Zach is a true stretch 4 because he can hit long jumpers and stillget 12 reboubds everygame. Lee's effort alone is what these knicks miss.

So frustrating

CrushAlot wrote:If you say that you miss them isn't that saying that Walsh's plan was a failure?

That's a stretch. Walsh left (or was pushed out) before he could finish the job. From what I've read the Melo trade (as finalized) wasn't his call so it isn't fair to say that the end result is on him. Walsh helped make this team relevant again so I wouldn't call his tenure here a failure.

loweyecue wrote:I think we overpaid for Amare though. No team would give him a 5 year guaranteed cotract the thing he wanted most, why couldn't we give him a 80M guaranteed ocntract instead of a 100M guranteed contract? Would e have walked away from that and signed with Phx for two years?

The nature of free agency is that you overpay. That's the caviat of building a team through free agency. Walsh's plan to begin with was actually to lure LeBron James to New York and when that didn't play out, the team signed Amar'e as a pre-emptive strike to both acquire a star player and make sure that they didn't get shut out. Amar'e alone is a bad contract, but you sign him to get Carmelo to want to play here and you bring Carmelo in because then guys like Chandler and J.R. Smith then want to come in for a run at a ring. Add good drafting to that and you get Fields and Shumpert and Harrelson, and suddenly you have a good team. Dolan was right to make the Melo trade, and I don't think anyone will disagree with that now that the supporting cast has actually been replaced as we thought it would. At the end of the day, I agree with Brian Cashman's assertion that free agency is about getting the player. If he wants an extra year or an opt-out and that's the difference between getting him and not getting him, you give him what he wants.

What happens if Amar'e doesn't come to the Knicks? We're New Jersey, except without Deron Williams. So yeah, it's easy to bash the contract because Stat isn't going to be a good player in year five. It's concerning that it's only year two.

y2zipper wrote:

loweyecue wrote:I think we overpaid for Amare though. No team would give him a 5 year guaranteed cotract the thing he wanted most, why couldn't we give him a 80M guaranteed ocntract instead of a 100M guranteed contract? Would e have walked away from that and signed with Phx for two years?

The nature of free agency is that you overpay. That's the caviat of building a team through free agency. Walsh's plan to begin with was actually to lure LeBron James to New York and when that didn't play out, the team signed Amar'e as a pre-emptive strike to both acquire a star player and make sure that they didn't get shut out. Amar'e alone is a bad contract, but you sign him to get Carmelo to want to play here and you bring Carmelo in because then guys like Chandler and J.R. Smith then want to come in for a run at a ring. Add good drafting to that and you get Fields and Shumpert and Harrelson, and suddenly you have a good team. Dolan was right to make the Melo trade, and I don't think anyone will disagree with that now that the supporting cast has actually been replaced as we thought it would. At the end of the day, I agree with Brian Cashman's assertion that free agency is about getting the player. If he wants an extra year or an opt-out and that's the difference between getting him and not getting him, you give him what he wants.

What happens if Amar'e doesn't come to the Knicks? We're New Jersey, except without Deron Williams. So yeah, it's easy to bash the contract because Stat isn't going to be a good player in year five. It's concerning that it's only year two.

Where did you see me bash the contract? I was asking what people thought of having potentially overpaid for Amare. No one was going to give amare a 5 year guratnteed contract that much was obvious. So we didn't have bid against ourselves - but this is what the Knicks do consistently.