Knicks Morning News (2022.11.21)

“I know who I am.” This Grimes stuff is sadly not even the weirdest that the Knicks have handled a player over the past decade or so. Remember when D’Antoni sent Nate to the dog house for WEEKS, and then brought him back without Nate having changed at all?

That said, that this Grimes stuff even vaguely reminds me of weird shit like that is probably not a good thing.

At 8-9 we’re still 1 game up on my preseason prediction*,
but it’is the way the record is build that let me perplexed.

I expected victories with lower teams, a few home win against good but beatable teams (ATL) and every loss to be hard fought.

Instead there’s no identity, every win is a fight, most losses are non competitive, many of our young players are regressing (RJ’s the obvious one, but Obi and IQ aren’t playing well too), others guys aren’t used in the proper way (Hartenstein) exiled (Fournier) or used freakishly (Grimes), our offense is clunky and constrained, our defensive schemes are stuck in the past.
Defensive effort’s missing or sketchy at best, accountability’s an empty word, good for some players, not for others.

Something looks off on the “mental” side.
It’s as if everyone is waiting for the happening of “something” to start taking things seriously.

I’m confused.

* I know we have been a bit lucky, playing teams with a long list of important absentees.

The Skiles Effect seems to be a legit thing in the NBA, and I thought that perhaps last season was just a sort of super-sized version of the Skiles Effect due to Thibs just being really intense during the fan-less season. This season, though, just looks like prototypical Skiles Effect in action.

In re Grimes:

If you expect the Knicks to do things normally and correctly, you will inevitably be disappointed. At this point, it’s like an Iron Law of the Cosmos.

(Substantively, I find it almost impossible to believe that Grimes would have been in Thibs’s doghouse on Thibs’s own accord. Which means that something else is afoot. (Pun accidentally lurched into.))

The Grimes thing is baffling, if it wasn’t just health-related. I’m not sure Thibs has ever spoken more positively about a player on this team since he’s been here, and that includes Empty Gym Julius and security blankets like Taj Gibson and Derrick Rose.

I usually assume that Occam’s Razor applies, but I’m with E that there is something very odd happening behind the scenes.

What am I missing with Grimes that you guys are reading/hearing?

It sounds like he was hurt and Cam did well while he was hurt so when Grimes came back, he started out of the rotation. Typical Thibs stuff. I mean, Cam did a good job. I’m sure if Grimes does well while Cam is out, Cam will be healthy and not be in the rotation too.

I’m not that concerned about losing to GSW and Phoenix on the road.

But I am starting to really worry about RJ. This is just not a good look 4 seasons into his NBA career to have extended spells like this of just horrific shooting. I’m sure it will come around but the net effect is a guy who is feast or famine and he doesn’t do enough of the other stuff well to make up for when he’s shooting this poorly. And it’s not even like he has nights where he goes 8 for 18 or something bad like that. It’s like he will have multiple games in a row where he’s like 2 for 20 or something ridiculous. I didn’t watch the game yesterday but when I looked at his stat line and saw only a “bad” shooting line and not an absolute horror show, I thought “oh RJ did ok” and that’s not good! Games like yesterday should be his “bad” games at this point.

I don’t know. 4 first rounders, RJ Barrett and Grimes for Donovan Mitchell sounds pretty sweet right now. Defense with Brunson and Mitchell would have been awful but we could stagger their play some and fill out the roster with defensive players around those guys to make up for it.

Some pretty bone-chilling RJ commentary from Macri in today’s newsletter (the one free one of the week), which included comparisons to Dion Waiters (in terms of game, not mentally), and concluded with this:

That, perhaps more than anything, is the irony of RJ’s cold start. This summer, many worried that the front office would send him packing, but now, that seems rather unlikely.

Not because the Knicks are dead set on keeping him, but because who in the league right now is willing make a big bet on RJ Barrett figuring it out?

Wow….Dion Waiters. That’s actually not an awful comp…while, you know, being an awful comp.

It’s an old-school reference, but RJ reminds me a LOT of former Indiana all-American and 6th pick overall in 1993 — Calbert Cheaney.

Both lefties, both 6-6-ish and bulky, both unathletic, both seen as “well-rounded” and “good defenders,” both from big programs and name coaches that gave them a reputation boost.

Right from the get-go with Calbert the question was “Could he shoot well enough,” and though there were times of optimism the answer wound up being: “No, he can’t.” (*)

Calbert was ever-so-slightly more lackadaisical than RJ, but the similarities are getting eerie at this point. He had some good moments, as has RJ, but once it became clear he was never going to be able to put the ball in the basket at starting association levels, he faded to backup levels with kind of “old man” skills. It’s looking very likely that 31 year old RJ Barrett will similarly have “old man” skills and be talked about as “smart” and “crafty” and “a pro.” A “good glue guy.”

But as a backup.

I think if you’re drafted high in the lottery from a program with a big-time national reputation and you have a “good attitude” and are earnest and say the right things and seem like a good defender and good all-around player, there’s an embedded assumption that “the shot will eventually come around.”

That’s a dumb assumption. Especially when the shot form is starting from as low a level as RJ’s. His shooting form affirmatively sucks.

(*) If anything, Calbert had better shooting form than RJ — but it never reached the level of “good.” RJ just has those hitchy shots that miss by a mile and way too often; Calbert never had those. Nor did Calbert have RJ’s absurd forays into the lane where he just puts his head down and says “I’m shooting” no matter how many guys are around and how many times he gets his shit blocked.

Bizarre aspects of the Grimes situation:

-They called his injury “day-to-day” for weeks on end

-They brought him back a few times only to see him miss more time, while refusing to say words like “re-aggravated” or “setback”

-When he was nominally completely healthy, he was glued to the bench despite 1) them talking about him being a starter all offseason and seemingly valuing him highly in the Mitchell talks–you would think “Cam Reddish is playing decently” is not something that would completely upend our plans for Grimes 2) us being in desperate need of his skillset 3) RJ Barrett being sick and terrible

It’s an old-school reference, but RJ reminds me a LOT of former Indiana all-American and 6th pick overall in 1993 — Calbert Cheaney.

Great (and scary) reference E!

I thought they may have been showcasing Cam for a possible trade. Maybe I’m giving them too much credit. They have more wings than they have rotation spots for, so these guys will have to fight it out. May the best man win. Giving Barrett the extension means he really has to play for non-basketball reasons, which gives him an unfair advantage.

I remember Cal Cheaney as a guy who looked like he was going to be a star, but the ball just never went in. Uh-oh!

Macri also did a statistical deep dive of sorts that used different criteria than mine from the other day but came to a similar conclusion. The gist of it is guys who have shot as much as RJ, shot as poorly as RJ, assisted as little as RJ, rebounded as little as RJ, and turned the ball over as much as RJ over the first four years of their career have pretty terrible track records.

Interestingly, Carmelo Anthony was the lone hopeful comp among the players that fit Macri’s criteria. However this was pretty much entirely a product of league average eFG% shifting over time–Melo and RJ had a similar eFG% to begin their careers, but in Melo’s day that approached league average while now it doesn’t come close.

What makes the RJ situation so difficult is it’s very hard to envision what RJ Barrett: Good Player looks like. There’s just not enough skill there. I definitely want him to lower his usage, but there’s not some grand plan behind that other than wanting the guy who can’t shoot to shoot less.

I don’t see his efficiency getting *that much* higher even at lower usage–a player whose weaknesses include “scoring at the rim” and “jump shooting” poses some pretty intractable problems.

Maybe at lower usage he’d be able to really dig in defensively, I don’t know. I do think it’s quite likely that if he’s ever going to be successful he’s going to have to accept some truths about his role in the NBA that he probably won’t like. There’s no guarantee he’ll be successful even if he does so, but it seems like the only plausible path.

The problem is we compensated him quite handsomely after 3 years of mostly doing the Maple Mamba thing, so we definitely didn’t send any kind of “you need to make serious changes” message. I guess the only way to do it going forward is to tell him he’ll start to lose minutes to Grimes et al. if he doesn’t tone it down. I will not be holding my breath.

“I don’t see his efficiency getting *that much* higher even at lower usage–a player whose weaknesses include “scoring at the rim” and “jump shooting” poses some pretty intractable problems.”

**************************

I think the conclusion that he’s weak at scoring at the rim is overbroad. His numbers make him look weak at scoring at the rim because he takes a lot of stupid shots at the rim. In terms of pure eye test, he actually gets to the rim effectively a lot and has a good degree of craft and skill in doing so.

The proposition, “RJ Barrett is poor or even average at getting to the basket” is inaccurate.

The first step in him getting better is stopping the pointless, insistent forays to the rim. We all know them when we see them and honestly at this point if you watch the games you can often tell when they’re coming right at their inception.

The question then is, “Is RJ Barrett himself aware of his drives that are going “well” as opposed to his single-minded foray drives?” (If he doesn’t have the ability to distinguish the two, the hope that he can keep the good while getting rid of the bad is forlorn and the conclusion that he’s “weak at scoring at the rim” will be baked-in. I’m not there yet.)

I believe he does. I do believe he has the instinct to say “Uh-oh, this drive isn’t going well, I should do something else.” Right now when that instinct kicks in he just keeps going because Maple Mamba or whatever.

Then the next step is whether he can effectively pass/create for others in those situations where his instinct tells him to abort the foray. I’m not as confident on that one. That’s a skill that can be developed though, even at a later age IMO.

A lot of the “Maple Mamba” shit has gone to his head and it has to be knocked out, either by a coaching staff or himself.

Barrett also has to face the exogenous problem of a crowded lane because of Thibs’ insistence on a traditional center.

In terms of “What’s next?,” a teardown makes the most sense, but that isn’t going to happen. An intermediate step would be “Hire a coach that will run a modern, open lane offense.” If that happened, it would also give us the definitive data point on how much the clogged lane is cramping the offense and individual players.

Do I personally need that data point before leaning teardown? No, but there is at least some risk in a teardown given the lack of real data because of the clogged lane. I’d take that risk, but it is a risk.

I can’t get myself to root for Ls, but i think Alan was right, it’d have been better if the road trip was a disaster. Thibs has to go, he looks like a good guy and he tries hard, but this is definitely not working. So the first move should be to change Thibs for a developmental coach, and this has to be done ASAP for us to have time to evaluate how the players perform under the new coach before the deadline comes. This way we can make some adjustments at the deadline. And then based on our record, we have to decide if we should tank and improve the Wemby odds or if we should keep trying to win.

Calbert is a good comp and I have actually thought about him. He was good at the peak of my interest in college ball. I still think Evan Turner, who someone brought up recently, is an even better comp.

Calbert fwiw posted 96. 97. 99. 99 TS+’s in his first four years in a ton of minutes. RJ is 85, 94, 90, 85 (so far in 2022). Turner was 89, 91, 89, 92, also in a ton of minutes.

I think there is a path to value for RJ where he stops shooting so much, scores more efficiently, improves his passing, ball handling and rebounding, and becomes an impact defender. Maybe ft shooting could be a way forward. I have always said he tops out as a .100 player and I still think its possible.

But it’s a narrow road to the Deep North at this point. He needs to find some wisdom or he needs to find a jumpshot and quick.

While I agree the clogged lane does not help, it sounds a bit like if we only had a good point guard some players will improve. RJ driving into a clogged lane with his head down says more about RJ than the clogged lane just like Mitch only being able to score off good lobs says more about Mitch than the lack of good lobs.

What a crazy negative thread so far. Can’t wait for the Huberts to wake up and contribute.

I’m not that concerned about losing to GSW and Phoenix on the road.

The problem is not losing to good teams, of course. The problem is the way we play.

I hear you darules. It’s not just us tbf. Most of Twitter is feeling the same way.

Alright, the Dutch are on and I always root for the Dutch.

Although it’s pretty difficult to root against Senegal, shit.

Never stop being Knicks Twitter, Knicks Twitter:

@KnicksMuse

Despite his poor play lately, RJ Barrett is still averaging more points per game than:

• Andrew Wiggins
• Domantas Sabonis
• Jordan Poole
• Nikola Vucevic
• Gary Trent Jr.

Let’s go Dutch.

Calbert Cheaney’s problem wasn’t whether he could shoot.. .he was known as a knockdown shooter… in the mold of Shawn Respert and other busts who could only shoot and not much else… and in a league that didn’t value that kind of shooting and when he couldn’t hold his own in the paint area it was never a surprise that he busted….

RJ’s problem is the same as any other player who has questionable shot selection… he’s always had trouble adjusting and reacting to late pressure… but he’s just not shooting the right shots… when he’s getting the right opportunities he does relatively well which was why Brunson was such a great pickup and things were going relatively well before this road trip…

the numbers are colored from a particularly bad stretch of games in which he’s probably not 100% or whatever was wrong with him…. he’s still at a career high ft% and some god awful westbrook esque 3pt shooting and that likely should get better…. his 2p% needs to rebound to where it was before the road trip tho… or else whatever macri is saying will likely wind up being true…

Please, darules. Give me the bright side of this season, because i’m in need of some hope.

E, just jumping on during a busy morning to +1 you on the Barrett breakdown. Very well outlined. And agree with Owen about it being a narrow road. Fingers crossed.

That KnicksMuse tweet is a joke I think.

Cheaney did play 22,000 minutes in the NBA. It’s something that always sticks out to me, how far early reputation can carry you. He was more like a Hubert Davis to me but it did in fact turn out he couldn’t shoot like Hubert.

Jeff Green is my hero in this regard. He managed to parlay being the 5th pick and the notoriety that came with playing with Durant/Harden/Westbrook/Ibaka into almost 31,000 minutes while posting a .079 career number WS/48. Surprisingly he has only made 80 million in his career which feels low somehow.

I still think the pressure to win is counterproductive given where we are on the win curve. We should be putting pressure on playing the right way and not on wins. Pressured to win, the players go for a style of play that definitely they’re not good at – iso play – probably because they see other teams doing it and managing to win hard fought games that way. If they weren’t worried about winning, i think they would be less tempted to go for the iso play.

The main issue for me is that RJ is barely being held accountable.

When Thibs was POBO/head coach in Minny, he “liked” Wiggins and in the season they made the playoffs, Wiggins led the team (and was 3rd in the league) in minutes despite a .505 TS% and a -2.4 BPM. Thibs was fine with signing Wiggins to a 5-year max extension, which went on to be widely believed to be the worst contract in the NBA.

Then when Thibs got fired, Wiggins posthumously threw him under the bus:

“I feel like I was on the rise my first three years and then some changes were made,” Wiggins said in 2019, clearly alluding to Thibodeau.

Wiggins added in the same interview that “yelling and screaming isn’t necessarily coaching.”

It wasn’t until Wiggins was in a setting where his chucking, lazy ways wouldn’t fly that he became a solid player, still not worth a max deal but no longer a liability numbers-wise.

When you combine RJ’s lack of accountability with the decline in IQ and Obi and the only partially restrained selfishness of Randle, and the resulting swings between gritty and uninspired basketball on both ends, it points in one direction: Thibs has to go.

One thing that we can’t ignore about RJ and just chalk up to bad shot selection is that even when he has a good look at the basket from inside 3 feet he often misses, especially with his right hand. Cam might flail a bit too much but he seems to be a much, much better finisher than RJ, especially with his off hand.

Who would you prefer, Sexton at 18M AAV or RJ at 27M AAV? Yeah, that’s exactly what Ainge thought too.

Z-man, but if Thibs goes will Leon hire a replacement (or promote Bryant) who in the interview process says the first thing I am going to do is hold players accountable which means RJ may be out of the rotation and Julius is very close to losing his starting slot. I would like a different coach, but I am wary of just getting an inferior version of what we have

How hard is it to understand that Grimes missed the entire camp, a bunch of practices, and couldn’t handle a game without this recurring foot injury?

It made perfect sense to be cautious with him even if he was officially approved to play. If anything, the evidence is they previously tried to rush him a bit and caused the setbacks.

Second, even if you are cleared to play and the injury stops bothering you, there is HUGE gap between fit to play and being 100% fit and your shot and timing at 100%. His missed the entire camp and many practices. The coaching staff got to observe him in practice and knew where his conditioning was and how sharp he was. What the player says is nonsense because they will always say “I am ready”.

Cam was playing very well on both sides. It made no sense to rush Grimes back and risk reinjury just to replace Cam. It made more sense to be cautious and wait until he was closer to closer to 100% fit and sharp again so he would be productive and less likely to get hurt.

The only reason to rush would be if there was a gaping hole at the position that was costing us important games. Then maybe a small risk would be OK. That was not the case.

IMO, this is so basic, if they handled it any other way I could consider it irresponsible.

The fact that Thibs basically let Wiggins do whatever he wanted with no semblance of accountability was one of the flags raised when we were initially considering him. I viewed it as a big problem, other people countered that the team was good (during the Butler year anyway) so it was fine. Looks like it was something of a pattern.

For a guy known to be, well, unpleasant to some extent, Thibs sure seems to have a problem telling players to cut the shit. Between Randle last year and RJ this year (and the rest of his career, really) there have been multiple clear examples of players who needed to hear some tough news and seemingly were not receiving it. I don’t know what the deal with that is, it’s hard to imagine Thibs is so deluded he thinks these guys are somehow playing well.

“One thing that we can’t ignore about RJ and just chalk up to bad shot selection is that even when he has a good look at the basket from inside 3 feet he often misses, especially with his right hand.”

This is my impression too, which puts me at odds with E. Guess that’s the nature of the eye-test. It’s genuinely difficult for me to recall an RJ finish that genuinely impressed me. He doesn’t seem to move much off the ball so there hasn’t been much in the way of backdoor cuts.

I always find myself thinking he should use his strength to truly challenge guys at the rim. He seems to prefer to chuck up ugly floater type things or avoid contact in some other way.

well, it’s monday…and now for some positive knick news – usa has their first match today…

How hard is it to understand that Grimes missed the entire camp, a bunch of practices, and couldn’t handle a game without this recurring foot injury?

He started his second game back after missing the entire camp and a bunch of practices, and playing less than five minutes in his first game back. It did not make sense. And you trying to say that the Emperor’s new clothes are actually really cool looking won’t make it make sense.

reference RJ, what’s left for there to be said?

>What a crazy negative thread so far.<

It's becoming a ritual.

Any solid win or bad loss causes a 180 degree emotional turn.

If it's a bad loss it gives some people the opportunity to whine about management, coaching, the rebuild etc… again even though absolutely nothing has changed in terms of the original expectations for the team relative to the results, what the team needs, and what the long term plan to attain those things is. It's all multi year stuff. Obviously there are pluses and minuses over the course of a season that are encouraging or discouraging, but this roller coaster stuff is pretty silly.

ha, funny to hear zach wilson getting roasted today for saying he didn’t feel like shit for letting his team down…

that young kid must seem like some tasty fresh meat for those ravenous j-e-t-s beat reporters…

“He started his second game back after missing the entire camp and a bunch of practices, and playing less than five minutes in his first game back. It did not make sense. And you trying to say that the Emperor’s new clothes are actually really cool looking won’t make it make sense.”

I’m saying there’s no way he could be 100% early on after missing the entire camp. So you ease him back slowly once he’s cleared. However, the initial effort to bring him back slowly, with hindsight, turned out to be a mistake. He got hurt again. To make the same mistake again would be idiotic. They had to make sure he was OK.

I dunno, if you have a better coach would that magically solve RJ’s issue like Wiggins? Maybe?
I just don’t think dudes like Randle and Fournier (for worse), and Brunson (for better) get affected THAT much by coaching changes.
Until this FO gets rid ofThibs, Randle, RJ, and Fournier, this is just the next Melo/Afflalo. Unwatchable low efficiency scoring keeping you out of the high lottery.
Did anyone see that terrible defensive effort Randle showed by not attampting to guard Barnes’ corner 3, then letting Ayton jump in, get the offensive rebound, and lay it in like he was all alone? How are you supposed to watch that?

reference the tone of this thread and every single thread ever put up here:

be the change you seek…

make it the way you want…take the lead, help set the tone…

passive griping ain’t gonna get the job done…

roll up them sleeves, toss some thought logs on to your creative fire – and gets to posting…

The way they have handled Grimes doesn’t make sense. Either they are doing it wrong or messaging it wrong.

Any solid win or bad loss causes a 180 degree emotional turn.

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Only because some of us are polite and don’t want to come on here and repeat the same stuff when others are celebrating wins. (And plus it’s boring and annoying.)

But there should be no illusions that the wins (such as they are) change our minds about the big picture.

Any solid win or bad loss causes a 180 degree emotional turn.

No, it does not. It’s different people that take the stage, if it’s a win or a loss.

And you trying to say that the Emperor’s new clothes are actually really cool looking won’t make it make sense.

Comment of the day, so far.

“The fact that Thibs basically let Wiggins do whatever he wanted with no semblance of accountability was one of the flags raised when we were initially considering him. I viewed it as a big problem, other people countered that the team was good (during the Butler year anyway) so it was fine. Looks like it was something of a pattern.”

Both things can be true at the same time. See: Mike D’Antoni

“I don’t know what the deal with that is, it’s hard to imagine Thibs is so deluded he thinks these guys are somehow playing well.”

Thibs never took over a team that was built to win, yet he has a winning record as a coach. Success breeds confidence, at times irrational confidence and chest-puffing. Even in Minny, the team did better before he was fired than after, kind of .500-ish like we are now. But the bellowing gets old and when the losing starts to get ugly, some players start resenting it and start grousing and pointing fingers. Seems like we’re at that point now.

Under current conditions, consider this my sticky after wins:

“Since this team is desperately in need of high-end talent and the best path to that talent is through high draft picks, if you want this team to be an actual contender some day, this win was counterproductive.”

I’m with strat on the Grimes situation. Really not a big deal, and PF (no, not Randle vs. Obi) is a nagging injury that can last forever if not treated properly. I don’t get the intrigue angle at all.

“So you ease him back slowly once he’s cleared. However, the initial effort to bring him back slowly, with hindsight, turned out to be a mistake. He got hurt again. To make the same mistake again would be idiotic. They had to make sure he was OK.”

Quentin Grimes’ minute totals over the last 7 games:

4
8
8
DNP-CD
DNP-CD
2
32

Enlighten us, what exactly is the coherent, medical science based idea here?

It’s nice how missing a Knicks game will brighten your attitude. I saw the box score and just shrugged and said “well, we should lose to Phoenix,” and that was that. I’m sure watching would’ve made me as negative as y’all.

Yet, none of the lines looked THAT bad… we are clearly a worse team than Phoenix, even with CP3 out. But unfortunately, all of these Knick concerns are long-running, especially RJ.

I just can’t believe even Z-Man is calling for a Thibs firing. I guess that means it could happen!

——

And as much as I’m down on RJ, it just doesn’t make sense to trade him for peanuts and build around Randle. But the Mitch signing is an even bigger problem, right? Because he just fully clogs the lane and takes away RJ’s only strength. At least Randle could imitate a stretch-4 or 5 if coach wanted that.

I guess what I’m saying is that this isn’t only on Thibs. He clearly has a disconnect with the FO, and they have both made some awful mistakes. But in the end, idk if Thibs really has a viable coaching strategy in 2022 unless a FO can get him the perfect lineup for his needs—and we are so far from that.

I’m not yet on team pessimist, but RJ the thought of 4 more years of RJ and Julius is pushing me there. Brunson helps, but they really need a number 1 option at the 2 or 3 that can take the ball away from Julius and RJ to make this situation salvageable. I really hope Chicago implodes and LaVine asks out.

I agree that the Skiles effect may be happening. A fresh voice, even if it’s just Bryant would be helpful.

“Either they are doing it wrong or messaging it wrong.”

Well their messaging sucks on pretty much every issue, so I’d go with door #2 for sure. Not that door #1 isn’t an option, but without more info I wouldn’t jump to any conclusions.

Individual losses have nearly zero bearing on anyone’s longer-term outlook on the team. They’re just the clearest opportunity for people to air their grievances.

Again, I get the Groundhog Day complaint, I really do! But the Knicks are just not giving us much else to talk about. I am happy to engage on any other remotely interesting topic, but I am asking genuinely: what else is there?

It’s pretty incredible that Grimes’s “foot” became “well enough” to play 32 minutes at precisely the same time the team needed him to play 32 minutes and had 32 minutes open in the rotation for him to fill.

But then again, we’re not at practice and Thibs is, so there.

“Enlighten us, what exactly is the coherent, medical science based idea here?”

I still don’t see the point of what you are implying. Clearly there was a medical condition that is well-known to be nagging and that needs to be handled carefully. Clearly there was no need to rush him back when his replacement was playing reasonably well and the team won 2 games in a row. In both games where he got DNP-CD the team won. Then they lost to the defending champs on the road in a game that was competitive for 3 quarters. Then his stand-in got hurt and he was given more minutes.

Beyond the poor messaging, I don’t get the hyperbolic takes on this. There are plenty of reasons to be frustrated and annoyed with Thibs and the FO, but the handling of Grimes should be very low on the list.

The 8-9 record is not far off where we expected to be but -2.8 net rating is definitely much worse than anticipated and legitimately worrying. That’s 24th in the league and more than a full point worse than every team except Orlando, LAL, Charlotte, Houston, Detroit and the Spurs. Basically, it’s us and the Lakers down with the Wenbanyama crew and it’s not exactly a miniscule sample anymore.

The evidence is starting to accumulate that this team is meaningfully worse than last year’s edition (they’ve sacrificed the defense without managing to meaningfully improve the offense) and even if you feel broadly okay about Leon’s plan there’s simply no way that is part of it. This team is supposed to be making incremental progress and that’s not what we’re seeing.

Yeah I don’t think changing coaches is going to make RJ make wide open shots. The only difference MIGHT be he plays less minutes.

I don’t know. The team losing some games against good teams on the road does not mean the team is tuning Thibs out. There have been no real rumblings at all of players revolting or tuning him out. It seems the players all like Thibs. Also, I don’t think our version of Thibs is nearly as yelly as Thibs was in Minny or Chicago. Honestly, I get a lot of the critiques people have of him as a coach but I don’t think Thibs has been bellowing on the sideline that much as our coach. He seems to be more mellow than previous versions of Thibs. He gets mad at calls and will yell at the refs but then lets it go pretty quickly. And it seems when players make egregious errors, he’s the same way. He might yank them from the game or make a quick yell/comment about their mistake, but the Thibs I remember seeing when I watched Bulls games? This is not that same guy.

Not sure if its just my observation but RJ is overweight. Its clearly effecting his defense this year on top of slowing him down more on offense.

When the team’s necessary future state resembles its present state essentially not at all, Groundhog Day is inevitable.

NBA games have an inherent attraction, yes, but above that rather low baseline there’s nothing really worth paying attention to. Few if any of these guys are going to be around if the Knicks are able to somehow manage to become a contender again and there’s a dearth of high-end guys (or guys at all) from the ’21 and ’22 draft classes to watch grow.

“Not sure if its just my observation but RJ is overweight.”

+10000

***even though absolutely nothing has changed in terms of the original expectations for the team relative to the results***

I really only follow this team within the context of this thread, and more so during the off-season than the on-season, but from what I’ve read here the expectation was that the Leon Rose regime has made the rapid development of RJ Barrett the fundamentally most important thing to the near-term success of the franchise. So his step-back (neè regression) is in fact a result that is counter to the original expectation of the team, and one that seems worth discussing without criticism by the Tory wing.

If Cam hadn’t got hurt Grimes probably wouldn’t have gotten into that game yesterday except for maybe 5 minutes here and there.

“I just can’t believe even Z-Man is calling for a Thibs firing. I guess that means it could happen!”

ess, with all due respect, if you can’t believe it, you haven’t been paying attention. I never wanted him to be hired, and have always wanted someone else. I have also felt that the “best* thing for the FO to do is to tank for a high draft pick. The difference between me and some others is that a) I accept the reality that Thibs and Leon aren’t going anywhere and hope for the best within that reality for as long as it lasts and b) I believe that we are not as far from a path towards building a sustainable competitive team than some others here.

But my position on Thibs as the right coach for this team has never changed from day 1. I don’t understand how anyone that has followed my posting could think otherwise.

The only change is that recent developments *in the reality that I accept* make me more optimistic that Thibs is getting closer to being fired. I’m still rooting for wins because that’s just what I do. But a growing segment of the team isn’t responding to him and the numbers are more and more suggestive of a team that is tuning him out.

RJ put on too much muscle in the offseason you mean?

I haven’t noticed much change in him since his first year. The cement is dry is the expression I think I have imported from baseball in the past to describe how I feel about his physicality.

“ess, with all due respect, if you can’t believe it, you haven’t been paying attention.”

**************************

I paid attention and I saw what anyone paying attention would see — you resolutely shilling for him against any criticism for at least 18 months, much of it aggressive and in-your-face at other posters who caught onto him long before you did.

Your “I never really ever liked him either” act isn’t really playing.

As Thibs’ firing seems to be nearing again, i’m predicting that we’ll blowout the Thunder tonight. Thibs, the Knicks ~~coach~~ cockroach! 😀

I will say. They gotta win tonight. Do that and they went 3-2 on the western road trip, which is objectively a good outcome. But if the lose tonight and if they lose big tonight, I imagine the seat will be much warmer.

“If Cam hadn’t got hurt Grimes probably wouldn’t have gotten into that game yesterday except for maybe 5 minutes here and there.”

That’s very possible. Not sure what difference it would have made in the outcome of the game though. Grimes had 10 points on 10 shots and was a -12 for the game. I know he got some assists, but he averaged 2.0 per 36 last year, so I’m not going to get too excited about it yet.

The issue isn’t that Cam was holding Grimes back. If anything, the issue is that RJ is holding Grimes back. Cam has been playing well enough to justify his minutes, RJ has not. And Grimes’ main competition coming into the season is getting one DNP-CD after another, so it’s almost as if that entire niche was eliminated.

PS I wonder what is gonna happen with Obi’s minutes…he’s been invisible lately!

“The 8-9 record is not far off where we expected to be but -2.8 net rating is definitely much worse than anticipated and legitimately worrying.”

Honestly, the most legitimate case for optimism is that this team could well be meaningfully worse than we anticipated. The numbers indicate we are basically the New York Jalen Brunsons and would completely spiral without him. There could be a real opportunity for us to get a better pick than we thought.

Realistically, I think we’ll move closer to the middle because there’s nowhere to go but up for RJ, Grimes’ return should help, and Quickley might eventually hit a shot. Of course, this is cold comfort because all else being equal you’d probably prefer to have the 24th net rating than the 17th.

As I said E, go fuck yourself.

“As I said E, go fuck yourself.”

********************

Within “the reality you accept,” or actual reality?

You know, Z-Man, it wasn’t an actual requirement of life that you acted like such a resolute asshole toward me and others during the empty building season. You really didn’t *have* to do that. Presumably you even had the power within yourself to not do that.

If rose and cam are out tonight…Grimes ought to get some decent minutes…

PS I wonder what is gonna happen with Obi’s minutes…he’s been invisible lately!

He’s been invisible for 3 games. Isn’t it too little to change his minutes? And even more given the examples of RJ and Randle.

If rose and cam are out tonight…

Deuce time? 🙂

Okay Noble, different topic to discuss. Is Brunson actually making the rest of the team any better?

So I really like him, and enjoy watching him play the old man in the paint game. But I think it could be argued that his two greatest benefits have been 1) not turning the ball over, while scoring now and again (both things our previous PGs couldn’t really do), and 2) keeping the ball out of Julius’s hands (which would otherwise lead to even more turnovers).

What I’m not really seeing is Brunson getting the ball to his teammates in places and ways that lead to easy scores. Which might be a result of the Cretaceous offensive sets the Knicks use.

Regardless, he’s WAY better than we’ve had in ages. Just curious if others see it this way, or am I missing something/deluded.

Note to KB: Any feuds that I’ve had with any posters in the past have been quelled by mutual agreement to either move on cordially or to simply not respond directly to one another. Except one. I proposed that to E recently and have not responded directly to any of his posts. He seems incapable of agreeing to that arrangement. It’s a standing offer on my part. But if he continues to gratuitously pounce when I am engaging in good faith with others, I’m not going to ignore it.

I knew Leon Rose sucked the moment I saw the details of the incineration trade. Not that the trade itself was that crippling, just that the thought process behind it showed a complete misunderstanding of the NBA draft and a rockheaded mentality with regards to player valuation. I called it right there and then.

I can one up you, JK47: I called it after his first draft.

The whole Obi Toppin thing was enough for me, especially trying to trade up for him. Then he showed us who he was when he traded the 33rd pick for garbage (or, as some said, cornering the market on the double draft).

Thin-slicing: it works.

“He’s been invisible for 3 games. Isn’t it too little to change his minutes? And even more given the examples of RJ and Randle.”

I would play him as many minutes no matter how he is playing. But he clearly has lost his mojo…missing dunks, moonballing 3’s…hopefully it’s just a minor slump and he fights his way out of it. But 1 point total in 2 games…that’s alarming.

I thought RJ was about to breakout based on his early 2p% increase. Just gotta hope he’s still playing through being sick.

I’m sure if you offer cordiality and a fresh restart with E today he would accept and we would all be happier.

Z-Man, you could have thought of all this during the empty building season.

I’m not going to go out of my way to respond to your posts, by any means, but when you then pull your condescending “all due respect” thing and blame another poster from not “seeing” that you’ve “been anti-Thibs all along,” given your history in this area, I’m going to (at least sometimes) respond.(*)

It would go a long way if you’d simply acknowledge a great deal of excess in aggressively defending Thibs in an in-your-face way to people who *you yourself* — apparently — now acknowledge were correct about him.

And then the next step would be to learn from it.

(*) I have to admit that your basis for thinking I would be under some obligation to “stand down” completely escapes.

@NBA_NewYork:
The Knicks are last in the NBA in:
🏀 Opponent offensive rebounds
🏀 Opponent shots attempted
🏀 Opponent 3s attempted
🏀 Opponent 3s made

Which might be a result of the Cretaceous offensive sets the Knicks use

Nobody moves in our offense and the few players that try to do it and make cuts (Obi, Hart) are constantly ignored.

We’re a bad fastbreak team too, with “assists” often a split second too late or made too close to the basket, when players don’t expect them anymore and the spacing is suboptimal.

Sometimes I wonder if they work on it in practices…

That said, maybe JB’s still adjusting after playing “second fiddle” to Luka for years…

“I can one up you, JK47: I called it after his first draft. ”

**********************

I was resistant, but this was a spot-on call. It took the incineration to get me to where I needed to be, and then last year’s “attach a lottery pick to clear the decks of a guy you signed to a buyout contract” was “same theme, new nail.” Guy doesn’t have a clue.

Someone is involved in his 8th feud of the year, and they’re all the other person’s fault.

If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you’re the asshole.

― Raylan Givens via Alan Sepinwall

I would play him as many minutes no matter how he is playing. But he clearly has lost his mojo…missing dunks, moonballing 3’s…hopefully it’s just a minor slump and he fights his way out of it. But 1 point total in 2 games…that’s alarming.

I agree it’s alarming, i hope he bounces back as soon as tonight. But what i’m really rooting is for RJ to bounce back, he isn’t this bad, and maybe if he can string 2 or 3 good games, he can get back on track.

I will also state that I continue to believe that Thibs is an excellent coach for a win-now team. I doubt if any coach would have gotten more wins with the rosters he was handed (or lobbied for) over the past 3 years. In fact, some of his harshest critics right now are also saying that we have the single worst roster in the league, yet somehow we are at 8-9, and have played half of those games without the guy who those same poster have called “our best player” for the last 4 years (except for some short periods when Obi took over that mantle.)

The statements “Thibs is an excellent coach for a win-now team” and “Thibs was a terrible choice for a team that has no business being a win-now team” are not mutually exclusive. I said that when he was hired and continued to say that all along. I continue to believe that he is fine as a developmental coach and that the assertions that he mindlessly plays vets over young players is overblown (see: RJ, Wiggins, etc.).

I have often compared him to Mike D’Antoni, who I think was, is, and will always be an excellent “win now” coach for a team, but a terrible choice for a team that is just starting a rebuild. The current situation is playing out very similarly to the way that one did, with some important differences. The D’Antoni Era ended with a capped-out faux contender with no upside. The Thibs Era will likely end with a team that is a tank or two away and a big fish in a trade/free agency away from regrouping. That’s a pretty big difference.

@TNFH I think it is much more interesting to discuss individual players and performances than the Knicks should or should have tanked discussion which has been beaten to death and will not happen at least until the next regime.

One thing we haven’t discussed is the fact that everyone wanted the Knicks to play faster, but we may not have the personnel to do it. This may hurt them defensively or it may take them awhile to adjust.

I’ve always thought Macri was just an impulsive fan who took over a really good platform from his buddy, who could breakdown video like a pro, but I think had to move on for personal reasons. The fact that he now appears to be down on Barrett after leading the bandwagon all summer is laughable.

I’m going to say one last thing in re the “feud” and then I’ll let it go.

It’s one thing to disagree with a poster, even in an assholic way. That’s life, that’s the internet, that’s lawyers, no problem. If we’d gone through the empty building season and the next off-season and a couple posters had been big rah-rah Thibs guys, “yeah, Thibs, fuck yeah, Thibs, coach of the year, molder of men, culture builder, suck on the record haters,” and all the rest, yadda yadda and come hard at Thibs critics, that would have been basically no harm, no foul, no big deal.

But then when you do all that, and you’re an asshole about it to boot and then when you now, after all that rah rah, Thibs shit had been proven ridiculous, then allege that “you never wanted Thibs” and that “if you don’t see that, you don’t know how to read and it’s your fault for not seeing it,” well then that can’t be allowed to stand.

So it’s either, “I was an asshole for 18 months even though I fundamentally agreed with you on the underlying basis of your posts and your complaints” or it’s “I’m lying now.” Neither is pretty, each warrants comment.

There’s also a difference between “defending” a move and saying “I don’t like it but it’s not a big deal because it’s mitigated by other “defensible” moves.

I challenge anyone to check the record and see how I reacted to the Obi pick over Hali, or the trade-out of #19, or the hiring of Thibs, or drafting IQ over Bane indicated that I thought they were “good” moves at the time. I didn’t like any of those moves. Still don’t.

I just didn’t agree that they were the portent of doom that others were claiming they were. And I still don’t.

Now that we are where we are, the question is what will happen when (not if) Thibs gets fired?

Insisting on playing a True Center (TM) at all times and clogging your offensive lane with both a True Center (TM) and his shotblocking opponent, and then still being last in the league in offensive rebounds allowed is about as LOL Knicks as it gets.

Before this team makes any major moves (such as firing the coach), I would really, really like to see what it looks like in a long stretch without RJ Barrett.

Before trying to decide if Brunson makes the team better or not, if we should move on from one or both of RJ and Randle, or even if we should try to make a trade to better balance the team, i think before all that we should try to see how this roster can play under a creative coach. As i said, i like Thibs, but he no longer has us playing defense, so why do we have him at all? Right now, my only doubt is who would this creative coach be? I like Becky and Atkinson. Who would you guys want to be the next Knicks coach?

I just didn’t agree that they were the portent of doom that others were claiming they were.

I don’t know about others, but I never said they were a portent of doom. I said they were a portent of mediocrity.

I’ve never doubted Leon’s ability to create a team that could compete for 8th place in the East.

Funny how E and Hubert (who recently call himself abrasive!) seem to not take any responsibility for past interactions. Please stop with the poor, innocent victim schtik. I doubt that anyone one wants to hear it right now, other than the two of you.

I’m not so sure the game isn’t passing Thibs by.

He’s maybe the right kind of coach if you have the right kind of personnel, but that’s different from “he’s a good coach.” I watch this current team play, and it seems like a poorly coached team night after night. The plan on offense is “dribble the ball towards the basket” and the defensive approach is “stop inside scoring and hope the opponent misses three pointers.”

That all may have worked in the not-so-distant past, but I’m not really sold on either of those approaches working in the modern NBA. I appreciate that the team is taking fewer long twos, and trying to modernize itself in that way, but when you watch us play against a good offensive team that has a lot of motion and cutters, it’s pretty glaring watching us try to score on the other end.

We have one guy (Brunson) who is a very good “bad shot” maker, and he has been far and away the best player on the team.

“In fact, some of his harshest critics right now are also saying that we have the single worst roster in the league”

Has anyone said this? I sure haven’t seen it. You might be confusing people saying it’s the least desirable roster in a larger sense with them saying it is presently the worst. The former claim is definitely plausible, the latter is insane. I mean there are teams just obviously not trying to win.

“The fact that he now appears to be down on Barrett after leading the bandwagon all summer is laughable.”

Macri has been an RJ skeptic for years. Prior to last season he ranked him as our 5th best asset. He definitely wasn’t leading any bandwagon this summer, in fact he was pretty explicitly in favor of trying to trade RJ for Mitchell.

“I just didn’t agree that they were the portent of doom that others were claiming they were. And I still don’t.”

The thing is, I think we’ve pretty clearly reached the point where all these allegedly minor mistakes are taking their toll. The idea behind minor mistakes not being a “portent of doom” is that they will be counterbalanced by good moves.

We probably could’ve withstood hiring Thibs, drafting Obi over Haliburton, punting on #19 instead of taking one of the many good players, giving Burks and Noel a combined $20M AAV, extending Randle, extending RJ, etc. individually.

But when “minor mistakes” seem to constitute the overwhelming majority of a front office’s decisions, they can still wind up putting a team pretty deep in the hole.

Building or creating a team to compete for 8 or 9 is easy because there’s no competition for that slot. No one else wants to be there on purpose.

So naturally there’s some low hanging fruit if that’s your aim — and that’s how your roster comes to have people like Julius Randle and Derrick Rose and assorted other mercs on it.

Lol it’s way to easy to start a fight here.

With all due respect, Z-Man, if you are now pretending that you weren’t the very definition of a “Thibs apologist” for months, then I call gaslighting.

And I don’t even care if you DO like Thibs! My only real observation was that he needs very specific pieces to be successful and that the FO hasn’t provided those pieces. You could easily argue that Line of thinking and be fairly correct, stating, “oh it’s not Thibs’ coaching; it’s that Leon has done a terrible job” or “it’s not Thibs’ fault; all his players have underachieved.” Those are fine opinions, really.

And I hear you—yes, you primarily stated that you like Thibs, just not for this team. But you’ve also defended minutiae such as minutes distribution when it comes to Thibs, and we all know it…

Cyber re the bright side think of Grimes, Cam, IQ and Sims on defense. Or just 2 of the 3 wings becoming real two way players. They’re showing flashes of it. Or one of the youngest teams in the league playing 50% ball. I’m not expecting rings right away but watching the kids grow is fun, and watching a coherent plan being executed is interesting, whether successful or not. So these are what, five things to cheer you up? If they do, beers are on you when I get to Lisbon one of these days.

“Okay Noble, different topic to discuss. Is Brunson actually making the rest of the team any better?”

It’s a good question. My first instinct is to say it’s pretty hard to say right now since some of our highest usage guys in RJ and IQ aren’t hitting any shots regardless of their quality.

I do get the impression Brunson has gotten Randle some easier looks. I was excited to see him play with Mitch and Obi, but that hasn’t happened much due to Mitch’s injury and Thibs’ rotations.

The only thing that stands out empirically is with Brunson on the floor RJ has a not-ghastly TS% of .543. The same size here is probably too small to care though.

Our offense also goes from a respectable 113 PTS/100 with Brunson on the floor to a “would be one of the worst in the NBA” 108.2 PTS/100 with him off. A lot of that is probably the result of just losing Brunson’s individual shotmaking, but I’m inclined to think there’s some kind of playmaking deficit there too.

At the end of the day, he probably makes his teammates somewhat better just by virtue of the fact that he draws the most defensive attention on the team. It’s just not going to matter unless more guys can start hitting shots.

Random and probably non-applicable thought — I’ve got a kid downstairs with a 103 degree fever, 25% of his school is out right now, and while visiting the drugstore to buy the VERY LAST bottle of kid’s Tylenol on an otherwise empty shelf (in a drugstore!), I watched some kid outside violently empty an entire bucketload of barf into the garbage can. Feels a bit like The Walking Dead.

Just maybe we should give Obi a bit of leash for the moment?

Here’s a scary RJ stat: Percentage of shots 0-3 feet (.594% career) vs. 3-10 (.308 career)
Year 1: .392/.201 (.568fg%/.207)
Year 2: .325/.228 (.605/.318)
Year 3: .309/.243 (.596/.307)
Year 4: .255/.259 (.629/.366)

So yes, his percentages are up in the paint this year but the increasing proportion of 3-10 vs. 0-3 means it’s not going to help his TS much because he’s swapping high % shots for low ones. I think this year’s splits looks a little extreme because of the last few games but the trend is bad, bad, bad. More shots from 3-10 than at the rim can’t end well. When your 6’6″ slasher is below league average in the paint (as he has solidly been every year of his career) he’s not really a slasher. And given the fact that he can’t shoot from outside at all that doesn’t leave you with much. At 22 there’s certainly lots of room to improve but he’s been nowhere near starter quality let alone let alone all-star or even third option. It’s not shot selection- he just can’t get all the way to the rim. He’s strong enough to get his shoulders past guys but his utter lack of explosiveness (both vertical and horizontal) means he gets no real separation and even guys his own height throw those weak attempts back in his face way too often.

But when “minor mistakes” seem to constitute the overwhelming majority of a front office’s decisions, they can still wind up putting a team pretty deep in the hole.

At this point, there’s just so much more bad than good with this FO:

* Hiring Thibs at the exact wrong moment in the win curve.

* Drafting Obi over Hali, and, for that matter, IQ over Bane. (IQ has turned out much better than any of us expected on draft night, but I wonder what we would have done without Wes stumping for the other Kentucky guy once Maxey was off the board.)

* Punting on the 33rd pick in that draft, which perhaps could be defended at the time but now is a clear case of this administration valuing future picks — even potentially much worse picks — over just taking a player in the here and now.

* Keeping the band together after what was clearly a fluky season, and then having to waste draft equity (even if most of it was 2nd rounders) to get out of those deals.

* Signing Fournier to what seems like a worse contract every day.

* Extending Randle before they had to, rather than waiting to see if his empty gym shooting was real.

* Punting on a pick in a deep draft for a potentially much worse future pick, and also taking Rokas and Deuce over, say, Herb Jones and Ayo, or just staying where they were and taking Jeremiah Robinson-Earl.

* Trading the drastically devalued Charlotte pick for Cam Reddish, which might eventually work out talent-wise, but was just dumb on a valuation perspective.

* Signing RJ to an extension before he had shown actual improvement, and/or failing to use him as the centerpiece for the FO’s primary goal of Trading For A Star.

* Signing Mitch to a not-small deal that solves some of our defensive problems but creates all sorts of problems on the other end.

Like Noble says, you can rationalize each of these individually in one way or another. But when these things Just. Keep. Happening? No good.

And I know this won’t be a favored take on this site, but honestly, fuck the World Cup.

‘European teams won’t use LGBTQ armbands at World Cup after FIFA threats’

So these are what, five things to cheer you up?

And there’s Brunson too, his play cheers me up. Maybe Brunson can still improve a little, and he’s a PG so he has a lot of good years still to play (meaning he’s part of the core for the future).

If they do, beers are on you when I get to Lisbon one of these days.

I’m in Porto, so you have to come to the north for those beers. 🍺 😉

Can we fire Thibs yet?

And trade Randle.

I am as disappointed in RJ’s play as the next guy but it’s hard to worry about any of it with Thibs and Randle still on this team.

We need to make a course change, everything else is rearranging deck chairs on the titanic.

NY born, Welsh wife.

***I can one up you, JK47: I called it after his first draft.***

I can one up both of you angelinobloggers: I called it after he built a career on making the knicks bad. (see: curry trade; melo trade; bargnani trade; mega-max-melo; etc)

“Here’s a scary RJ stat: Percentage of shots 0-3 feet (.594% career) vs. 3-10 (.308 career)”

that’s not really RJ’s problem…. if you want to look at what shots actually got traded… he’s actually totally foregone midrange jumpers (4.1% total between 10ft – 3p) in favor of basket shots… and actually you can look in that 3-10 ft to see where it’s gone…

the more concerning part is the over-reliance on his 3pt shot… he’s proven that being a catch and shoot corner guy he can do for one year but he’s tried to expand his game to pullups and it hasn’t really worked out too well…. couple that with a really terrible 3pt% and he’s doing the westbrook thing where he’s shooting himself into irrelevancy…

what he was successful with earlier this year.. and really his entire careeer… was when he stopped forcing it and letting the ball come to him… that’s always when he’s at his best…

I don’t remember Z-man’s original position on Thibs, but I have seen him denying to ever have wanted him hired in the first place for the last 2 years, so I can’t blame him for being annoyed by people continuing to make it seem like he is a Thibs supporter at this point.

DJphan- Short term I’d agree- his biggest issue right now is the over-reliance on the three and shooting it abysmally. And yes, this year the mid-range (which was never much to begin with) has been split between drives and threes. My larger point is that if your percentage of shots at the basket drops from .392 as a rookie to .255 in year four and your percentage from 3-10 goes from .201 to .259 you might improve your percentage 0-3 but your over-all TS isn’t going to budge or is likely to drop. More shots from 3-10 doesn’t really get him anywhere.

I just don’t see any path to league average TS without quality three point shooting (37+ at good volume) and even then you have to squint.

And I know this won’t be a favored take on this site, but honestly, fuck the World Cup.

Cowards…I’m really surprised that not one country’s players sacrificied their careers and tournament earnings, flipped the finger to FIFA and simply chose not to attend. Armbands is just fake virtue signaling. FIFA knew it and bullied them into submission. Qatar is obviously ~50 years behind the Western civilization on human rights but its their country. Going to someone’s house and rubbing our values in hosts faces is clearly an act of provocation and would turn the one month tournament of the worlds most beautiful game which brings the entire world together into an uncessary political circus.

Being as charitable as possible, at an absolute bare minimum, he’s been relentlessly, consistently, and aggressively anti-anti-Thibs and at the same time complimented Thibs at length for all manner of things — he did it again in this very thread — and even suggested that he could have been a good coaching choice for the “right team,” without in any way distinguishing, or even trying to distinguish, these Knicks from the “right team.”

He has essentially “permitted” zero criticism of Thibs that goes outside the extraordinarily circumscribed lines he himself has painted for criticism he will “accept.” He has fought every single effort of any other poster to independently criticize Thibs on their own terms. For multiple years.

Which means that any distinction between that and a “Thibs supporter” is so tiny as to be meaningless and the “I don’t like him either” shtick is entirely academic. Beyond the superficial and self-serving assertion of a beef, it’s frankly impossible to even discern even now what his beef with Thibs *is*. The Knicks were somehow the “wrong” team for Thibs? Based on what exactly? If Thibs is, as Z-Man has said repeatedly, a good development coach and good for young players, then what exactly is the problem with him?

And there’s a big difference between “I didn’t want him hired in the first place” and “I don’t support him.”

Re: World Cup

It’s a farce from the moment it has been assigned (with well known established bribery).

Infantino is just another bandit in Blatter’s mold.

The players, if so interested in human rights, had one choice, not go there, but no one has the balls to do it.*

FIFA understand only one thing: losing money.

Don’t watch the games, don’t buy merchandise, just boycott it every way you can.

* Or they could have done like my Eurepean Champion national team, get eliminated 😀

This is America. We barely know what the World Cup is. We boycott by default.

things i have not enjoyed about thibs this year:

1. maybe there is no coaching solution to randle’s desultory defensive effort. but damn is it hard to watch.

2. i<3 is not being used well. he sucks at several things, so if you're not using his passing in the pinch or on the short roll he's going to be pretty anemic. we should think about trading him if we're going to use him this way.

3. the knicks are the only team i can recall who has gotten worse at running the spain pnr over time. the back pick has become pure window dressing.

4. i think iq/brunson fit together much better than iq/rose. and i don't say that bc iq has a 65% ts with jalen — too small for signal. he just has a better knack for moving to the open spot while brunson does his dancing w the stars stuff. and their effort/awareness mitigates some of the defensive weaknesses. more minutes.

5. stop putting rj on great opposing point guards. that is not at all his strength. he is actually bad at it. it wastes his generally adequate defensive strengths. put literally anyone else there.

edit: oh, and i am on team ‘the grimes minutes thing is weird’

This is America. We barely know what the World Cup is.

Other Americans (brazilians, argentinians, mexicans, costa ricans, uruguayans, ecuadorians, canadians) may disagree…

The penalty for wearing the one love armband is a yellow card and they didn’t take it? I would like very much that Cristiano Ronaldo starts the game with a yellow card and we do the right thing, than what we will actually going to do.

And I know this won’t be a favored take on this site, but honestly, fuck the World Cup.

Not sure why you think that won’t be a favored take. FIFA is despicable, and this tournament is appalling. Most everyone who follows the sport has been on that take for ten years now (or whenever they announced the hosts).

I’m particularly sick and tired of the corrupt media using the term “migrant workers.” They were slaves. Stop calling them by the name their masters want to use.

The one in Russia was just as terrible, of course, and similarly built on slave labor. But the media only lately cares about Putin’s atrocities; in the past they were too busy giving him adoring coverage in exchange for money.

E’s posts have been very well written today. Sometimes I think a different person took over his account.

somehow FIFA makes the NCAA look legit…

Infantino is just another bandit in Blatter’s mold.

His speech was INSUFFERABLE. “Today I am Arab. Today I am gay.” More like “Today I am rich because Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad is paying me so much money to say this bullshit.”

@FredKatz
Cam Reddish (sore right groin) and Derrick Rose (sore right toe, even though he has 10 toes) are both out tonight, Knicks say.

I feel better than ever about ignoring the World Cup. And I already felt pretty great about it.

I remember the World Cup final being on a few World Cups ago, and watching a meaningless Mets-Marlins game instead. It was great. I never felt so proud to be an American.

I have an Irish surname but grew up with Italian culture around a lot of little old Italian ladies, so I got into it a little bit the one year when Italy won. That was the year of the Zidane head butt. Well, by “got into it” I mean I watched the final game for maybe a half hour. That was pretty cool even if that Italian team turned out to be dirty and corrupt. Kind of made it even better in a way. So yeah, fuck the World Cup!

I’m so American that I thought the World Cup was a summer event.

“My larger point is that if your percentage of shots at the basket drops from .392 as a rookie to .255 in year four and your percentage from 3-10 goes from .201 to .259 you might improve your percentage 0-3 but your over-all TS isn’t going to budge or is likely to drop. More shots from 3-10 doesn’t really get him anywhere.”

increasing 3-10 ft shot attempts are not great but it’s barely that much more than last year to the point that it might be just a scoring artifact… the decreasing rim shots is not that much a concern since he was already at a sky high.. and unsustainable… rate his rookie year… it should be declining because he was putting up some bad attempts… some of those did turn into bad floater attempts… or that pivot fadeaway shot that he likes for whatever reason…

the larger point.. which i think we can agree on.. is that he’s relying on shots further from the basket.. which isn’t good but it’s not some crazy amount of shots either way… i think he’s been in the process of fixing it but he has channeled all of his worse qualities on this road trip tho which has masked some of that progress he’s made…

RJ Barrett, over/under complete and utter trash tonight?

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129 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2022.11.21)”