[news.google.com] — Friday, August 11, 2023 4:50:36 AM
Knicks to try signing Immanuel Quickley to new deal before start of the season? Hoops Hype
[news.google.com] — Friday, August 11, 2023 2:07:11 AM
Investors Can Buy The Knicks And The Rangers At A Discount The Acquirer’s Multiple
[news.google.com] — Friday, August 11, 2023 12:59:00 AM
New York Notes: Knicks Future, Hart, Quickley, Nets Picks hoopsrumors.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 11:52:30 PM
Knicks set for Christmas Day showdown with Bucks at Madison Square Garden New York Post
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:41:31 PM
Report: Bucks to Play Knicks on Christmas in New York Brew Hoops
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:35:32 PM
Bucks will play at New York Knicks on Christmas Day, report says Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:25:00 PM
Celtics-Lakers, Bucks-Knicks Among 2023/24 Christmas Day Games hoopsrumors.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:15:03 PM
On Giannis, On Julius! Knicks Face Bucks in NBA Christmas Showdown Sports Illustrated
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:04:18 PM
Knicks’ Brunson ‘Should Already Have’ All-Star Nod Sports Illustrated
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:52:51 PM
Ex-Knicks Coach Derek Fisher Hired by High School Team in Los Angeles Sports Illustrated
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 8:02:20 PM
‘Bag Man’ Josh Hart: Knicks Extension is ‘Dream Come True’ Sports Illustrated
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 6:57:04 PM
Gilbert Arenas, Trae Young Talk Villain Status After 2021 Knicks … Sports Illustrated
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 4:28:04 PM
Josh Hart’s extension puts Knicks in favorable financial position ClutchPointsKnicks Sign Josh Hart To Four-Year Extension hoopsrumors.comImmanuel Quickley next on Knicks’ list with Josh Hart back in fold New York Post
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 4:03:50 PM
Ex-Knicks Lottery Pick Steps up in France’s Win Sans Evan Fournier Heavy.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 1:59:31 PM
50 Cent Takes the Stage in Style: The Jeff Hamilton-Designed … Landon Buford
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 1:46:29 PM
Knicks’ $18.9 million burden picks up injury amid trade talks Empire Sports Media
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 1:09:00 PM
New York Knicks Sign Josh Hart to Contract Extension NBA.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 12:50:00 PM
Knicks’ Josh Hart stirs debate over ‘outrageous’ air travel garb Fox News
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:48:55 AM
Ex-Knicks PG Named Bucks’ G League Coach Heavy.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:44:14 AM
Pod Strickland: Episode 322 The Strickland
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 10:00:00 AM
The Infatuation’s EEEEEATSCON New York Presented by Chase Sapphire? Returns to Forest Hills Stadium, October 7 & 8 Yahoo Finance
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:46:00 AM
Celtics Announce 2023 Preseason Schedule NBA.com
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:45:44 AM
Why the Knicks were right to play the 2023 offseason patiently Yahoo Sports
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:40:28 AM
The FIBA World Cup Will Help RJ Barrett Grow The Knicks Wall
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:06:46 AM
Grading Knicks’ Biggest Moves from 2023 NBA Offseason Bleacher Report
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 9:00:31 AM
Grade the Trade: Bulls deal Zach LaVine to Knicks in blockbuster proposal Pippen Ain’t Easy
[news.google.com] — Thursday, August 10, 2023 8:30:58 AM
Jalen Brunson faces pressure with new Knicks, Team USA status New York Post
44 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2023.08.11)”
Knicks Bucks on Christmas at MSG is juicy.
This team is starting to remind me of the 1990’s Pacers in terms of star power, with Jalen Brunson in the Reggie Miller role. I never considered Reggie Miller to be a true “superstar”…never averaged more than 22.6ppg during the entire 90’s, never a high usage player (career high 25.8), never an MVP candidate, lousy defender and rebounder…definitely a top 10-20 player but never top 5. He had a very solid but not spectacular supporting cast…who was the best secondary player, Mark Jackson? Rik Smits? Derrick McKey? Antonio Davis?
The point being that we need that true superstar if we are going to win a championship…and as much as I love Brunson, he’s not that guy. But even as currently constructed, this team is a perennial playoff team that could make some long runs. And they have the means to get better should an opportunity arise.
I haven’t felt this good about the present and future of this team as a fan since the ’90s.
That’s a good comp, Z-man. And I would say Rik Smits was the second-best player. At the very least, it felt like he gave Ewing a ton of trouble every time, whereas Oakley and Mason were evenly-matched with the Davises, and I don’t recall Schrempf ever really going off on us.
Damn, I totally forgot about Schrempf, he was really good! But he was more of an early ’90s guy and for me the rivalry didn’t really heat up until post ’94. The Pacers never got out of the first round with him. By then, Detlef was kicking ass with those great Seattle teams.
BTW Alan, how’s your recovery from surgery going?
Day-by-day, Z-man. I’m still extremely limited in what I’m able/allowed to do physically. I get winded really easily. And it hasn’t been a linear progression. Wednesday, I felt the most like myself that I have since before the surgery. Then yesterday, I was tired and uncomfortable all day. Today’s a bit better. By 8:30, I had already gotten in 2/3 of my total steps from Thursday. Onward and upward!
Hopefully in a couple of weeks you’ll be over the ups and downs and as good as new!
Thinking back to those IND teams reminds me of how competitive and bitter those EC rivalries were back then, and how sort of watered down they are now. Nothing really has any sustainable juice today…there’s been so much roster flux, the standings have been sort of all over the place…the opposing superstars aren’t as hatable as Jordan or Reggie…the coaches aren’t as hatable as Jackson, Riley and Brown…Trae Young is probably the most annoying opponent yet the Hawks just can’t seem to get it together. I can’t wait until we get past just being happy to make the playoffs and start feeling those deeply visceral feelings of hatred that I last felt a decade ago, and even that was somewhat watered down. Just don’t know when and how it might happen. Maybe a couple of years playing the KP Celts, the Trae Hawks, the Spida Cavs might do it…
Though Shrempff did go off against the Knicks in the playoffs, he only played 4 games against them, way back in 1993. He was then traded for Derrick McKey to try to shore up what was then one of the worst defenses in the league (Pacers were a top 5 offense and a bottom 5 defense that year). They also brought in Larry Brown, Antonio Davis, and Mark Jackson. That’s when the “rivalry” really began.
The Larry Bird coached Pacers were actually quite a bit better than the Larry Brown coached Pacers in the 90s. They had Chris Mullin and were a much more efficient team (top rated offense, I think).
On the lack of competitive and bitter EC rivalries…
By far the biggest factor is we have not been good. Rivalries start when a team knocks us out of the playoffs and we have a subsequent year playoff match up with them. We have yet to have that (at least within an interval where at least some of the rostered players or coaches are the same). Agree roster flux is also a big factor. I think the hatability of the individuals is probably not that much different and is more a by-product of the rivalry happening. I don’t think we would hate Trae Young without our loss to Atlanta. I am positive we would hate Joel Embiid if Philly had knocked us out of the playoffs. And I think our future rivals will absolutely hate Josh Hart.
I like Trae Young and I find those MSG chants directed at him to be kind of embarrassing.
Oh, for sure BE. But the rivalries I’m talking about were not just involving the Knicks. There was plenty of hate between the Bulls, Heat and Pacers aside from the Knicks. I don’t think there is nearly that level of hate even between the winning teams like the Celts, Miami, Philly and Bucks.
I guess the closest thing right now is the Heat and Celts…they met in the conference finals 3 of the last 4 years…but the rosters have changed so much over that span that the level of intense hatred between the players and coaches doesn’t seem to be there. Maybe the way the game is policed has something to do with it…no more flagrant elbows, cheap shots, coaches making inflammatory comments in the media…
Mullen had one very good year with the Pacers, he was pretty much washed after 1997-98. But yeah, the Larry Bird stretch was clearly the best version of the Pacers and the Knicks were sort of transitioning away from Ewing being the man during that time. Other than the miracle 4-point play year, they kind of had our number.
Alan, I hope you feel much better very soon!
Reading that the final year of Hart’s deal is a team option. That totally changes the calculus of the deal to me from “fair but maybe a bit of an overpay” to “good deal for the Knicks while still getting Hart paid.” Way to go Leon!
Love the Indiana comp. Deep team. No MVP. Same as 99 Knicks. They both went to finals. Pacers would have won a chip but ran into a hungry Shaq and Kobe duo.
With IQ extension underway, everyone is locked for next 3yrs and ready to rumble. We’re a top 3 team in Eastern Coneference and will average 55 a season over next 3yrs.
Need to get lucky to get an MVP candidate. Leon has a boat load of assets to trade and a winning culture to attract.
Orange and blue skies…
It’s kind of telling that the 1999-2000 Pacers made it to the finals. Their highest BPM player (1,000+ minutes) was Mark Jackson at 3.1…then Reggie at 2.7…Jalen Rose at 1.7…they literally had a cakewalk over the lousy Ray Allen Bucks, the woeful Iverson Sixers, and the corpse of Patrick Ewing Knicks.
Bird’s Pacers teams averaged 56 wins a season over 3 years*.
That doesn’t seem like a very realistic comp. If we’re a top 3 team in the East, who got bumped from Philly, Milwaukee, Miami, and Boston?
* adjusting the 33-17 record to 54 wins
OT
What’s going on in Maui is disastrous. I’ve been to Lahaina. Maui is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen and Lahaina was one of the most beautiful places on Maui. This is terrible.
Strat, totally. We vacation just up the coast from Lahaina of late (and fully purchased plans for this December), and it was our regular shopping stop. Took a catamaran out from there last winter to watch a pod of about 50 humpbacks breaching over and over like it was the whale Olympics. A lovely, goofy town filled with the nicest people imaginable. Utterly leveled.
Buckle in, people.
By the time Larry Bird took over the Pacers, their core of Reggie, Smits, and the Davis boys had been together forever. Mark Jackson was in his 4th year with the team. Derrick McKey was in his fifth. All of them were hardened vets, not kids like Mitch, RJ, Grimes, and IQ. In 1998-99, the ages of the starters were 33, 33, 29, 32 and 35, and non starting rotation players were 30, 26, 26, 32 and 37.
In that sense, there is no comparison…the Knicks are much earlier in the teambuilding process.
But in terms of roster construction, the Pacers had their most successful period (made the playoffs in 11 out of 12 years with 5 trips to the conference finals) without a single top-10/all-NBA player. They did it with stability, chemistry, depth, coaching, and roster coherence.
Hubert, I get your point but why is that a NY problem?
Do you think Leon has a task force data team figuring out who exactly is likely getting worse and by how much?
Is this a trick question? The answer seems pretty obvious…
Are you saying that their POBO was not only funny and good-looking but also good at his job?
Well Boston just paid jaylen brown way too much money and zinger is already hurt. So they could take a step back. Miami had a great run but it also could be kind of fluke. Bucks have Gianni’s but their core is aging. Philly has an aging old harden and a potentially unhappy embiid and not much else except maxey.
I don’t see the top of the east as being this insurmontable mountain for us to climb. All of the top teams will probably still be good this year but I don’t see them as staying that good forever. All of them are older than us.
More worried about teams like Cavs, pacers and magic potentially getting much better. But we can get better too!
This is Leon’s biggest mistake…interesting player developmnet strategy.
https://streamable.com/f3ygep
i don’t appreciate being tricked to say anything about jalen that couldn’t be on the liner of an air supply album, but i think we’re underrating reggie a ittle here. jalen was awesome last year and otherworldy in the playoffs, but reggie is more special than he is sometimes given credit for. some random career playoff metrics:
player mins bpm
garnett 5283 5.1
miller 5308 5.0
pippen 8105 4.9
manu 6075 4.8
lillard 2458 4.3
kobe 8641 5.4
wade 6697 5.3
kidd 6088 4.3
mailman 7907 4.1
it’s completely fair to say that reggie’s value was mostly just being an efficient scorer. but this maybe shrouds just how ridiculously efficient he was for a high usage spacer. he basically never happens. reggie’s career TS+ (relative to the league) was 116. steph’s is 114. nash was 114. durant is 113. ray allen was 110 lillard is 106. and klay is 105. i’m not saying he’s comparable to a super usage scores like steph or kd, but he really was a uniquely special offensive player whose efficiency doesn’t look as gaudy in absolute terms as it was compared to the relevant opportunity cost.
looks like the 2025 draft may be back on after all. sag for flagg? lag for flagg? stupor for cooper?
we also can be a lot worse…. Randle’s 3-10 ft%.. along with several others showing outlier %s in the same range…. being prime candidates for some regression… and barring some improvements elsewhere Randle alone could cause some rather large issues for us this season if he’s not in the right alternating year version of himself….
not like anyone wants to think about it… but we were a 7th seed for most of the season until we got incredibly hot in the second half…. and if you buy the fact that we’re not really a 17-8 team with josh hart shooting over 50% from 3… then we’re probably short of a 47 win team again on that basis alone…. take a couple of other factors then we’re just not going ot be as good as we were last year….
but brunson and rj could take a sizeable step which i’d buy but i dont think that’s enough to come anywhere close the top 3….
flagg has competition in boozer and dybantsa… but it’s shaping up to be a real good year….
pt, no doubt that Reggie was a special performer on the biggest stages more often than not, but as we know, BPM is a noisy stat and it sort of covers for some of his dreadful weaknesses. He was a god-awful rebounder, maybe one of the worst rebounders of any 6’7″ players ever. He averaged 2.8 rebounds per 36 in the playoffs for his career. He was also a mediocre defensive player and gave back much of what he scored on the other end of the court. Brunson is also flawed…he was being attacked on the defensive end pretty regularly by the likes of Gabe Vincent. But if Jalen Brunson continues to light it up in the playoffs, he might get into that level of conversation….Reggie only played in 11 of his 144 total playoff games before age 27, so hopefully we’ll have 100+ more Brunson games to better compare him to Reggie…or better yet, will land the star that Reggie never had on his teams.
Randle and Brunson both just had career years, so of course there is potential for regression to the mean from those guys. I think it’s fairly likely that they can sustain that good play from last year, and that some of the young guys can improve, but there’s a range of possible outcomes here. I wouldn’t be penciling in perennial 55 win seasons just yet.
Just so I’m clear, the idea here is that a 46 win team — one that got deeply outclassed in the 2nd round — whose only move was to add a backup guard has vaulted to the top of the East and is now on par with one of the best EC teams of the last 20 years. That’s what we’re saying now?
“Are you saying that their POBO was not only funny and good-looking but also good at his job?”
Yes, but sadly, by the time he got here he was decrepit and washed, probably the worst of all the yes-men hired by Dolan. He remains a pretty good KB poster tho…
The Heat lost a lot of their key players, if they don’t get Dame then they’re a worse team. They barely made the playoffs this year.
We beat Cleveland handily.
Harden might be on his way out or tanking games till he’s out.
Having Hart the whole year is a huge upgrade. Maybe Grimes/IQ/RJ takes a leap. Brunson might not be done either.
I wouldn’t bet on being top-3 but it’s not a crazy notion.
They outclassed everyone in the East, we just happened to run into them in the 2nd rd. They nearly swept Boston.
Hubert, to play with your probably slightly tongue-in-cheek question — what I find so fascinating about this team is that even though we’re rolling back much the same team, we really have no real idea what we have.
We finished tied for third in the east in the playoffs. Yet I think we were all shocked that one of Boston, Philly, or the Bucks didn’t make to the finals. The whole playoffs felt weird.
We got rolled by Miami, but we had a lot of players hurt.
It was a tale of two seasons, with the post-Josh Knicks going at a 55-win pace (56 if you round up).
But a TON of unanswered questions with this roster:
Can Randle beat the every-other-season blues?
Will other teams start to solve Brunson? (depends partly on the answers to these other questions)
Is RJ just a dud?
Will Quick get demonstrably better?
Will Grimes get demonstrably better?
Will Hart play demonstrably better than his mean?
Will whoever plays backup 4 be able to hold down the fort?
I don’t know the answers to any of these. I suspect that if Randle is ‘Good Julius’ and nobody regresses, we can make the playoffs and maybe make some noise. Some regression, no real improvements, a rash of injury, we could struggle to win 42. It all breaks our way, I’m not sure about a 55-win season, but did any of us really expect to waltz into the second round this past year?
Hubert thinks Miami beating the bucks and Celtics easily was a fluke but beating us in six means we suck lol.
It was a tale of three seasons actually. First third was when we played Fournier and rose and cam. Below 500 team. Second third was 9 man rotation with McBride and grimes and we were an over 500 team. Last third was post Hart and we were on pace to win 55 games. We’re probably somewhere between that second team and third team.
yeah swift…i think that’s about right on where we land on wins…
on one hand…we were only 5 games over 500 at home…i reckon we do better than that this yr…
OTOH…only 4 teams in the league were better than us on the road…probably regress a bit there….
if they offset each other…we’re in the 45-50 range…
I think we’re an incredibly simple team to figure: run back the same team, expect the same result. (I suspect slightly better, probably 48-50 wins, largely bc I think Brunson will be even better.)
And then we have every reason to expect our offense will shit the bed in the playoffs bc too many of the players who contribute to our regular season success can’t shoot. Teams that can’t shoot don’t go on runs to the finals, they get figured out pretty quickly.
They nearly swept us.
Where do I sign for a 48-50 win team that loses to the eventual EC champs in 6 games in the second round that also has no rotation players over 30 years old, 5 rotation players 25 years old or younger, no contracts over $30.3M through 2024-25, is not in the tax, and has all of its own future draft picks plus up to 4 additional first rounders?
Really doesn’t refute my point that we lost in the 2nd round because we just happened to run into the Heat
Nearly swept? It was six games. And we nearly took it to 7. Come on, Hubert. I know you love to be mister negative when it comes to thibs, Leon and the Knicks but you’re being ridiculous. Nearly swept is 5 games. We won’t two games. Game 7 came down to the last minute. We were actually on the upswing in that series but it was too little too late. Boston and the bucks got easily handled by the heat too. Are those two teams going to be only ok then?
Like can’t you just fucking admit we’re in a good spot? Like just for a moment until the season starts and we lose games? Then you can act all negative but I just don’t get this obsessive need to hold on to this negativity when literally everything about our team and last seasons says we’re in a good spot? Are you seriously always gonna be like this unless we wins title?
I would not put the Heat in the top 4 in the east. Not sure I’d put us there either, but they barely made the playoffs. The Celtics should be very good, Philly . . .I mean who knows what their team is going to be. Milwaukee should be good as long as Giannis stays healthy but that supporting cast is very creaky.
Nowhere! The great thing is that, being fans and not players, we are not subject to the Collective Bargaining Agreement and we are therefore free agents every summer (with early termination options built in).
So, the good news is that you can choose to do even better than 48-50 wins! (The bad news is that you may have to root for the Miami Heat, Boston Celtics, or, egad, the Indians Pacers.)