the 9 turnovers tonight!)
The good news is, if he plays well, Rose can just let the decision come to him over the next year and a half. By the 2022 trade deadline, we will all have a much better idea of what Randle really is. In that sense, kudos to Mills/Perry on that deal…looks very team friendly right now.
The next 4 games should be telling. Teams have some film on us now and we will be clear underdogs in all four games. If we go 2-2, then that’s more reason for optimism about the playoffs/pessimism about the tank.
Yeah I gotta agree with Deefense on this one regarding Randle. His contract is reasonable and we have a team option for next season. And he’s 26. It would be one thing if he were 30 (like Morris last year) but this dude is just entering his prime. The constant worrying about hurting draft position bc a player who isn’t 22 years old is helping us win games seems borderline psychotic. I feel like it stems from this misguided idea that your team has to either be one of a handful of contenders or be tanking. What the hell is wrong with just being a good basketball team that wins some games and makes the playoffs? If that happens it’s not off the backs of overpaid aging vets. Randle could stick around all this season and best if he keeps it up. Like deefense said, you aren’t trading him for a top ten pick.
If we lose a bunch of games that’s a different story. Of if he was 30 instead of 26 I could see it too. But if this is a new level of play for him, he could play like this for the next five or six seasons (or more!)
What I would much rather see is elf continue to do well but Quickley also look competent and flip elf for a pick. That is the thing. If we win games ALL of our players become more valuable to other teams. People never seem to consider that part of the equation when talking about winning games vs. tanking. Losing not only makes you less attractive to free agents, it makes all of your players less attractive as trade pieces. So you get a higher lottery spot but you have a harder tome picking up picks in trades and attracting free agents.
And as much as Philly processed, they don’t look like perennial shoe ins to the finals to me. They got Simmons and embiid and are a playoff team. That is it for now.
Here’s a fun fact from tonight’s game: From the 48 minutes at the center position, the Mitch/Noel tandem had a decent 13 points, 17 rebounds, 3 steals and 5 blocks. And they still got destroyed by the Cavs’ Drummond/McGee combo…29 points, 26 rebounds, 4 steals and 7 blocks.
Assuming we make it through the whole season, then every team in the East has the same schedule (except for games against themselves). If we win the games we’re supposed to and steal a few here or there we can make the playoffs.
Every other bottom feeder will play the same 4 teams we’re about to face and they will also be expected to go 0-4.
Record is an illusion. The relevant questions are (1) who stole games they should have lost, and (2) who lost games they should have won (or lost to another bottomfeeders)?
Drummond/McGee were doing so well that they even tried them together for a bit! Which was really just insane.
this draft is pretty deep… there’s going to be a solid player all the way up to about #10 at least that’s a true lottery type talent….. so winning some games isn’t going to hurt us in the sense that we miss out on a good player in this draft…. however mobley.. suggs and cade are guys that are probably worth it on the top end to go after and a bottom 2 record would give us a very decent shot to grab them…. they are worth it and they could turn this thing around much quicker than whatever the status quo is…
that’s what tanking could net us…. and i don’t think we’ll be too good to be out of the lottery entirely but the stakes are pretty high this draft….. if we want a shot at a contender this decade this is as good a shot as any to net a true franchise player…..
they were a kawhi bounce from having a great shot at a title….. and a dumb trade away from actually building a perennial shoe-in to the finals if they didn’t trade fultz… and they could have also just kept butler too!
Totally. But in fairness to the Knicks duo, they stayed on the floor and helped on the other guys. It’s a nice lesson for Mitch…your guy can go off a bit and you can still help the team win by not committing early fouls. The Knicks also ran some doubles at Drummond at the right times, taking some pressure off of Mitch.
They fired the guy doing the processing before he even finished the process, followed him up with two incompetent executives who made every manner of bad decision and they’re still a perennial playoff contender due to the process. Bringing up the Sixers as anything other than, “Okay, it worked that time, but that doesn’t mean it will out for another team now” is ill-advised.
The Suns are just murdering the Pels.
Idk maybe obi will turn into Julius Randle 2020 but I am more convinced we fucked up not drafting Haliburton
Saw this on twitter
2016 Sixers had Joel Embiid, Nerlens Noel, Richaun Holmes, Christian Wood, Jerami Grant, Robert Covington and TJ MConnell on the roster—and Sam Hinkie got the boot
Looks that way at the moment. I don’t think anyone here wanted Obi so there’s that…
haliburton… rj…. mikal bridges.. randle… mitch…
i couldn’t care less about tanking with that kind of lineup….. esp if randle is playing like this…
Butler didn’t want to stay in Philly.
They yanked for four years and got two all stars that don’t fit well together out of it. It’s unreasonable to expect any owner to go along with processing for longer than that.
Fultz looked broken. Olaf or was a bust. What magic crystal ball do you have that shows you hi lie would have a finals team right now under if only they kept processing.
I’m just saying. You could build a team as good as Philly is now without having to go through all of that pain. I agree that tanking has its value and its place when a season is lost but also we messed up the Frank and Knox drafts and got worse picks than we statistically should have most years.
My point is just that with better drafting and some more lottery luck (not even good luck just what we were supposed to most likely get) we could easily be as good as philly is right now.
And if Randle is for real he’s 26 years old and on a good contract. Immediately thinking oh shot we gotta trade this guy for a pick he’s hurting our draft number is kind of psychotic. He’s not 30 year old Morris on a one year deal
this sounds about right d-mar…if we can get decent point guard play, we could hit 30 plus wins…
elf hasn’t really demonstrated that he’s a guy you can count on over the course of a season (I’m trying to remember another NBA player with as flat a shot trajectory as elf), IQ though could potentially change the current situation at point guard…
Agreed, ride him for as long as you can. If he continues to thrive you build around him with the pieces you have and use him as a trade chip for bigger fish down the road should some star want to come to NYC in the next few years.
bingo, you play to win the game…unless it’s March and you have no prayer of making the playoffs…
Yeah, “Twin Towers by the Lake” made me feel young again, as in “Ewing & Cartwright Twin Towers” young
I know, I know, it’s not politicaly correct but this quote, just woke up, made me laugh, my bad.
I’ll go more right wing radio host with a booming, resounding voice:
“Tank corrupts your competitive soul. You tank and the Great God Of Basketball drop you 3 spots in the lottery, then you tank and you’re Colangeling, then you tank and it’s Covid-19, then you tank and it’s… Apocalypse!”
I’m joking (for the most part), there’s a lot of time to stink and the standings will take the expected shape, for now let us rejoice the first winning streak in 303 days (hat tip to Mike Vorkunov) and been at .500 for the first time in light years.
This year show us that you must bathe in positive things every time you can, enjoy life while it last, every single moment.
Basketball wise I think one thing is underrated: 10 less game to play it’s not nothing, less time to right (or wrong) the ship, especially for teams with many roster changes and missing a full training camp.
It’s so weird to first read posts advocating trading Randle for a first round pick and then read posts hoping that in a couple of years Toppin will be as good as Randle. Now Toppin was something like the 10th pick. We won’t get a higher pick than that if we trade Randle just for picks. If you put the two together, it means trading Randle for a pick means we are hoping to get someone whom might become as good as Randle in a few years, i.e probably get less value in the future than what we have now.
Good stuff in Vorkunov’s gamer from Thibs and Randle about Randle’s improvements this year, including this passage about the offense as a whole:
Funny thing is, we heard throughout training camp that Thibs was focusing almost entirely on defense. Yet there’s a clear offensive system in place, despite the fact that our PG play has been extremely hit or miss. So that’s a pleasant surprise.
On spot. I have high hopes for this coaching staff, which is the thing that separates Rose from the previous front-offices, he wasn’t afraid to clean house and bring the guys he thinks are the best. Now it’s on him, for better or worst, and i like it this way.
With the caveat that bad habits are hard to weed out,
I’m astonished of the difference this coaching staff has made.
And they had far less time to work than previous CS!
Every single player out there looks different (with shades obviously),
more effort and focus on D, more movement without the ball on O,
it’s like night and day.
Payton, Bullock, Barrett, Randle, Mitch…
this is the team steve mills and scott perry thought would be decent last year. It looked ok under Miller and it looks ok now.
in retrospect, they were absolutely right to throw Fizdale under the bus ten games into the season.
having said that… what was the point of bringing in new management if all they’re gonna do is realize the flawed vision of the previous management?
Thibs was playing both Quickley and Toppin before they got hurt. Knox and Frank are both part of the rotation, both getting about the right amount of minutes given their modest contributions. And RJ is getting tons of minutes and usage, with one of the bigger changes so far being how much more frequently Randle and Payton get him the ball. (Macri says half the passes RJ is getting this year are from those two guys, up from 37% last year.) and Mitch is both starting and playing significantly more minutes than Noel.
I’m not sure what the complaint about Rose is, Hubert. It’s a healthy mix of kids and young veterans, Burks is 100% gonna get us a pick at the deadline, and we’re in good shape for other moves. This is still a bad team, but one that is clearly improving. And the better these guys play, the easier it will be be to acquire other guys, whether it’s by trading someone like Randle or no longer having to pay the loser tax to acquire rotation-level free agents.
Randle is not a guy you build around. But I agree you don’t trade him for a pick in the 20s just to improve your draft chances.
I blame myself for introducing the phrase “build around” about Randle, since his ceiling is likely third guy on a good team. But he’s already being paid like that, if not slightly cheaper than many third bananas. So let me rephrase: at what point (and we are absolutely not at that point so early in the season, sample size problems and all) does Randle’s improved play move the needle from “trade him for any halfway-decent package or better” to “keep him as a part of the team’s future, just not the main part”?
Well for starters it is directly responsible for the most competent coaching staff since MDA or JVG. We don’t know what moves were available to be made but this assessment isn’t that fair either. The roster is much more balanced. We aren’t paying Bobby Portis $15M or Taj $10M. We are paying a very solid Alec Burks $5M. So there is stuff around the edges that’s good and one major decision that looks questionable in Toppin but potentially a mulligan in IQ. So jury is still pretty out there on Leon year 1.
Or what Alan said lol.
GSW have 2 picks (their own and MIN’s), but they’d have to send salaries back and i don’t want Wiggins. So the best candidate for now are the Celtics, they have the trade exception and can absorb Randle’s contract while sending us a 1RP. As the pick is their own, it will be in the 22-26 range, so we better ask for something more… maybe one of the Williams?
I get that every Knicks fan suffer from PTSD but, as of now,
the new management and coaching staff stayed away from some of the Kbloggers surefire predictions:
– They’ll spend big on mediocre free agents: NO
– They’ll trade picks and assets for aging & expansive veterans (Paul, Westbrook): NO
– They’ll refuse to play the youngsters NO (injuries aside)
– They’ll start Noel over Mitch NO
Add that they get decent to good veterans at the right price (Burks, Noel, even Rivers) or pay less for the same ones (Payton) and gets draft pick for parking another team payroll reduction (Davis).
I understand the skepticism over the draft (I’d rather have Haliburton than Obi, I’m more open about picking IQ at 25 given our “inside intelligence” about him),
but the team look improved, steps are made in the right direction, and we’re here:
– predicting FO’s next bad move
– debating that a 26 years old player is “too old” instead of analyzing if he could be a decent number three option on a winning team two years from now like Alan said
(I hate Swirling Into Triple Team Randle and hope we’ll trade him for two first, but I admit he’s playing out of his mind, and maybe at 26 and with the right coaching he’s reaching his prime)
– negating every effect of the CS (despite going 17-27 Miller’s team is not close to this one, sorry)
– deprecating every ray of hope with a “yes but”
Yes, bad habits are hard to weed out… not only for players
I think you have to keep him at this point. He’s not untouchable even if he maintains his current production, which is unlikely for my money. No 3rd best player on even a finals team is untouchable. But you don’t just get rid of him for peanuts.
Question:
Let’s take a big dose of LSD. If Randle at the end of february is still playing at 24,8/10,5/7,5 with over 50% FG shooting (3P% is not sustainable, even on LSD) do you still want to trade him for a pick in the 20s?
Tyrese had a night. Plus 20. Makes me a little sick.
Julius is going to disappoint some of you. Love his work at the moment though.
I kind of wonder what good team would want him, given how much of the ball he needs. But someone will.
I suffer from the same sickness watching Hali playing and yes, Randle is prone to regression, even if maybe a lesser one that we think.
I agree with Cyber that Boston looks the best trade partner and I hate the idea of trading with the Celtics 🙂
The PER king, Iggy Brazdeikis!! 87.49! WHY ISN’T THIS KID PLAYING??!! HAHAHAHAHAHA! LOL!
I kid
If this is the version of Randle we get with a 30 AST%, .600 TS%, and .420-ish FTr then you can build around him. Again, I am not saying it’s sustainable. But a lot of what he’s doing is in line with his better numbers during his two last years with Los Angles and New Orleans outside of his 3PT%, which will dip down to Earthly proportions and his insane assist percentage. Cause right now I find it very unlikely we’ll draft or acquire a better player in the next couple of years while his contract is up than what he’s currently giving us now.
But you can’t expect the Sixers to wait five years of missed playoffs. You know, like the Knicks’ seven-year drought.
The Sixers missed the playoffs for five years while building a perennial contender. The Knicks are possibly going on year EIGHT of no playoffs while trying to be “competitive” most seasons.
Oh yeah, any “trade Randle” positions are strictly based around, “He isn’t going to keep this up, so trade him while he has actual trade value, which he didn’t coming into this season” (and even there, it wasn’t seriously “trade him after Game 4!” but rather “trade him after he comes down to Earth but still has that early luster on him”). If he has actually turned a corner, then sure, keep him.
No, of course not. And that’s the plan, to trade him for a lottery pick, if he keeps this level of play. If there’s no deal to be made, then keep him as he’s a good player now.
I guess the question is what deal do you find acceptable for a .191 WS/48 player? Assuming he maintains this level of play, carrying the team on his back with a reasonable contract for that type of production, we better receive more than what we got for KP – which was DeAndre Jordan, Wesley Matthews, Dallas’ 2021 unprotected first-round pick, a top-ten protected first-round pick in the 2023 draft, and a previous top 10 pick rookie.
I can’t believe people would look at the collection of low cost talent Hinkie amassed and say the Process was something that we should not have emulated.
The idea you can find a Simmons and Embiid at the end of the lottery is dumb. Yes Kawhi, whatever whatever.
Colangelo cost them a trip to the Finals.