Posted by earthmansurfer:

Posted by islesfan:

Posted by loweyecue:

Guys, tanking sucks. The idea of improving our odds for landing a high draft pick by tanking is preposterous. Improved odds are just that they are improved odds, they are not a gurantee. We could lose every game from here on and end up with the 21st pick or something. Put no faith in ping pong balls. Yes some teams in the past may have used trhis "strategy" to obtain high draft picks, but they just got lucky. For every team that succeeds you would find many that didn't. Even with a high pick a draft is no gurantee of getting a bona fide superstar. This type of reasonig "lets tank to improve" is dangerous and the players who execute this can consequently never win anything even when they get their superstar. There are enough natural born losers in the NBA (aka Marbury clones)so there is absolutely no need to teach young players how to lose for improved draft prospects.

Yes I have read all the reasoning of "resting the vets" and playing younger players etc, but when your goal is to rack up losses which it has to be to improve your odds, that goal will translate to our players learning how to do what is easy instead of playing hard for wins. Dont want it, will not advocate for it. Tanking is STUPID.

[Edited by - loweyecue on 03-08-2009 2:14 PM]

You want a guarantee? The Knicks would get a higher draft pick if they're in the lottery instead of making the playoffs. That's a guaranteed fact.

The only players who are guaranteed to be here after next season are Chandler and Gallinari and they need to be put out there in crunch time for the experience, win or most likely lose more than they need to be swept in the playoffs. There is no benefit from having Larry Hughes, Chris Wilcox, Quentin Richardson, Jared Jeffries and Al Harrington getting minutes. At this point I'd rather see Nichols and Samb get as many minutes as they can handle.

I pretty much agree. If Gallo and Chandler are the future then let's grow with them. I know Gallo's back is an issue, but if he is going to play 15 - 20 minutes a night anyway, give him the occasional start, see how he does, and adjust. He is the future right? It's not like it's some crazy decision. I know we want to create an atmosphere of winning, but running Duhon into the ground not only decreases his trade value but it also plain hurts the team. Give him a cut in minutes and try Nate at the point (as was brought up in another thread by Briggs.)

And the new guys, if you are not going to play them at least give Samb and Nice 5 minutes somewhere, let's just see what it does on the defensive side of the ball (regarding Samb). A real game experiment, not a theoretical one. The fans would love it and it helps us in many ways.
Ok, D-Nice hasn't "paid his dues" but give him 5 minutes at least. Let him feel the garden, remember how well he played in the summer leagues for us? Could be he is likes the NY feel.. (I mean you don't know, so players thrive here and others wilt.(Not as in Chamberlin)).

My objection is against tanking which I interpret to be intentionally losing, I dont have any issues with palying the younger guys. What I have an issue with is an organization that makes a concious decision to not try to win. That is something that affects the players regardless of how its handled. These players are being paid to go out there and play and they are doing what they can at least in the effort department. When as an organization you chose to tank it just shows the players you dont care about them and they are garbage. Now this may be the exact way you feel about it as a fan but as an organization you should not be treating your highest paid employees as garbage, it sends a fairly strong message to all kinds of people.

I love the way the team is playing right now. Play the young guys, give an entertaining performance, and come up short at the end. We get to see a good game and the team continues to rack up the losses. Beating the bobcats might have been fatal to our lottery hopes. This team needs one more solid draft before we are ready to move on to the playoffs. If we can add a Thabeet or Stephen Curry or some other solid prospect and resign Nate and Lee or do a solid S&T deal, we should be in good shape for 2010, even if we cannot get rid of Curry. I would take the chance of moving up into the top-3 over making the playoffs and getting bounced by Boston or Clevland.

Posted by JohnWallace44:

oy... Steph Curry...

He should be a good player in Europe some day.

What makes you think he won't be good in the pro's? Look at the success that Eric Gordon is having as an undersized SG and Curry is a better shooter than Gordon is.

Tanking does not equal throwing games.

By tanking, we mean not playing the veteran players with no future on this team and giving minutes to the young players who could have a future here. Veteran players have the experience and talent to help win you more games but developing players should be the focus here and not doing whatever we can to win games.

If the team wins every game down the stretch playing Chandler, Gallinari, Nichols and Samb as many minutes as they can handle, then so be it. But the chances are that they'll lose a lot more than they win against veteran players with more experience than them.

haha - Jamaican Jet Fan gets it.

Look at Nate... dude's 5'7", but he has an NBA build right?

Curry does not have an NBA body, and his dad was just a role playing shooter, so... why do we think he's going to put on enough weight to be in the Chris Paul, Deron, Rose class?

And if he's not going to be in their class... let's not make that pick.

I want to come out of this draft with one of those "holy crap" freaks that the other team has to scheme for. Its a weak draft at the 2, 3, 4 positions, but its not at the 1 and 5 and those are the spots we are or should be targeting. There are enough freaks that one of them, be it Jennings, or Warren, or Thabeet, or Evans... one of them will fall to us.

Posted by islesfan:

Tanking does not equal throwing games.

By tanking, we mean not playing the veteran players with no future on this team and giving minutes to the young players who could have a future here. Veteran players have the experience and talent to help win you more games but developing players should be the focus here and not doing whatever we can to win games.

If the team wins every game down the stretch playing Chandler, Gallinari, Nichols and Samb as many minutes as they can handle, then so be it. But the chances are that they'll lose a lot more than they win against veteran players with more experience than them.

exactly, play the youth & let the bukkake fall where it may... players aren't gonna go out on the floor & purposely try & throw games.

Duhon is killing us. If he wasn't a horrible player, the last few games were ours.

Haha yea, he is the third coming and fourth, but horrible the last bunch of games, you know? He is good person, good man; he play well again one day.