Knicks Morning News (2023.01.20)

He comes “cheaply” because the other teams play a modern style — what Z-Man rightly denoted the style you see when you watch something like GS/BOS — not the style you have to play if you play Mitch.

He’s the definitive Moneyball player. The other teams want different, modern tradeoffs, not the tradeoffs you make if you have Mitch.

NOTE: None of this speaks to what Mitch theoretically could do if deployed in a more modern style, though obviously to a degree that’s reflected in his market value and cost.

I’m not sure why Moneyball became a diss all of a sudden. It’s been a good thing to find inefficiencies in the market, no?

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Not when it means losing in 5 in the first round when you happen to make the playoffs and general purgatory hovering over the entire project.

The marginal wins arguably achieved by picking up the loose change the other teams leave laying around are counterproductive if you want to build a contender. If what you want is to be able to turn on the TV or go to the Garden on any given night and have the Knicks with a slightly better chance at winning that particular game, I suppose it’s ok. There’s nothing wrong with that; it’s just not what a whole lot of us have in mind.

This is really just more of the “contention or bust” divide that features prominently around here. Is what it is.

“Do you remember where you were when you heard the Knicks lost in the playoffs?”

Oh, yeah, definitely — sitting in nice seats I lucked into for all three games and where a lot can be observed.

and is a beast on the offensive boards.

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At the cost of hovering, clogging the lane for other players, and probably indirectly impacting transition defense.

There’s a reason the other teams don’t “hover” their center.

Rather than dwell on what a player can’t do well, you should focus on what he can do well and try to build a team that complements each other so the sum is greater than the parts.

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Obviously concur, but when the players are all stuck in a primitive style, all we can do is project.

The Knicks three best offensive players are all slashers. They have to deal with an extremely clogged lane. As I’ve said in the “what should the front office do?” conversations, rather than project and guess, I’d really like to see the lane become unclogged and the offense modernized before making any final decisions. As Z-Man noted, and as I’m sure you’d agree, you turn on a GS/BOS game (or basically *any* other game) and the differences in spacing and openness are stark and obvious.

I’m not even convinced Mitch couldn’t play well in an open lane, modern offense. He can pick and roll and rim run, and could likely crash the offensive boards very effectively from distance. I see no reason to believe he *has* to hover to be effective.

He is 2nd on the team in RPM, 3rd in RAPTOR WAR, 3rd in BPM, and first in individual net rating. Box score stats, impact stats, and stats that combine the two agree he’s very good!

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The other front offices aren’t obsessed with that stuff. I realize that bringing up outside opinion warrants the tumbrils and the guillotine around here, but Mitch’s reputation is not that. He’s not even Tier 5 in the Athletic and his peak Top 100-ish rating is somewhere in the 92-ish range.

There’s ample reason for that — they’ve been pointed out here at length. Those people aren’t just doing those ratings that way just to piss off the Mitch faction at Knickerblogger.

Now, it’s of course possible that those rankings are off. That’s certainly possible and as an open-minded sort, I never dismiss those possibilities. But making that case requires far more rigor and analysis than some superficial all-in-one metric that anyone who pays attention knows is biased toward certain types of players. (cough … Isaiah Hartenstein).

Is there a center somewhere who is a great fit with a guy who takes and misses a lot of shots in the paint?

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Oh, I don’t know — maybe one that … doesn’t bring elite shotblockers into the paint????

This shtick where you pretend front offices care more about The Athletic tiers and The Ringer rankings than they do about various metrics is so tired.

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Another strawman. Never said front offices don’t pay attention to numbers and metrics. Never even hinted it. Did say they aren’t obsessed with it, and they aren’t.

The outside opinion is generally reflective of what front offices are thinking, and all of them of course use numbers and metrics vigorously. As if the Athletic guy and the b/ball guys at ESPN and SI are just a couple jabronies watching a few games on TV and bloviating.

The metrics alone aren’t indicative of Mitch’s actual value and reputation in the marketplace and it’s impossible to see how that really warrants any kind of relitigation.

https://theathletic.com/3412054/2022/07/11/nba-players-top-125-tier-5/

This is the Athletic article that describes the tiers, gives the methodology, and lists the Tier 5 guys.

“Is it still relevant?” Well, the methodology and philosophy are. There’s 60% of a season of new data, of course, so there’s likely been some player movement.