Posted by islesfan:

The season is almost half way over, can anybody tell us where D'Antoni has improved any part of the team going forward?

I understand that the team is rebuilding with 2010 in mind but that doesn't mean that it makes any sense to just waste the next 2 years. D'Antoni has to teach the young players who have a chance of staying beyond 2009. Teach them the fundamentals of his offense, movement, screens, pick and rolls, positioning, sets and then do the same for his defense. It's BS that this team still looks like nobody is coaching them.

Posted by SlimPack:

Posted by GallOfFame:

Posted by SlimPack:

Well, I didn't watch the entire game, (it just didn't seem worth my time to watch after about midway through the 3rd quarter) but from what I saw the offens looked Ok, but no Knicks could hit anything. It seemed like they just missed every shot they took, and many of them were relatively wide open.

You realize this has been the case 10 of the last 12gms? Maybe shooting the 3-ball isn't best suited for this roster, which means an adjustment in coaching needs to be made. You can't keep pacifying the results. Check out Nate's percentage from deep the past 5-6gms yet he keeps shooting them at an alarming rate. In the broadcast it was mentioned Nate is clearly the best shooter on the team, that he's been harder on himself than anyone but his teammates and coaching staff want him to keep shooting his shots. Sometimes telling a player to keep doing things maybe he shouldn't be doing is a bad thing. Tell him to step inside and shoot mid range jumpers or attack the basket to get his groove back. I find it comical he's our best shooter as it was mentioned "PURE SHOOTER" and the guy is shooting 42%FG overall and 31%FG(3pt) from downtown.

What percentage does this team shoot from 2? Is it significantly better than their 3 point percentage? with guys like Jared Jeffries, and qrich starting on our team, I don't predict making them shoot more 2 pointers would help very much to be honest, but then again I'm no coach.

As for the advice given to Nate, I agree he should be told to go to the basket, but for all I know he was. keep shooting your shots isn't that bad of advice because historically Nate has been our best 3 point shooter percentage. He's been in a slump lately though.

[Edited by - Slimpack on 01-11-2009 03:31 AM]

Posted by GallOfFame:

Posted by GKFv2:

Posted by GallOfFame:

Posted by GKFv2:

Posted by djsunyc:

fire d'antoni? you're too extreme and too emotional. i said nothing of the sort.

they run 1 single offensive play. pick and roll with duhon + lee. that's it. i'm sorry, but d'antoni's offensive playbook is 1 page long. it's starting to look like he's in coast mode right now.

There are no shooters on this team. He does run more than one play but many of them are broken. You didn't say to fire him, you're right. Yet you made a topic complaining about his coaching. When you fail to regard the roster and blame the coach it basically comes down to the fact that you are unhappy with the coach and want a change if things do not improve.

Will a 30win or less season be acceptable to you next yr because it's all about 2010? Don't Pussyfoot around the question either.

Yes and for the same reasons everyone else listed. It's not about the wins for me because I can see the bigger picture. I can see the light at the end of that tunnel that never existed under Layden and Isiah. 2010 is just the beginning of that light. Getting quality players in here with a high basketball IQ and work ethic while also developing our young guys like Chandler and Gallinari is our only goal. It's not about the wins, it's about what we are doing with our roster. How we are shaping it and how we are shaping our young players. I never expected to be winning just because we got a new coach and GM and basically kept the same team until we traded Zach and Crawford. I knew if we kept the same team that we would go right back to the 23 win ways. We might even go back to that with this team but at least we are actually building something here rather than watching Crawford and his large contract chuck shots and Curry wasting minutes on the court, as well as Marbury being an annoying embarrassment.

Thanks for answering, at least there is some harmony what you see long term in this rebuild.


In advance I'm telling you Shut Your Trap when we hand over a Top 5 pick to Utah if this happens. Don't say jack squat. I mean Zip It.


My whole point is if you hire a high profile coach then he shouldn't be given the same leash as a rookie coach producing less than mediocre results. Matter of fact even rookie coaches aren't given 2yrs to suck it out to rebuild. 2yrs or less... Theus fired, P.J. fired, Whitman fired, Vincent fired, Stotts fired

Posted by Allanfan20:

Posted by islesfan:

Posted by GallOfFame:

Posted by GKFv2:

Posted by djsunyc:

fire d'antoni? you're too extreme and too emotional. i said nothing of the sort.

they run 1 single offensive play. pick and roll with duhon + lee. that's it. i'm sorry, but d'antoni's offensive playbook is 1 page long. it's starting to look like he's in coast mode right now.

There are no shooters on this team. He does run more than one play but many of them are broken. You didn't say to fire him, you're right. Yet you made a topic complaining about his coaching. When you fail to regard the roster and blame the coach it basically comes down to the fact that you are unhappy with the coach and want a change if things do not improve.

Will a 30win or less season be acceptable to you next yr because it's all about 2010? Don't Pussyfoot around the question either.

Wins are totally meaningless in judging this team this season and next. Obviously losing games is more beneficial to the organization but teaching the kids the fundamentals they'll need in D'Antoni's system needs to be happening now, not in 2010. That's the only barometer that the Knicks should be judged on over the next 2 years. One quarter into that 2 years, there's been no improvement and no coaching to be seen anywhere.

Islesfan, I have said this to you before, and you have yet to address it. NBA coaches DO NOT teach fundamentals. They can't teach players to be better shooters. They can't teach players to be better passers. They can't teach players to motivate themselves. They can't teach players to know how to box out. If he took his time teaching everyone of the players, there would be no time to do anything else. The players have to find a way to learn the fundamentals in their OWN time even though they should have learned them in college.

Mike D'Antoni's job is to insert the winning system in, but he can't do it without the players. We don't have the players. Neither did Larry Brown, and heck, neither did Isiah, and all 3 of those guys are VERY GOOD at knowing the actual game at basketball (Isiah just happened to suck as a GM and didn't know how to handle his players, or just about everyone else).

To top it off, you guys keep saying that we need to develop these guys for 2010, when we know full well that most of these guys wont be here for that.

Posted by djsunyc:

i'm watching knicks in 60 and the offensive play sets are downright terrible.

3 knicks are parked at the 3 point line just watching every single play. in most cases, FOUR knicks are standing at the 3 point line watching stuff.

they don't send anybody on the offensive glass. they don't run any picks or screens for players away from the ball. nobody cuts into the paint.

there is NO movement.

and duhon is not good enough to create for others.

i'm not hating here. i thought the d'antoni hiring is a homerun for the knicks. i also thought he had alot to prove (just like riley did when he got here). but i would have to say that for being an offensive guru, his offensive plays are really not that special. in fact, they're quite elementary.

Posted by SupremeCommander:

This is on the players, definitely. But I don't know if D'Antoni is simply being way too proud here or not... the playbook does look really simple. A lot of that seems to be an unwillingness to draw something up that plays to this team's strengths (whatever this team's strengths are).

Posted by McK1:

Posted by SupremeCommander:

This is on the players, definitely. But I don't know if D'Antoni is simply being way too proud here or not... the playbook does look really simple. A lot of that seems to be an unwillingness to draw something up that plays to this team's strengths (whatever this team's strengths are).

Knicks are 6th in the league in ft% yet are 29th in attempts

Knicks are 16th in the league in 3pt fg% but are 1st in attempts

that's all i'm saying. do something else. there's still 40+ games left...try to do something else with these guys. you have full backing from walsh. you know the plan in 2010. your job is safe. there's no drama. just change up a little bit.

[Edited by - djsunyc on 01-11-2009 11:41 AM]