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2022-23 Game Thread: Knicks vs. Booker-Less Suns

Man, the NBA is kind of merciless, right? The Suns seemed poised to be title contenders for a few years, but now they look like just another team. Life comes at you quick.

Afternoon games are such crapshoots. You never know wno was out partying the night before.

Let’s go, Knicks!

124 replies on “2022-23 Game Thread: Knicks vs. Booker-Less Suns”

Brunson back!

Still don’t get RJ’s injury, are Luka’s fingernails sharpened like Sabretooth or something?

From Begley: Tom Thibodeau was asked today about Cam Reddish getting DNPs on nights when other out-of-rotation players get fourth-quarter minutes late in blowouts. “We just want him to stay ready. It’s a coach’s decision,” Thibodeau said.

It sounded like RJ’s bone broke through the skin causing the laceration. Maybe it was bent in a weird fashion after colliding with Luka.

Called Mitch post-up. Missed the lefty layup, sadly. But there it is again!

Shamet is a black hole on offense, our double always strategy is going to fare better today.

Edit: Of course, now that i said it, maybe i jinxed it. 😛

What have we done wrong that the punishment is having to listen to Wally instead of Clyde?

Knicks look great, and as someone who may shit on Randle more than anyone else here, he’s playing beautifully. A word I don’t think I’ve ever used for him before. Or ever thought I would.

“What have we done wrong that the punishment is having to listen to Wally instead of Clyde?”

Wally’s homerism is too over the top. It makes him annoying.

Mitch dribbles between his legs, appears to have surprised even himself!

cybersozesays:
January 2, 2023 at 15:35
Suns on pace for 44 pts 😮

So is Randle!

I paid for the game in the NBA app, but then I am unable to see it, :/, thank god for the streaming sites.

Except for Sims banging his head on the rim (…I can do that…) this has been a pretty perfect game so far.

Let’s keep it up!

We all know how meaningless big first half leads are, but the Suns look comatose today

Randle looks to be back in All-NBA form again.
I’m dying to see a Robinson 3.
Brunson>Paul at the moment.
The Sims-Hart pairing better than Obi with either one of them.

I love McBride’s defense and hustle, but his 3p shooting has been horrendous at the NBA level over two seasons on quite a few attempts per 36 minutes. It’s good to see him hit one because at some point you have to wonder whether he can be a solid backup long term given he’s undersized at the SG and not really a PG.

NO TAKING THE FOOT OFF THE GAS PLEASE!

My heart couldn’t take blowing this one.

Fournier’s numbers aren’t great but he looks like he adds a lot to the offense—coming off curls, forcing the hard close, driving, etc.

Deuce with the corner 3!!! (Nobody mentioned it earlier)

“Is leading by 32 good?”

Nothing is safe at MSG with these Knicks.

I want to be up 40 by halftime before I can relax. 🙂

So. Um. This will work. Haha.

Any deep stats from games with Wally at the mic? Could he actually be a plus asset?

The level of competition is what it is, but it’s hard not to be impressed with the ball movement and defense regardless. Grimes has gotten so good at that dump off to Mitch.

“It’s good to see him hit one because at some point you have to wonder whether he can be a solid backup long term given he’s undersized at the SG and not really a PG.”

Start to wonder? “Solid backup” is looking like a 95th percentile outcome right now. It sucks because I really do like watching him go at it on defense, he’s like what everyone pretended Frank was on that end. But he might be the worst offensive rotation player in the NBA right now.

Brunson>Paul at the moment.

Not a knock on Brunson, but CP3 isn’t looking like himself.

Every time I am able to watch a game I see terrible floaters that make me want to kill things.

Grimes really thinks he can pull-up anytime he wants. Maybe encouraging longterm because he looks solid doing it, but definitely not the highest quality looks.

We went iso Randle again and the end…and got 2 points for like the last 3 or 4 minutes…

Some last season-y vibes from Randle this half. Not terribly concerning and defensible given we’re missing a high-usage guy, but as a strong supporter of his play this year I’d like to see it nipped in the bud.

Bad end to the half. Suns won’t keep shooting this bad or us this well. Huge lead but I’ve been a Knicks fan too long.

Between IQ/Randle/Brunson none of those guys make quick decisions. Randle likes the iso. Brunson likes getting to the post and spending a couple seconds in the post. IQ needs to dance around the perimeter.

I think it hurts flow & continuity on offense at times. It’s harder to get the defense unbalanced and get the kickouts that lead to open 3s.

The offense is good enough anyway, perhaps more qualitative than meaningful.

If we can keep them under 50 through 3 that is really impressive.

Knicks should play all their games against teams without their best player, we do much better in those games.

I mean, Wally should stop trying to argue he’s actually the league MVP but he’s been really good and is the MVP of the Knicks to this point.

“ MVP chants for Randle. Well earned, honestly.”

You can’t play much better than he has lately

hart and sims not exactly giving you the d you want to make up for playing two 5s

This will be single digits by the 5 minute mark…

As long as we win the game, i don’t mind.

Was watching Fournier on D and he was really hustling and trying to be in the right place and not lose his man as per usual. Perhaps that’s why he’s no longer in the doghouse, a new commitment to defense.

This will be single digits by the 5 minute mark…

This take didn’t age well. 😛

“This team would be really good if they could win games with insurmountable leads” is not a statement that should make sense, but it does. And so I must always worry.

@Ptmilo – I don’t think of Hartenstein as a defensive player at all. I would love it if he was, but he’s not. Sims shows flashes of defensive greatness but needs more development.

I missed this “playing against teams without their best player”, can we keep doing it? It’s nice.

Great game by Randle and Brunson has returned well, which is great to see.

Kinda seems like letting everyone else pick up RJ’s usage doesn’t lead to the apocalypse but what do I know

Relaxing win,
worst thing of the game is Wally, he’s really annoying and his homerism is off the chart…

Chris Paul -38 in 30 minutes, not bad…

“Breen trying to justify Thibs leaving Randle on the floor…”

I think Breen may be correct. I think he allows some players to pad their stats for all star selections and trade value.

He does that with RJ also.

Thibs is the ultimate stats padder with minutes in blowouts and D’Antoni used to be the ultimate stats padder with pace and space.

“Kinda seems like letting everyone else pick up RJ’s usage doesn’t lead to the apocalypse but what do I know”

I agree, as long as Brunson is playing and Thibs is willing to start Quick.

It’s a shame we blew the Bulls and Spurs game. They weren’t just tough defeats. We melted down. I would feel a lot better with those two wins.

Quentin Grimes is the big revelation. Shooting, passing and defense. Three beautiful drop offs to Mitch that I counted.

@FredKatz
The Julius Randle thumbs down incident at the Garden was about a year ago now. Today he was getting MVP chants at MSG.

Asked about coming full circle with the fans, Randle laughs.

“I don’t even remember that,” he smiled.

The Suns have a bit of a dilemma. They have a very good team when 100% healthy, but I’m not sure they are a serious contender anymore with this version of CP3, no Crowder, and some other very good teams getting healthy again relative to last year. It almost feels like they should trade Crowder and CP3 and try to do a quick retool before CP3 has no value left at all.

“Marc Stein: Dallas’ Luka Dončić (for the second week in a row) and Washington’s Kristaps Porzingis have just been named West and East Player of the Week by the NBA. ”

But they couldn’t make it work in Dallas even though they had the highest rated offense in the history of the NBA together up until that point. lmao

“if pat riley had drafted deandre ayton both guys would have retired by now”

I said out loud during the game that watching Ayton always makes me really happy we didn’t do any of those Mitch + picks for Ayton swaps the internet loved.

It’s hard to put my finger on exactly what it is, but the guy just strikes me as a loser.

KP says he’s willing to opt out and take less money per year starting next year if he can get an extension. IMO, that increases his current trade value over and above also looking more like himself this year physically. Looks like Dallas sold at the bottom.

Cuban may be a great owner to play for, but he’s rapidly ascending to near the top of the list of bad managers.

He got Dinwiddie and Bertans for KP. Dinwiddie is a very nice player that fills an important role since they lost Brunson (an even bigger Cuban blunder to not extend him), but he’s not near good enough to co-star and is close to 30. Bertans is a bad contract with little role.

The Mavs have the best offensive player in the league. But it seems likely to me they don’t have a single player on the team currently that’s almost certain to still be there with Doncic in 2-3 years. Maybe Josh Green can grow into a solid consistent role player and DFS is still there?

They have 2-3 bad contracts and are minus one 1st round pick.

They still have a good team, but what a mess they made over the last few years.

“One final gift from KP if he can get that WAS pick to convey”

100%

We have to hope they keep Beal healthy and decide not to blow it up. KP is playing well, but he’s not enough of a force to carry that team into the playoffs. They don’t have much of a supporting cast. Beal has to be playing. They are kind of a mess and imo should be blown up, but they seem content to just try to make the playoffs. Let’s just hope they don’t take our spot. lol

I’m just glad that now people will finally stop with the awful take that Ayton somehow made sense for the Suns over Doncic. It never made sense and it never will, they just got lucky that Sacramento drafted an actual bust right after and took the heat off them.

Wow, we’ve been seeing some crooked numbers in the box score over the past few weeks.

The Suns have a bit of a dilemma. They have a very good team when 100% healthy, but I’m not sure they are a serious contender anymore with this version of CP3, no Crowder, and some other very good teams getting healthy again relative to last year. It almost feels like they should trade Crowder and CP3 and try to do a quick retool before CP3 has no value left at all.

Yeah, like I said at the start, the NBA is cruel like that. They went from contender to pretender super quick. No one takes them seriously as a contender anymore, just two years removed from being in the NBA Finals. Same with Miami, really, but Phoenix was so much younger overall that is is more shocking.

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Funny, no one was talking about Spida his last 4 games when he was 5-16, 10-25, 5-16 and 4-16.

I wouldn’t be shocked if Fournier works his way back into the rotation as the games mean more…

I think Fournier should be in the rotation. Go with a ten man rotation and let him be the back up SF. We need some scoring punch and if he’s out there with IQ, McBride and Sims his defensive shortcomings won’t hurt us for ten minutes or so a game.

Hold on to Fournier and Rose. Trade Cam and OBI.

It wouldn’t surprise me if Thibs shortened the bench to IQ, Hart, Obi (or Sims) and Fournier, with Rose and Deuce becoming situational, as well as one of Obi or Sims (probably Sims.)

I doubt that Thibs goes back to a 10-man rotation…he likes having a starter on the floor at all times, RJ is a minutes-eater, Randle’s minutes are going up, and Grimes and IQ are also playing extended minutes. Mitch and Hart are getting all the C minutes. So it’s really about which combo of Fournier, Deuce, Rose, Obi and Sims fills out the 9-man rotation. Specifically,
-Rose vs. Deuce for the PG scraps (IQ has shown that he can handle 10-15 mpg there)
-Fournier vs. some of Grimes’ minutes and some of IQ at the 2’s minutes (he’s not getting any of RJ’s because Thibs)
-Obi vs. Sims at the backup 4 (or sliding RJ there for 5 mpg)

I don’t see anything ourside of these parameters happening w/o a trade or injuries.

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