‘2. New York Knicks. It’s been 51 years since the Knicks won a championship and they’ve been to the Finals only twice in that span, but this may be their best chance to return. OG Anunoby was re-signed with the express purpose of defending Tatum and Brown. Mikal Bridges was acquired from the Nets to defend elite shooting guards and small forwards. Jalen Brunson is coming off a brilliant second season in New York and Julius Randle is healthy and should be a major factor. The only issue is center, where Isaiah Hartenstein signed with the Thunder, leaving oft-injured Mitchell Robinson to man the middle.’

It wouldn’t surprise me if we begin the season with Sims and/or Precious in the rotation due to Mitch’s health, and I like both of them in switch-heavy schemes. I can’t find them now but I recall seeing numbers which matched my eye test–Sims is miserable at protecting the rim but surprisingly good on the perimeter.

Precious should be a solid regular season innings eater, and I have some hope for Dollar Tree breakout from him. I have a bit of a soft spot for guys with a diverse skillset who haven’t been able to put it all together. Maybe he can be the Paul Reed we had at home.

My guess (for the regular season) is more like 24 minutes of Mitch, 12 minutes of Precious or Sims, and 12 minutes of small.

And by the playoffs it will just be Mitch and small.

Denver doesn’t really have any choice here, but I’d be very nervous about this deal if I was a fan of theirs.

Honestly, our backup Cs might be worth playing even if it doesn’t give us the offensive potency of the death lineup.

Oh I also think they definitely are. I’m talking about the platonic ideal of this team.

In an 82 game season you can’t go to your death lineup in every game. I think the Warriors played with at times but mostly saved it for the playoffs until they got Durant and then it just became too easy.

Precious Achiuwa is like our David Lee. He’s going to soak up a lot of minutes in the regular season so we don’t have to go small too often.

Sims could be great if you just have him switch every time. He struggles playing drop against the PnR, but he has quick feet and guarded the perimeter effectively in college when he needed to do it.

Toronto played a ton of switch, so Precious is used to it, as we saw playing vs Philly.

We should really be playing switch-heavy schemes. It fits just about everyone on the roster except Mitch, Donte, and the PGs.

I sound like a broken record but I think this is what we’ll see this year: when Mitch plays, we’ll get traditional Thibs ball; when he goes to the bench we’ll get exactly what you describe. And I’m really optimistic about it. Like, 99th percentile outcome optimistic.

Forgive me for the incredible hyperbole but this team reminds me of the 2015 Warriors. I know we’re not going to be as good as them but we have a similar template, i.e. start with your traditional center (Mitch/Bogut) then give way to your death lineup.

The obvious problem is we have no Draymond Green on the roster. We do have OG Anunoby, though. I wonder if he has a next level to go to defensively. It sure would make that contract more palatable if he could become a middle-of-the-floor defensive QB.

And the last cause for my 99 percentile optimism: I expect Randle to work well in these switch-heavy schemes, and be surprisingly effective.

We don’t need Randle to be Draymond Green or Bam Adebayo on defense in these small lineups. We just need him to be as effective as Nikola Jokic on defense. I think he can clear that bar. The Nuggets had the 4th highest playoff DRtg when they won the chip, and they had no rim protector. Just Jokic and great perimeter D.

I still can’t figure out why we didn’t just draft Kyle Filipowski for the backup 4, though. He seemed like a great fit.

His girlfriend is part of a cult that’s not Nova basketball or Thibs’s Church of Minutes

—Switchable players—

C: Sims & Achiuwa
PF: KBD, Randle, Dadiet (in theory)
SF: OG, Hart, Toppin
SG: Mikal

Then he reverted to 30% again 🤷🏻‍♂️.

I’m too unmotivated to look at shot charts or figure out if anything other than luck contributed to his one good season. Suffice to say it would be fantastic if it happens again.

I still can’t figure out why we didn’t just draft Kyle Filipowski for the backup 4, though. He seemed like a great fit.