Da Grinch

basically in watching the playoffs I am seeing a major differnce in supporting casts , every playoff team has at least 2 players who effectively supliment their star players by

being able to play good defense and hit an outside jumper.

or being able to play on the court by giving his team a bunch more possesions by either being an excellent rebounder, getting steals and blocks , taking charges .

the knicks have too many players who are not good enough or versatile enough to effectively aid their scorers , they dont space the floor and they dont get enough extra possesions .

they were last in blocks.

only 4 teams had less steals than them.

its easy to blame a team's stars when things aren't going well , but if the other team has given their starsthe type of help they need to be most effective , the knicks haven't in alot of cases it wouldn't matter anyway how good your stars are.

a very good start to the rebuilding effort would be draft well and get some role players who are worthy of minutes at the end of games...

__________________
"I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races--that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together in terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior. I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."- Abraham Lincoln Sixth Debate with Steven A. Douglas at Quincy, Ill., Oct. 13, 1858

TwinkieFoot

I completely agree with you on how we need to make these sort of moves to build a winner. Last year, I noted how the second round contained an abundance of these sort of players and how we should place greater importance into retaining and making these selections. The Jazz for instance is a perfectly example of how these sort of players can help build a winner. Aside from Deron Williams, their team is composed of late first round and second round picks; Carlos Boozer, Memhet Okur, and Kyle Korver were second rounders while Kirilenko was the 24th pick in his draft. Take a look around the league and you'll notice an even deeper trend that most successful teams have key players that were selected very late in the draft. We have an infinite amount of researchers financially and it is time that we look to invest some of them into more picks in the future. I doubt we'd be sorry about this decision if we did.

southeasy

NY has a player who owns his role by definition by the name of renaldo balkman. he is very able of providing "his team a bunch more possesions by either being an excellent rebounder, getting steals and blocks , taking charges" pure hustle & toughness i just think with a new coach, he can maybe get back his PT that for some reason he wasn't given all year

atleast thats my opinion cause thats one of my boys, maybe new yorkers see it different. i know he's a poor jumpshooter (you can't even call him that) but you know what i mean, is that what is keeping him off the floor? he's also an underrated passer.

__________________
Primero Veinte Con La Enfermedad
1AJosh Howard/1BGerald Wallace/2Amare Stoudemire/3Chris Bosh/4Rajon Rondo/5Sean Williams/6Travis Outlaw/7Al Thornton/8Caron Butler/9TJ Ford/10Dwight Howard/11Antawn Jamison/12Dorell Wright/13Leandro Barbosa/14Samuel Dalembert/15Thabo Sefolosha/16Stromile Swift/17Jose Calderon/18Trevor Ariza/19Jamario Moon/20JR Smith

Cierre pero ningún Puro: Julian Wright, Renaldo Balkman, Ronnie Price, Jeff Green, Amir Johnson, Louis Williams


RIP to the Career & The Man, Jonathan "Best Practice Player In NBA History" Bender & Eddie "Most Known Unknown" Griffin

Da Grinch

I think its more about egos than draft position , when you are drafted 50 something its a statement the nba is making about your prospects that you are a role player(maybe) so you have to fit in ...you dont have a guarenteed 3 years to get it together ...5 if you show any semblance of a game or talent.

the knicks have the most 1st round picks in the league on their roster , so they dont lack talent , they may lack humility , they lack the ability to want to fit in for the most part even the hustle players seem to have aspirations of stardom and big bucks , i dont know if that is the sort of thing that lends itself to team success.

the Jazz have an established system which aids them greatly , if you come in you have to fit in or you will get sent out , they know what they want out of players and the roles dont change , they run a pick and roll game and they want their other players to slash around the 2 pick and roll and space the floor...every1 defends, every1 plays hard.

the knicks dont have that , very few teams do ...but all the top teams seem to somehow , you dont see lazy 50 win squads

__________________
"I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races--that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together in terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior. I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."- Abraham Lincoln Sixth Debate with Steven A. Douglas at Quincy, Ill., Oct. 13, 1858

TwinkieFoot

That would suggest that we may be taking steps in the right direction by bringing in a guy like Donnie Walsh who has consistently built winners molded in a similar fashion; defensively oriented and scores in the paint. I've been a long time supporter of trading quantity for quality and have recommended condensing the talent on this roster. It would lead to an established rotation that in turn would promote chemistry and higher level of play on the floor (even though we would not be as deep). I think this is really the main issue Isiah failed to address as a GM. I do feel, however, that he had to build this roster in the manner he did in order to gain assets to lead to better trades. Somewhere along the line, he got confused and thought that this is close to being the final product (evident by the Randolph move). The players as individual still hold value in my opinion and can still help bring in the kind of players you mentioned to win.

TwinkieFoot

Balkman may be a start but certainly not the end all for players we need that fit this description. More importantly, we need these kind of players in our starting lineup that have proven to be capable starters...which Balkman has not.

TwinkieFoot

DaGrinch also touched on an interesting point that we need to establish a particular culture out here in order to win. Looking across the league and especially the playoffs, I think it is evident that this can be accomplished in a multitude of fashions. At the moment, I do believe that the best model to mimic for the future would be the Hornets.

The current heavyweights of the league are getting older and will drift into irrelevance soon enough (Spurs, Mavs, Suns, Pistons, Celtics, etc). That means the key to winning in the future (the only viable option for us) is to be able to build a team that can respond to the threats of the new kids on the block. At the moment, the Hornets lead this particular pack while still demonstrating the ability to beat the leagues best. They, as well as most of the youngin's in the league play an uptempo style game and I believe that we should as well. The keys to the game remain the same (play good defense and score in the paint), it is just the method of doing them has changed a little.

Knowing this, I think it'll be fairly difficult to build this sort of team with a guy like Eddy Curry. It's not that I do not believe he can contribute to a winner but me questioning whether the kind of winner he can contribute to will be a better model in the future. I think we not only need our 5 to get down the court on offense but also play defense, which Eddy has shown problems doing(and likely will continue to with a new wave of athletic scoring 5's coming into the league). If we were able to land the no.1 pick in the draft, I would recommend trading both it, Curry, albatross contracts (ie Jefferies or James) and possibly David Lee to a team like the Bucks for Andrew Bogut, filler and their lottery pick (which I'd hope to be high enough to get Derrick Rose). I think Bogut is an individual that represents the new model of a top tier center and may have a break out year fairly soon. With guys like Bogut and that high lottery pick (ie Derrick Rose) in this years draft, I think we accomplish the task of condensing our roster and adding key players to build around.

Da Grinch

balkman is that , but he had such a poor season he couldn't be counted on...but the thing about him is that he has to be on the floor with people that minimize his faults too, a scorer who can shoot at the other forward spot because he is basically the worst shooting small forward in the league ...even if he were playing well which he isn't.

__________________
"I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races--that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together in terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior. I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."- Abraham Lincoln Sixth Debate with Steven A. Douglas at Quincy, Ill., Oct. 13, 1858

Da Grinch

walsh has his beliefs , but i dont think they are as black and whate as the media makes it appear.

he had smits on that team for a while and just buoyed him with tough guys(greg dreiling lasalle thompson) to make up for what he lacked until he became a very , very good player and even then he had antonio and dale davis .they had a good scorer with softness/defnsive issues and put defensive players and toughness around him to make up for what he lacked...he didn't get rid of smits he made smits better by hiding some of his flaws to some degree .

he wants a defensive team ...but who wouldn't especially after watching the knicks the last seasons.

i definitely agree with trading quantity for quality .

i believe you get talent and then you get the players you need to fit the system and personel you have....

I think Thomas' main failing as a GM was having the wrong guy as coach , a coach that allowed his players to freelance too much on offense , he allowed Zach to chuck basically and get out of the offense , ditto marbury early in the season...there was no accountability and he lost the team early by choosing to play marbury in that game after the players voted him out ...I understand Mardy got hurt early but it was just a mistake , a mistake combined with zach's chucking just torpedoed the season.

__________________
"I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races--that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together in terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior. I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."- Abraham Lincoln Sixth Debate with Steven A. Douglas at Quincy, Ill., Oct. 13, 1858

Kiyaman

We must remember that Isiah Thomas 2007-8 plans was for only the players he gave playingtime to in the Preseason and the first 45 regular season games.
Which was Marbury, Crawford, Q.Rich, Zach, Curry, Lee, Jefferies, Jones, and Malik.
Isiah benched players the first 45 games of the regular season.
Which was Nate, Balkman, Collins, Chandler, Morris, and James.

Isiah did not care about how much D.Nichols trained to fit into the Knicks rotation, or care about the dedicated young players that trained all offseason with the Knicks BUM coaching staff to be physically healthy for training camp. Isiah had no plans for these players.

Here's what D.Nichols offered the Knicks.

D.Nichols (Peremeter Shooting) is the bench role-player you bring into the game to open up the court for C-Curry low post moves and PG-Marbury tight coverage from slashing.
The tall 6.8 D.Nichols is the player that adds three to four passes to the Knicks offense rather than the 10 to 18 seconds of dribbling from Marbury or Crawford.

At one time Curry used to get doubled and trippled team down in the low-post teaching him to draw the double while keeping the ball over his head to pass back out was the play to be drawed-up for the offense this season.

The Knicks rebounding PF David Lee was supposed to get minutes at the SF position in every game to out manuever oponents SF for the offensive rebound.

Having Curry & Lee pass the ball to a 6.8 SG-D.Nichols to shoot from the outside is what this team been lacking.

TwinkieFoot

The thing is that I feel it would be much easier to build a good defensive team through a strong defensive focal point in the paint. No matter how good a perimeter defender you are, you are going to get beat as a result of screens, excellent ballhandling or not focusing. A defensive center fixes a lot of that because of their ability to help and disrupt the offensive rhythm. Like I said, there is many ways to win in this game but I feel as though there is one model that is emerging as the most effective way given the culture of the league now (Hornets).

Smits was a pretty soft center in Indiana but look what it took to help him win; a player capable of being the franchise leader in rebounds and block shots (Dale Davis) and an eventual all-star (Antonio Davis) who were both top tier defenders. This was in addition to the fact that the team boasted two all-star caliber players on the perimeter (Reggie Miller and Jalen Rose), one of which is recognized as a HOF and one of the greatest clutch players of all-time and a PG that dished out the 2nd most assist in league history, who was still in his prime (Mark Jackson). All this and no title. Even if we did decide to build our team in this fashion, how long would it take us to find players that can do that sort of thing? And even if we did find them, would it make us title contenders with the league becoming more uptempo? I think it might very well be easier to build an uptempo team that is founded on some of the same principles of a winner: playing solid defense, in and outside the paint, and scoring the ball consistently in the 15 ft area around the basket.

Think about it for a second; the proof is almost in the pudding. Who beat the Pacers in the 1999 playoffs? The New York Knicks who ran a more uptempo style of game that exploited that donut hole down low(and made irrelevant and/or inconsistent offensively at the very least). Almost all the young teams are following a similar blueprint 10 years later with a few moderations and for just cause. The league has been changing rules that favor more uptempo offenses and does not nearly reward low post play as much as in the past (evident from the lack of fouls called for Eddy Curry the past couple of years). We been missing out on several prominent, franchise changing players, the past couple of drafts that could benefit from these rule changes. I believe its time that we make a change about that.

About Zeke's biggest mistake, I think it all goes back to what you said earlier about having a first rounder ego. Is there much he could have done about the freelancing given these players resume and pedigree in the past?