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47 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2024.11.16)”
I deadlifted yesterday and was extremely tired and the game seemed well in hand. Apparently it was not.
Definitely it was not
I read some of a Nets blog. The fans were very frustrated by Hukporti. The Nets’ two centers are injured and they don’t have a third one on the roster and our fourth string center looked great. Basically they were jealous. They wondered why couldn’t Marks have found some sort of third string center so they didn’t get killed inside. Of course they know they are supposed to be losing, but they can’t help rooting for better play.
I thought Huk I looked good too, but I didn’t think Sims looked bad. Sims got more rebounds and he moves his feet and defends better in space than Hukporti. He had a much better plus minus. But Huk is a more willing scorer and gets more blocks.
Went to MSG for first time this season last night. Don’t know if it was the cup or Friday night or a little of both but it was a raucous atmosphere. Even Tom Brady wanted in on the fun apparently.
Let’s win this fucking cup.
Is there any way the Knicks can trade to get back DDV before the trade deadline? He’s having a terrible season so far, so maybe it won’t be pricy, and if he gets his mojo back when he’s here, which I think he will, he’d make the team so much better.
I know it’s a fantasy, but is it even possible within the scope of the cap and league rules?
It’s possible but you may not like the trade.
Deuce & Precious are close enough in salary that Aller can probably figure out the difference.
Minnesota won’t do Mitch for Donte but if Mitch regains value you can look for a three-way trade.
A couple of adrenaline threes with tons of time on the clock. One for Brunson, one from Payne, was poor clock management at the end of the game.
Clyde spoke of seeing “assininity” out there. lol. Really they can be better.
“Is there any way the Knicks can trade to get back DDV before the trade deadline?“
Bridges is so good. And Deuce a sixth man candidate. Everyone needs to chill
One big feather in Leon’s hat is that I’m 99% sure they’d give us Randle and Donte for KAT right now 🤣
I will do the Mitch trade. This bench would look solid again if it had Deuce, DDV, and Precious, and the team would regain its aggressive identity.
Why would you want a third two guard at the cost of an elite rim protector and offensive rebounder?
I am waiting with bated breath to see 20/25 mpg of Mitch =5 KAT =4 OG =3 Bridges =2 and Brunson =1. Kat played great at the 4 with Frenchy last year and 2 years ago with the Nyets Bridges had his best statistical season playing 80% of his minutes OOP at the 2.
That line up is going to score plenty of points and be far superior defensively, rebounding, etc…
“One big feather in Leon’s hat is that I’m 99% sure they’d give us Randle and Donte for KAT right now 🤣“
If I could have one back now it’d be Julius
Unless the rules changed recently, teams have to wait until the next season to reacquire a player. Even if Minnesota waives him, he couldn’t be claimed until July.
“teams have to wait until the next season to reacquire a player.”
but DDV is not the same player (he was).
The Raptors wouldn’t give us back RJ, but that’s because he’s essential to their tank.
Last night kind of felt like one of only a few representative Brunson games, right? His numbers on the season are still well-within the expected range, but something has felt a bit off.
Overall it’s still kind of hard for me to arrive at any conclusions and my priors haven’t shifted that much from the beginning of the season. The offense should be great, the defense is going to be an adventure all year.
I do think I underrated how much our lack of depth would hurt, since I figured we’d run a 7 or so man rotation in the playoffs anyway. Maybe, but, we have to get to the playoffs first and all of our innings eaters are suffering from dead arm at the same time.
No one should view the likes of Landry Shamet, Precious Achiuwa, and whatever Mitchell Robinson can provide as saviors, but I think it’s reasonable to hold allowing us to settle into more normal rotations has a force multiplier effect.
Technically we can, it would require Minnesota waiving Donte, a new team acquiring him, and that team trading him to us… or something like that. In short, it’s not happening.
I hope Pacome can have another couple outings like this and start to get more regular playing time, 5 points and 4 boards in 11 minutes isn’t going to get him to an all star game but it’s nice from a 19 year old and he looks like he has a basic grasp of how to play defense.
Apparently by NBA.com we had a worse ORtg than Brooklyn: 124.0 to 124.5.
I assume we had an extra possession.
Hukporti had 19 contested shots, the rest of the Knicks had 18. Sims had 5.
They weren’t necessarily good contests, kept at a lot of 3pt shooters from 10ft away, gave way too much space.
Maybe all that highly annoying hype is true. McCain goes for 29 on 10-17, 5-10 from three.
Of course the Sixers lost, which makes me happy.
Thanks, yeah, indeed a fantasy.
Okay, I’m going to do that thing that E and Pags do, which is repeat a criticism, but unlike them I’m only going to do it this one last time, instead of every damn thread (unless people think it’s a worthy topic of discussion).
It seems lunacy to look critically at the guy who scored 37 points and literally hit the game-winning three. But I feel like I’m being driven mad watching Brunson bring the ball up. The full-court pressure everyone’s now using makes him go super-slow (I don’t know why), and once he crosses half-court he’ll often turn his back to the basket and defender and dribble five seconds or more off the clock for no goddamn good reason.
Then someone finally runs up to set a pick that he ignores and he drives the other way into a double-team that leads to more time off the clock and not infrequently a turnover. And if there is a pass it’s with like 4 seconds left, which means that player has to get a shot off regardless.
I think there’s a reason Cam Payne has been effective and it’s not necessarily that he’s a good point guard. But he brings the ball into the frontcourt in like 4-5 seconds, which lets the team get into their sets and the ball moves around because people aren’t forced to take a last-second shot when they touch it.
Maybe this is just me, in which case I’ll shut up. But it really feels like with the kind of firepower we have on the team this year, Brunson’s grinding, slo-mo style of starting a possession is not serving the team well.
The big takeaway for me was that we substituted Simms/Huk for KAT and got massively lower usage from the C position, but the offense barely suffered because the combination of Brunson, OG and Bridges just upped their usage a bit and the team remained extremely efficient (TS 65%).
I’d WAY prefer having Towns playing because he’s the most efficient of all, but it shows that we have so much offensive firepower in the starting lineup that just because OG and Bridges are not averaging 20 PPG, that does not mean they are incapable of it. They are sacrificing . We have underutilized capacity that comes in handy when someone is hurt or when the matchups require someone to take on a bigger role. And that’s why they cost so much.
Doesn’t that apply to just signing the player?
It was designed to prevent a team from trading a guy that the other team didn’t want to make the salaries work, and picking him up again when he got waived.
But I would think if you make a fair trade offer that works under the salary cap rules you can get said player back. That would make sense, anyway.
I don’t actually want to give up anything to get Donte back, FWIW. I’d gladly steal him but we’re pretty set at his position.
Raven,
IMO you are definitely not wrong. Brunson dribbles and looks for his own shot way too much. He did that last year too, but last year Randle and OG were out much of the time and we didn’t have as a diverse a scorer as Bridges. So a lot of the time he was forced to up his usage a lot or we couldn’t score. This year it’s an entirely different team with a lot of different scoring options. He hasn’t made a full adjustment to that. If he did, I think it would make the offense even better. There will still be nights or possessions where he can take over (like last night), but I agree with you.
DDV doesn’t approve this comment.
That’s been driving me mad since the Indiana series when McConnell really seemed to wear him down.
I’m not sure anyone else can handle full court pressure, though. Maybe Bridges can?
Josh Hart can certainly get the ball up quickly but I feel like he’d just keep going to the rim too often without a “Stop Forest Stop” sign flip from the crowd.
Thanks, Strat. Glad I’m not completely insane.
It’s clear the new plan is full-court pressure and then double-team Brunson, as per the playoffs last year. Every team is doing it. And we do nothing to counter. Sometimes Hart brings the ball up, but that seems to be an accident of him being closest to the in-bounder, not a “plan.”
If the double-team comes early you can sometimes see the lights go on with the team that “Hey, someone should be open!” But if there’s four seconds left on the clock, that is often moot.
I’m with you, Raven, teams have now discovered that if they press Brunson full court, we lose a lot of clock and then it’ll be easier to defend us with less time to look for the perfect opportunity to score.
I think someone yesterday said that it should be Hart bringing the ball up, probably you, and i agree. Hart has no problem in bringing the ball up fast, well i don’t think there’s a thing Hart does that it’s not fast. LOL. And then he can get it to Brunson.
I also saw Brunson ignoring the screens and thought to myself “what the hell?”. There’s something going on with Brunson, maybe it’s the newborn, i don’t know, but i wish he can get his sh*t together soon.
“But I would think if you make a fair trade offer that works under the salary cap rules you can get said player back. That would make sense, anyway.”
I thought the rule was to guard against a trade that is actually a rental (which would also incentivise tanking even more). For example, a team that decides to tank at the deadline trades its star to a team that is making a push for an injured or overpaid player to match salaries. They then do the reverse trade in the off-season.
There’s another thing i’m worried about Brunson. Last season we were super optimistic because Brunson reached a high level and he saved us many times, but in a lot of those times we were without Randle, which would lead us to think, if he can do this without help, now imagine if we get him help. So far, this season, and of course it’s a small sample, but i’m anxious to prove that Brunson can be at his best with help, and not only when he’s the only one expected to make things happen.
The offense wasn’t the problem. The Nets doubled JB and he scored 37 points on 20 shots. Everyone but Cam Payne a small dose of Kolek shot the ball well. We didn’t turn it over a lot.
“So far, this season, and of course it’s a small sample, but i’m anxious to prove that Brunson can be at his best with help, and not only when he’s the only one expected to make things happen.”
My theory, based on absolutely no evidence other than giving JB the benefit of the doubt is a good bet, is that he struggling in trying to get everyone involved in the offence. He’s got a play or person in mind on those possessions. Hopefully that goes away.
Okay, I’ll shut up about it now, especially as people have been saying about other topics, it’s a problem, but it’s not THE problem. It’s just aesthetically irritating and seemingly easily fixed.
On the other hand, “Victor Wembanyama is the first player in the NBA this season to have 6+ 3-point field goals in 3 consecutive games. The last 3 players to do that in the league since 2022 are Steph Curry, Trae Young, and Klay Thompson.”
@Raven,
I know it sounds crazy after he won the game with his last shot and yesterday between injuries and fouls we were undermanned, but count me in on the subject, that’ why I wrote that I hate us being 30th in pace…
If they press JB someone must take the ball up in his place, if they constantly double him up we should find the open man*.
I was critical with Randle (and Melo before him) about pounding the ball and slowing the pace too much, I can’t help but do the same with Brunson.
We’re a much better team when the ball whips around and some of our players are very good in transition, we need to improve on that.
I’d rather risk a turnover trying to get an easy basket than work 23 seconds to take a hurried three pointer with the defense set**.
* We did it a lot using I-Hart as an “hub” in the high post last year, we could do the same with KAT and J-Hart.
** Yesterday late in the 4th JB took a three (and missed) after a Nets’ turnover when we had an easy fastbreak simply because he didn’t even look if his teammates were free running to the basket.
On another subject, overall Bridges had a better game, but he completely disappears in the 4th until the decisive block, who incredibly happened to be his only statistical voice in 10:39 of play (zero shots, zero fouls, no rebounds, no assists, no turnover).
It was really weird.
This has to be a “delayed stat”, because he had only 4 yesterday (on 13 attempts) and his ill advised airball down the stretch did help the Lakers a lot.
Max, Mikal can look like Frank all game–that block was worth one first round pick in and of itself. So now when I hear about how much he costs, it is down to four picks.
LOL BE
Mine is that the defense is so bad it leads to a lot of offensive possessions that seem critical, and our “this is a critical possession offense” isn’t as good as our “this is just a possession” offense (largely bc on the critical possessions it seems like Brunson tries to do too much).
It’s like “we were just up 12 and the D gave up 6 easy points, so *I* have to score now to stop this run.”
almost every time jalen misses a shot it seems like the ball comes back at our own rim really fast…
IMO DDV is not Bridges.
DDV had a terrific year for us last year. He shot more and tougher 3s and they went in, but he’s not going to create as much as Bridges off the dribble. Bridges has been deadly creating things in mid range and IMO it’s likely he 3p shot will eventually revert to the mean. DDV is struggling to score as well this year. He seems to be reverting back to his mean.
More importantly, Brunson is being hunted on defense. That’s why we end up looking surprisingly good when he’s on the bench because Payne has been pretty decent on defense. Also, Hukporti is already much better defensively than Sims and should get those backup minutes asap.
But I’m not gonna lie: 40 min of defense each from Brunson and KAT is going to be a daunting task.
The other thing that crossed my mind was Huk getting 30 minutes last night. I didn’t pay close enough attention to his entire defensive effort because I was watching boxing at the same time, but if Thibs played him 30 minutes he had to at least be OK. I was hoping he would replace Sims as backup by mid season, but if it happens sooner that would be great. He has to prove he can defend and not just block shots! I think that would open the door to moving Mitch. It’s not like I want to trade Mitch, but we still have some holes to fill and knowing we have a solid backup C besides Mitch would be a plus.
Bring up Chuma Okeke. Thibs will play him because he plays defense.
I definitely subscribe to the too many cooks in the offensive kitchen theory. It’s shades of Isiah except this time everyone can actually score efficiently and a few of our stars can defend.
Couple of thoughts on our big men glut (to be): first, Mitch has no trade potential because he’s hurt, and often hurt, and nobody will trade for him unless he comes back and proves to be the monster he was. So it seems silly to talk about it now.
Second, our collective hive memory is consistently mighty short. Huk might well turn into a monster on D, but Mitch WAS an actual monster last year before he got hurt. Like all-star D, turning drivers back to the perimeter like they were annoying bugs to be scattered with a wave of his hand. It’s unfortunate he has no offensive prowess, so again if Huk shows he has something there, that’d be great.
Third, I keep thinking that Huk and Sims SHOULD be a decent tandem on defense, with Huk playing the classic rim protector and Sims, with his quick feet, taking on smaller, quicker center types and 3-D guys. But I have to say I’ve not been impressed with his defense guarding guys taking threes (mostly on switches, but still). So maybe not.
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