Knicks Morning News (2023.05.31)

Perry was a fine placeholder GM (and I mean that positively, not top-echelon, not a moron or a shill). He was highly professional, a good guy, and he avoided catastrophic blunders. He made some very nice deals and some pretty dumb mistakes, but so do most GMs.

He also is the last link to the pre-Leon days, and that’s a good thing too. Since taking over as POBO, Leon has done a masterful job of rebranding the team and putting the clown show that Perry was a part of into an increasingly smaller object in the rear-view mirror. He has certainly signed off on some uninspired moves, but the team has purchased a commanding marketing position grounded in sustainable “success” at a relatively cheap price and with little bearing on future flexibility. Considering that he had zero experience as a team executive when he was handed the reins, and that rebranding the franchise while avoiding a long, painful rebuild was an extremely challenging and complex undertaking under the watchful eye of a petulant, meddling owner, I am totally forgiving of the learning curve-related suboptimal moves.

Honestly, I think Perry was kept around mainly to flatten the learning curve, and now that purpose has been fulfilled. I’m sure some team looking for professionalism, experience, and sound judgment will offer him an executive position. But I am confident that Leon, now entering his 4th offseason, has grown into the job, is here for the long haul, and knows enough to make final decisions based on his own judgment rather than on the blind trust of one underling or another.

I love that Leon keeps his mouth shut and holds his cards close to his vest.

It seems more clear than ever that the Knicks FO is using the Riley/Spo regime as a model, for better or worse. The X-factor seems to be Thibs.

Since he’s not going anywhere until in the future when there’s a clear setback to the plan, I wonder if Thibs has (or can be forced to have) the humility to look at what the Heat did and to be amenable to emulating it, especially on offense and in terms of player utilization.

The Heat run such a nice mix of inside/outside, iso/ball movement, etc. that it’s very unpredictable, and Spo is not stubborn at all, as he showed with situationally benching Love in favor of Martin.

It seemed clear that Thibs’ inflexibility with Fournier was in contrast to the way Spo first benched, then brilliantly utilized Duncan Robinson. What did Duncan do for the Heat that Evian (who is a clutch performer on the international scene, and who can drive and create as well as shoot) couldn’t have done for us?

I also wonder whether Grimes is capable of emulating Caleb Martin’s playoff game, not the .700+ TS% per se, but the all-around game. And whether IQ can be as playoff-tough as Gabe Vincent, given that IQ seems to have more potential overall.

Beyond that, it would be nice to have a more offensively oriented C than the Mitch/iHart tandem, but that’s hard to do without giving up more on D and rebounding than you get back on O. Guys like Bam and Horford are a pretty rare breed and don’t come cheaply anyway. But it’s an issue.

We can quibble about Rosas and Brunson, but whatever, I’m not a big believer in blackballing people for life. I mean, we all spend too many of our waking hours discussing, rooting for, and patronizing a team owned by one of the most despicable individuals in the sports world. If Rosas and Brunson keep their noses clean going forward, I have absolutely no issue with their hirings beyond are they competent at their respective jobs (and if Rick led to Jalen, I don’t even care about that!)

Obviously Phil and Mills did not blow every single move, and it is in fact a positive that neither guy blew draft picks in ill-fated starfucking binges like drunken sailors like their predecessors. But they were both incompetent in their own ways and made numerous egregious unforced errors. Phil’s social media presence and the musings of his shill Charley Rosen left a bizarre mark on this franchise, mostly in cartoon ink.

Perry was in a whole different class…actually a competent, highly-respected executive who made lots of net-plus moves, with some clunkers mixed in, as is true with all decent but not great GMs. Clearly he was a buffer against Mills’ abject incompetence. But unless you know how much of a hand he had in each negotiation and decision, whether a trade, a free agent signing, a contract extension, a draft pick, what have you, it’s hard to evaluate him beyond that.

But please, please please, let’s slam the door shut on Phil Jackson and Steve Mills and put like 10 deadbolts on it. They fucking sucked.

Phil did manage not to fuck up the accidental #4 pick he used on KP, every other pick from #2-10 pretty much sucked. Alas, there was a pre-ACL window where KP would have commanded a king’s ransom in a trade. At least we got something for him!

Zach Edey back to Purdue…probably a wise choice