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Cavs Freaky Friday moment vs. Knicks tears outdated playoff narrative to shreds ? Jimmy Watkins – cleveland.com
02/22/2025 11:00:00
Cavaliers’ Beatdown of Knicks Made Stephen A. Smith Depressed And Sick – Sports Illustrated
02/22/2025 11:00:00
In the face of the NBA’s elite, New York Knicks crumble yet again, searching for redemption in a sea of slam dunks and missed opportunities – Motorcycle Sports Australia
02/22/2025 11:02:04
NBA: Cleveland Cavaliers hammer Knicks in Eastern Conference showdown – Citi Sports Online
02/22/2025 09:52:54
Cavs shoot 61 percent to blow out Knicks – KNBR
02/22/2025 10:35:48
Concerns Grow for Knicks Star After Blowout Loss – Heavy.com
02/22/2025 08:44:54
Cavaliers ?remember? 2023, bury Knicks 142-105 – News-Herald.com
02/22/2025 08:22:33
Cavaliers crush Knicks 142-105, extend winning streak to six – The Washington Post
02/22/2025 07:48:04
Celtics face the Knicks on 4-game win streak – The Star Democrat
02/22/2025 07:02:36
NBA roundup: Cavs hammer Knicks by 37 – MSN
02/22/2025 07:15:56
Knicks aren’t just falling short against NBA’s elite teams, they’re getting absolutely bludgeoned – CBS Sports
02/22/2025 06:42:28
ESPN Star Slams New York Knicks After Blowout Cavs Loss – Yardbarker
02/22/2025 07:03:43
Despite great record, New York Knicks season is as good as dead according to Stephen A. Smith – Marca English
02/22/2025 06:56:05
Game Night: Cleveland Cavaliers’ strategy dismantled New York Knicks’ defense – 12newsnow.com KBMT-KJAC
02/22/2025 06:45:51
NBA roundup: Cleveland Cavaliers hammers New York Knicks by 37 points – Sportstar
02/22/2025 05:45:53
Cavs crush Knicks in battle of NBA East elite, Thunder roll – KHQ Right Now
02/22/2025 06:31:37
Cavaliers center Jarrett Allen hurts right hand in rout of Knicks, expected to undergo MRI – MSN
02/22/2025 06:00:48
New York Knicks vs. Cleveland Cavaliers – Final Score – February 21, 2025 – FOX Sports
02/22/2025 06:10:43
Cavaliers center Jarrett Allen hurts right hand in rout of Knicks, expected to undergo MRI – KSTP
02/22/2025 04:43:20
Knicks continue to struggle against Celtics, Cavaliers in battle for East – NBA.Com
02/22/2025 05:24:09
79 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2025.02.22)”
Wingstoppers, y’all.
Have literally any other opinion on basketball
Anyway, saw a post on Instagram about umarell. Who said that here?
Maybe Jowles, confirmed by Max or Farfa.
Do we have a consensus now?
Everyone gonna focus on the defense but in all 6 of these games against the top 3 our offense has been curb stomped, too.
If we actually had an elite offense we could be competitive, even when surrendering 143.
It was Max or Cyber I think but Jowles really cottoned to the concept.
Let us never speak about last night again, except to note that if we had lost to the Bulls I would be in a dark place
On a brighter note (even though it may only appeal to Clarence), Flour & Weirdoughs on Key Biscayne is even better than Zak the Baker. Guava & cheese babka shouldn’t taste so good. And the cacio y pepe croissant I just finished was delicious.
“Umarell” is so ingrained in society it has deserved a Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umarell) and my avatar is an “umarells at work” photo. 😀
Dadiet scored a bit, but inefficiently. Hukporti has some skills and talents, but is nowhere near ready.
I stand by my “this is a good team” and that we need to round out the rotation. Always expected 2nd round for this season, with a good season being getting to the ECF.
Jamal Murray and Jokic were both bad defenders that would never win a championship because of it, and then it happened… with the right cast of players around them.
But please, anyone that thinks ECF is impossible, just say it right now, because if in May/June we are there, i don’t want to read “yeah, i was skeptic but i also said that if ______ we would make it”. Just assume it. I want to be in the ECF and i think it’s possible. And if we are out before that, i’ll assume i was wrong.
Of course these games against the Celtics and Cavs are not bringing a lot of hope that i’m right, but i still think Mitch will make a difference, and i think some players will play a lot harder in the playoffs, at least i hope so.
Luckily I’m the only person who followed up the Memphis game by saying a 37 point margin of victory ultimately proves nothing, so I’m not as distraught by last night as those of you who invented the 37-Point Corollary.
The Cavs were ready. We were not. Whatever.
Tomorrow is, I think, the most important data point in the season.
We see this all the time in the NBA: teams who have been humiliated treat a regular season game like game 7 and get revenge. The Magic did it to us a month ago with a bunch of scrubs after we humiliated them twice. The Sixers did it to these very Celtics in Boston on Christmas.
If we don’t do that tomorrow, be prepared to break up the band.
I’m not saying we need to win, but if we can’t be competitive after 6 consecutive curb stompings, with the whole damn world now echoing what I’ve been saying since November, there’s a real problem here.
Obviously the playoffs are more important than tomorrow. But I think how we perform tomorrow is going to be the best indicator of how we will perform in the playoffs.
Show us your heart, or show us that you don’t have one.
Re: Umarell, yeah it was Jowles and i had never heard of it before he mentioned it here. I’m glad there’s a name for that, because portuguese old men also like to go watch construction work. 😀
Do they wear the official uniform with the sleeveless multi pocket jacket and the arms folded behind the back? 😀
I’m mainly posting only on game threads this days, here’s a summary of my Knicks related thoughts.
– I’m okay with being the 4th, 5th or even 8th team in the League, win 50-plus games and hope in playoffs luck.
I’m getting older and I’m not interested in building from scratch, too many bad things can happen in real life during a “process”, I rather take today’s team maybe-meaningless wins than basically all the rest of this century pre-Leon.
– We were spoiled in the last two years, with teams that often overcome injuries, went beyond their talents and very rarely gave up on a game, no matter how bad it was going.
Compared to those gritty bunches this team has no soul and no identity.
Even with all its flaws I immensely loved last year’s unlucky team.
– This is Year-1 of the All-in Era, I think our roster will be better on the margins next year but the core, for all his talents, has meaningful issues that needs to be addressed very decisively.
– Team defense is a problem because JB is a traffic cone (that’s why’s so good at getting charges 🙂 ), KAT is irritating in his inability to at least raise his arms and Thibs’ philosophy doesn’t work anymore in 2025 (anyway it isn’t easy to overcome two very bad defenders, no matter the coach).
– The offensive side is better, but only when we share the ball and move the players, a couple of things often overlooked given JB’s tendencies to isoball and Mikal’s-OG’s uncanny ability to disappear for long stretches.
– The bench is what it is, a healthy Mitch will help (if he ever become available), Deuce and Payne are okay, Precious’ low BB-IQ is overmatched against good teams, Shamet is nothing, the rookies (all of them) need to play against scrub teams to build experience but have the wrong coach to do it.
– My feeling is that Thibs’ magic has run his course, he should finish the season and then run away with the huge money his friend Leon granted him with the last extension.
We need a new voice, but we’re such a nepotistic organization that I’ve little hopes in a change of the guard next summer.
– I would be very happy to be wrong, so please surprise me Knicks!
sleeveless multi pocket jacket? I think they do, but i’m not 100% sure.
arms folded behind the back? This one i’m sure… it’s hilarious! 😀
You know, Cyber, I’m actually much more optimistic than folks think. My assessment has been that “all the evidence so far indicates this team has no chance.” And I have been holding that line pretty strongly.
But there is nothing permanent about statements like that bc we’re still accumulating evidence. These ass whoopings are actually really beneficial bc we never had even a puncher’s chance doing things the way we were doing them. Never. And these 6 games against the top 3 have proved that beyond doubt.
And now that no reasonable person can deny that, maybe our very-slow-to-adjust coach will finally try something different (like, I don’t know, starting Deuce over Precious?). And then maybe we’ll start seeing evidence that this team can, in fact, compete with the top 3.
So I am actually optimistic that after last night, something will change, and we’ll see something different tomorrow. And if we do, and it works, I will be throw out all 6 of these humiliations and become very open minded about our chances of making the Finals.
On the other hand, if Precious starts again and we get our asses kicked, I think you can fire Thibs before the plane lands.
And then maybe I’ll be optimistic with the new coach.
When you play against a solid defense, on average you are going to score less than usual automatically.
When you can’t stop a team at all because your defense is terrible, your offense is going struggle even worse because there are fewer defensive rebounds and transition points.
I like Precious, but he’s more of very good 3rd string PF or meh backup PF because he has no outside shot. With Josh Hart out, Precious is starting. Josh Hart is pretty big key to our offense. He’s our secondary playmaker/ball handler, gets us out in transition and even though he’s not a spacer, he has to be respected from outside more than Precious.
OG may be back, but he’s not 100% sharp.
IMO our problem is 90% defense.
How we fix that is problematical because we have two weak links on the court, but we need to see what we look like with Mitch and Hart back and OG at 100%.
I think the only thing that will change this year is that Mitch starts playing. Thibs will make changes when he’s backed into a corner, like when he finally benched Kemba and Fournier after 20 games because he was on the hot seat or Plague because we we’re down against Atlanta. But absent that, I doubt anything changes in time to matter this season.
Maybe next season will bring something new.
For now, hopefully Mitch’s return slides everyone to their more natural position. OG is normally a 3, Mikal a 2, KAT’s teams had more success when he was at the 4. Not to mention our success in the Cavs series was largely on the backboards of Mitch and Hart who didn’t play.
I think Thibs deserves to finish the season, although we look like the Titanic on our way to hit the iceberg. But like Max, i’m hoping Leon can see that we need change in the summer.
Although Mikal will never be worth 5 picks, and we all agreed on that when the trade happened, or at least i think we did.
But when he plays great, the team also plays great, so i think he is the key and that makes me understand why Leon went all in on him. If very good Mikal shows in the 2nd round, against one of Celtics and Cavs, i think we have a good chance to make it to the ECF.
The problem has been that Mikal’s very good games are not many until now, but that’s where my theory that we might have an extra gear for the playoffs is real. With his iron man record quest and all that stuff, maybe he plays at 60% or 70% during the regular season, to then go all in the playoffs, when there’s time to recover between games.
Maybe this is not a good theory, but that’s what i’m holding on to, right now. 😉
The silver lining in all of this is that Mitch is going to play this season, hopefully for an extended amount of games. That will go a long way in providing the data needed for the off season moves, including coaching staff.
See what happens when we don’t start Deuce? We have got to stop playing Precious + a center against good teams it just does not work at all.
DRed for coach!
I thought DRed was already the GM.
No, no, no. I think we played well, I thought we were focused, but I wouldn’t call it a statement win,” Atkinson said. “They’re obviously a really good team, we were at home, but I think we got good feedback on what could work if you play this team in the playoffs. That’s probably the most important thing.”
I think we can be pretty sure Thibs was worried about the Cavs size, potential advantage on the boards and scoring inside if he went too small with Deuce. The problem of course is that Precious hurts the spacing and without Hart we lose valuable playmaking and ball handling also. So it’s very debatable as to which way sacrifices more. We can be sure that what we did last night did not work.
That Atkinson quote is kind of chilling. Basically saying they know exactly how to handle us come playoff time.
That Atkinson quote is kind of chilling. Basically saying they know exactly how to handle us come playoff time.
My fix of the Atkinson quote”but I think we got good feedback on what could work if you play this team in the playoffs if both Mitch and Hart are missing“
+1
+1
Yeah fair point, and OG was kind of a shell of himself too.
Still doesn’t excuse the beatdown tho.
A review of the back end of our bench, given the time we had to observe them yesterday (and thank you Thibs for that small favor…).
I’ll be happy to move on from Shoot-First Payne. He’s competent, but just not what you want at point on a decent team. Maybe on the Magic he’d be good, as they can’t shoot top to bottom.
Shamet’s too small. He tries very hard on defense, which I appreciate, but he’s constantly being shot over by taller players as if he wasn’t there. And yesterday he passed up multiple shots for no good reason. Maybe that’s a good thing, but even that’s not a good thing.
Didion has a dad bod and acts it. He has a decent shot and no clue otherwise, and the dad bod and lack of movement makes me think he’s not in NBA shape. Maybe that’ll change next year. In general I find him useless.
Wright plays excellent defense and looks like he has never played offense before in his life. Never really seen that before.
Huk is God (no subjectivity here). He’s big, he moves his feet, he has a nice, feathery jump-hook thing. Makes some rookie mistakes still, but his energy and ability to move makes up for some mistakes. Probably never a starter, but with some seasoning (and I’d argue, even now) a decent backup.
Kolek is not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy.
What about a sea change to the defensive approach, one that includes incorporating zones and more switching?
I supported Thibs not abandoning his principles after 20-30 games. But we’re approaching 60 now and repetition hasn’t helped, so we’re getting closer to the definition of insanity.
If those kinds of changes aren’t on the table, we either have to scrap this experiment and goback to Thibs ball with KAT at the 4 and Mitch at the 5 or just scrap Thibs.
Only person who looks like they actually care during these games is Brunson. KAT and his 0 effort defense just brings bad vibes.
i’d say scrap thibs…his quotes after last night (and actually he said the same thing on the on air interview during one of the tv timeouts) and i am filtering them from the actual words to what we all know what he was saying… was that essentially we were loafing/laying down like dogs and the team has no toughness…when the coach starts telling his boys that through the press…there’s dark clouds on the horizon..
I mean he is accurate but at the same time…lets face it…there is a chasm of talent disparity between that team and ours (from top to bottom) and even if you battle hard (like the last years teams)…you still aren’t gonna come out on top but at least you gave effort ….
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GkZwCLZWQAApDUw?format=jpg&name=large looks like Macri is hanging it up
How long until he starts attacking certain players or staff?
And when you play against a great offense, on average you’re going to give up more points than usual automatically.
There’s supposed to be some type of irresistible force vs unstoppable object dynamic.
When it’s roadkill every time, stop denying the truth.
We have a lot of offensive talent, enough to overwhelm most of the league. But this offense is easy to dismantle with the right mix, and most contenders will have that mix.
The next hire should be Jay Wright. A coach with X and O’s and not just relying on playing players 40 plus minutes and never making adjustments.
Things like this happen when you have a group of players you give 40 minutes to every game and every other player is a towel boy. How is a roster going to develop that way? Do you think TY Jerome would see enough minutes under Thibs or would he even look Dean Wade’s way. Dean Wade isn’t some great player. They just have a really good coach
In the backcourt Garland and Mitchell aren’t some elite defenders, but the coach makes it work
Talent gap by 40 points im not trying to hear that
Brunson
Bridges
OG
Towns
Mitch
No excuse if he can’t get that unit to defend decently. Outside of Towns vs Mobley the Cavs don’t have some massive defensive starting lineup upgrade
It’s not random, though, Cyber. There is a reason Very Good Mikal doesn’t show up in these games. There is always one guy on the court (usually Josh Hart, sometimes Precious) that the opposing team doesn’t respect, so they put their center on him and that center protects the space Mikal needs to operate.
This type of defense is very hard to run without elite wing defenders who can cover ground quickly and rotate sharply. That’s why 90% of the league can’t employ it. When we play the 10% who can, you’re not gonna see good Mikal. We were better off with Donte’s quick trigger and unlimited range. And that’s why people are calling for Deuce.
Have you seen our bench play?
There’s a reason Huk is getting minutes: he’s not terrible. He’s also not great, but hell, for #58 on a rookie deal he’s extremely promising and decent enough that Thibs started giving him minutes awhile ago. He also gave Payne lots of minutes until he showed that No, he really isn’t a great backup point, just a mini-microwave. And Shamet? Yikes. Being that, from the start of this season he’s shown trust in Deuce, and he’s given Precious more minutes than he deserves. I defy you to make a case that any of those players who aren’t getting minutes belongs on an NBA court at the moment.
Ty Jerome is three inches taller than Deuce and is shooting 44% from three while scoring two points more per game than McBride.
Dean Wade is, at least, 6’9″. He’s basically a slightly better shooting Precious.
De’Andre Hunter, meanwhile, their first guy off the bench, is averaging 18 points a game while shooting 41% from three, while being, you know, 6’8″. (Scours Knicks bench…) Nope. (Scours Knicks starting wings…) Nope.
Isaac Okoro is 6’5″ and shooting 39% from three. Strus is mediocre in all ways but can shoot the three decently, has some size, and rebounds better than he should.
You have to get all the way to Sam Merrill to find someone who is 6’4″ and fairly pointless, which is our Shamet. Who’s a key bench piece for us.
Delon Wright might be the best Knicks best point of attack defender . He just recently came over and should get a chance. All of these small guards outside of Brunson on this roster aren’t going to cut it.
Knicks waiting and bringing back Shamet is on the FO, they could’ve signed a bigger player who would have have more use to this team.
Dadiet- get him in the game against bad teams to get him reps and see if he could help you in later in the season in a smallish role. He is 6’8.
At least some of our record up to this point is an illusion, because no other team plays a playoff rotation for 82 games. We banked some early wins, but the bill for that is coming due.
Trying to play all of these guys for 3000 minutes was never going to work. They’re getting fatigued now and starting to get hurt, and the answer is to give the other starters even MORE minutes.
We were coming off a back to back against a mediocre team who pushed us to overtime despite playing their bench 97 minutes while we played ours 50. We got the win, barely, in Chicago, but the next day these guys had to go out and would have all had to play 40+ minutes again if we hadn’t gotten blown out. We probably rushed Anunoby back too.
Seems to me like the overuse is going to continue and we’re going to go into the playoffs banged up and exhausted. And it will probably be like this as long as Thibs is coach.
We can talk about back to backs and Mitch coming back, but I think enough evidence is in. We aren’t as good as Boston or Cleveland and therefore we won’t make the conference finals. We’re still a good team that can be fun to watch, and actually ranked in the top five in the NBA but we have a long way to go. We still won’t win Sunday either.
Knicks are going backwards against the competition. They demolished the Cavs in the playoffs two years ago, with a young nucleus, giving up 103 points per 100 possessions. How many possessions did it take the Cavs to get to 103 last night? 75? Cavs have made some nice moves around the edges, but it’s the same Core Four — Garland, Spida, Mobley, Allen as two years ago. They’re leaving tire tracks on the Knicks now.
Knicks have also gone backwards versus the Celtics. Two years ago, Celtics lost in seven against Miami, Knicks lost in six. Knicks were more banged up. Knicks gave up 104.3 points per game, Celtics gave up 109.1. Point differential was Knicks minus 3.8, Celtics minus 3.8. Also tire tracks.
Knicks simply aren’t keeping up. No two ways about it. Part of it is Thibs, part of it is personnel. And the Knicks have depleted their asset chest significantly more than the competition.
I’m not ready to concede this. People forget how dominant Mitch was in the paint. The issue is how much he’ll give back in offense…but there’s a non-zero chance he takes us to that top level. Even if it’s only a 15% (in part because who knows how healthy he’ll be, now and for the rest of his career), it is a chance.
Otherwise, yeah, no way. And Sunday will be ugly.
This is why teams don’t pay $42.5mm for their 3-and-D wing.
OG is a lot better than Hunter, but Hunter + Strus+ Okoro + Jerome + Wade is a lot better than OG. And that’s the kind of depth we can’t afford with his salary on the books.
And we’re 4-1 without him this year, so we can put that stupid “impact on winning” narrative to bed.
His acquisition has been a disaster. Negative BPM player, hasn’t moved the needle against the top teams a micrometer; if anything the needle has gone the other way.
Absolute best case is that he functions very well on defense only if the right other pieces are around him — and I guess if he doesn’t have to play the 4, which no one said a word about until like a month ago. There really isn’t much evidence for that proposition either, but we can be charitable.
OG isn’t the issue. The issue is the starting Center who is horrendous on defense and it drains the team. Now they have to move him to PF which they didn’t want to when they traded for him. The constant attacking of Brunson and Towns is so glaring every time a good team pops up.
Not really. You can squint, I guess, and say OG’s a touch better — but Hunter’s become without question a positive OBPM guy; he’s at almost 2 with Cleveland. OG’s flat.
I’m kind of hoping we beat the Celtics if only to bathe in the thunderous silence that will occur here on Monday.
OG is not “the issue” but he is “the reason” we have no depth.
But I was just replying to Raven. I don’t miss anything we gave up for OG.
I won’t be silent. I’ll be thrilled. And I’ll be here talking about what this new evidence means.
Bridges needs to be better, those 5 picks would look good right now.
don’t hold your breath raven…not happening…
instead of looking at the off season (and last yr in season) moves in isolation…holistically…it is becoming clear that it isn’t gonna work (if working means being in the finals)…even if you want to consider mitch to be the messiah…it ain’t workin …coupled with a coach on fumes of yester year…we’re latter day yankee cashman-like…good but not good enough..
Why’d you delete all the stuff about moving on from him this summer and the “experiment” possibly “failing”?
You’re dancing a lot of angels on a lot of pins to strain to reject the idea that they’d be better with the pieces they gave away for him. Or that those pieces aren’t missed — they obviously are. Their depth and bench are terrible.
There’s no rule that says you *have* to keep trying to thread this needle. It can’t be threaded.
OK, Hubert edited his post a bunch of times (I responded to I think the second version) and wound up at least at:
So we’re probably getting somewhere.
RJ and Quickley wouldn’t be “depth” on this team, they’d be making a combined $60M or whatever they make and they’d be playing heavy mediocre minutes.
Maybe try to sell the idea of opportunity cost instead of the idea that we’d be better with RJ and IQ, that’s a better argument. “Should have traded them for a better player than OG” or some such. Nobody is buying the actual argument you are selling, might be time to change tactics.
Because I agree with Raven’s point that we shouldn’t be looking at past moves in isolation.
And also because I didn’t bring it up to beat a dead horse. I was looking forward to the solutions phase.
If this experiment fails (and we are getting ahead of ourselves here; there’s still an important game tomorrow), I think reverse consolidating OG into 3 players and apron relief is one of the key steps we can take to address our lack of depth.
Quickley is on a 5/162 contract and has been injured and ineffective in Toronto. He’s 25 so has no development remaining.
Who wants that contract? Not me!
It’s naturally embedded in my criticisms of the trade and how it worked out. Went without saying, but happy to say it explicitly.
It’s been an asset/talent depletive trade from the get-go.(*) Some of the commentators said so at the get-go — Stefan Bondy of the Post among them — as did I. There are clearly scenarios where RJ Barrett and Immanuel Quickley could have been used in asset/talent accretive trades. Plenty of them. Leon should have done that instead. I have no great attachment to either player. Other than going to the game they played in MSG a few weeks ago, I don’t think I’ve seen either of them play a second of basketball since they left.
(*) Made worse by the high number Leon gave OG last summer.
Obviously getting our ass kicked again by one of the elite teams gives plenty of fuel to the fire for those who think the team has reached its zenith and can’t hang with the top teams.
But OG was back after multiple weeks off. Players rarely have good games their first game back like that. Hart was out and he’s probably our third best player. And, of course, we still don’t know what the Mut h factor might add to this team.
Plus second game of a back to back on the road after barely winning an overtime game.
Obviously Cleveland, Boston and OKC are better and have more depth. But the I still think if we’re fully healthy with good Mitch in the rotation, in the playoffs where teams always play a shorter rotation anyways we could potentially hang.
That being said, I think even with a fully healthy Mitch set maybe one more good bench si bc piece away from truly being able to win it all.
The good news is that while we may not have a lot of draft assets left, all of the rest of our top guys are all locked in next year so we’re really just trying to find that one piece.
Excuse me, I meant Pepper’s.
Name them.
Losing sucks.
Dadiet just came back from a toe injury or something, might be part of his dad bod. Generally, he’s not a great athlete and has a bit of the Knox baby giraffe limb control. He got up some good shots and had a nice cut. I think he forgot where he was and stepped out to the FIBA 3pt distance instead of the NBA on one shot.
I don’t think Thibs will do it. We’ll win enough games against every non-Boston, non-Cavs teams that he won’t switch. Plus, I think we’ve tried it in small doses here and there. Never for a full game, but a couple possessions and it didn’t look great.
He makes a lot of rookie mistakes, which is okay for a rookie, but not so great for a team trying to contend. Definitely some eyepopping plays though. Needs to rebound better.
I would hope his value around the league is higher than Wiggins’s, so he should have been offered for Butler.
In my humble opinion.
That said, Wiggins only has two years left (one and a player option) at $58, so that probably entered the equation. OG’s got four at $176. Gonna be a tough contract to move.
If you’re actually reading what I’m saying, my take today is that this ass kicking was a blessing.
My take all year has been “we can’t hang with the best teams doing it this way.” I have never made grand proclamations about never ever being able to hang or the situation being unfixable.
The whole situation is extremely fluid, and I’m very happy that my thesis has been proven before the playoffs bc it gives us the opportunity to make changes before we get there. I’m even optimistic we might see some of those changes tomorrow.
You can’t land a killshot in February.
I think all of Kolek, Huk, and Dadier could be good depth either next year or the year after. Either would be very helpful. Add a healthy Mitch (should such unicorn exist) and one cromulent wing and we’re OK on depth. The real issue is that our starting 5 will have 2 one-way players (even if Mitch is back). It will take creative coaching to make that work, and it’s a fair question whether Thibs can get there.
I think my only real point was taking the rare opportunity to review our bench, and then looking at our competitor’s bench, and noting that theirs is probably a 25-30 win NBA team, while ours would likely get relegated to the G League after a year.
Lots of blame to go around for that, most of it described for months. I’ll note that I was in favor of both wing trades at the time, I really thought that both were keys to unlocking something fabulous. That’s harder to envision 2/3 of the way through this season. Honestly I think it is that both are much more passive than I thought they’d be. Looking at their seasons, they’re playing very mid to their career stats, but much worse is that they consistently disappear (on offense) — for quarters, for halves, sometimes for games at a time. Hard to be a ‘juggernaut’ when your two keys do that regularly.
I know it’s hard when you have two such ball dominant players (and maybe Jalen can dial it down just a bit). But if Hart can do it…
Rotation players on/off:
Bridges +7.9
Payne +6.5
KAT +6.3
OG +6.2
Deuce +5.2
Shamet -0.2
Sims -1.3
Hart -1.5
Brunson -6.1
Achiuwa – 8.0
There’s undoubtedly a lot of noise. I looked it up a bit ago and teams are shooting around 40% when Hart or Brunson are on the floor. In theory that’ll drop…
Unsurprisingly, Brunson’s poor on/off comes entirely on the defensive end. When he’s off the court we’d rank 6th in the league on defense.
Four of these 6 games have gotten out of hand in the first quarter and been over by halftime. It’s not the depth that’s killing us.
Let’s see what we do tomorrow. I really think it’s the most meaningful data point of the year.
Our bench is great 6-8, it’s what happens after that’s terrible. But when it comes to the playoffs, you only need 8 players (but yes, ideally a couple more because of injuries).
EB, I’m curious where OG ranks this year in whatever metric you kept using that said he was a top 20 player last year.
EB I sort of agree (not sure 6-8 is great, they all have concerns of one sort or another). But only two players on Cleveland are playing over 30 minutes a game, and they’re at 31 and 30. There’s a reason for that.
Not sure what metric that was, but OG is 118th in the association in DEPM.
I don’t think I’ve seen either of them play a second of basketball since they left.
So you didn’t see a second of the Knicks Raptors games, despite looking at Knicks games and following RJ box scores since he left incessantly? Strange…
It was probably EPM. They rejiggered their formula, and it does not love him nearly as much. They now split it into forward-looking EPM, which incorporates previous seasons, and actual EPM, which only does this season.
In the forward-looking EPM, he’s in the 90th percentile at +2.1, right between Desmond Bane and Chris Paul.
Some other names directly ahead of Bane are Melton, Norm Powell, Gobert, and Jamal Murray.
Directly behind him are Lonzo (no way they have enough data for him), Trae, and MPJr.
The single years stat puts him in the 82nd percentile, tied with Hart, Looney, and Sandro M on the Spurs who doesn’t seem to have played much.
Darko ranks him 29th but that seems to be the outlier and ranks him higher on offense than defense.
nbarapm.com has a number of other metrics he doesn’t do as well in. As a summary, other than DARKO: two have him around 50, one around 70, and two around 90.
If you want a real scapegoat though, Mikal is ranked 100+ on every metric except 3.5yr RAPM where he’s ranked 83rd.
For reference, De’Andre Hunter is 160+ (His defense is really bad). Ty Jerome is around 50th in most of them. Okoro starts around 130. Strus 170.
Cam Payne has most of the metrics sub-100 ranking. Deuce is around 140 with a couple over 200. Hart is as high as 30 and an eyeballed averaged around 60.
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