Finestrg wrote:

TMS wrote:Isiah would be trading future 1st round picks & signing those guys to multi year huge money extensions... getting AI & trading for T-Mac actually fits perfectly under the 2010 plan that Donnie Walsh supposedly wanted to implement when he got here.

I agree totally. Should've signed AI and traded for T-Mac already. Can't understand for the life of me the logic in not going after both of these guys. This team is beyond terrible right now. Getting AI and T-Mac would've gone a long way with trying to salvage the rest of this season plus it wouldn't have interfered with the 2010 plan IN THE SLIGHTEST. So what's the problem?? Shame on them for passing on AI and shame on them if they don't at least make an offer for T-Mac. I don't even care if we had to include Chandler to get McGrady, not a problem, get it done. Maybe I even give them Gallo to get it done (I'm still against giving up any future picks in a deal -- as a rebuilding team with an uncertain future, I can't justify giving up any future 1st round picks at this point -- we have enough available assets already on the roster to sweeten up a McGrady deal for Houston if need be, starting with Mobley's expiring contract, Gallo or Chandler)..And F all this "monitoring the situation" nonsense with McGrady -- they should've traded for this guy ALREADY and concentrated on nursing him back to health in a Knicks uniform. Now Curry's hurt again (knee)..Complicates things again just a tad, though I don't think it's believed to be serious. He's only expected to miss one game (MRI was clean). Curry's weight is down, he appears in the right frame of mind and he's shown flashes of production since he's been back...Man, getting T-Mac to play with Allen Iverson for the rest of the year AND also possibly getting Curry off the books in one big swoop?? What the hell is wrong with that Donnie and Mike?? Tell us. They're both no-brainer moves to make. It's exactly what they should be doing. If it didn't work out either because AI turned out to be some kind of problem or T-Mac never got healthy, hey whatever man, they tried and as a Knick fan I'll respect the attempt to try and salvage this lost season & live with it. They both expire at the end of the year and come right off the books. No harm no foul.. Even if both players did nothing, they still would've gotten Curry off the books for next year in this scenario which would be a HUGE positive..

You make those moves and for the rest of the year you go to war with this lineup:

1 - Douglas/Nate
2 - Iverson/Hughes/Nate
3 - McGrady/Harrington
4 - Lee/Hill/Jeffries
5 - Hill/Darko/Jeffries

I'd start my two prized rookies and begin to lean on them a little bit (the experience would be invaluable for both guys) and I'd finally move Lee to his natural position where he belongs..Incorporate either Gallo or Chandler into the mix, whoever doesn't go in the T-Mac deal. If it were up to me though, this leftover asset would be shipped off in a seperate deal to try and land Ricky Rubio. And if Duhon and Jeffries got fazed out, SO F'ing what. Duhon's been terrible and has nobody to blame but himself if he lost his spot and Jeffries hasn't done a thing in the world to deserve any of the PT he does manage to get (never did anything to even get the damn contract Zeke gave him in the first place). If both of these guys never played again in a Knicks uniform I wouldn't care at all..

This is what you do. End of story. If nothing worked out with that lineup this year, OK, I'll be fine COMPLETELY starting over next off-season with Douglas, Hill, our 2 2nd round picks and a boatload of cap room, enough for 2 max. FAs minus Eddy Curry..It's the only plan that makes any sense right now, for this year, next year and beyond...Shame on them for not realizing it and going after it.

Gooood post.

This is the kind of risk taking that would yiel us a championship squad sooner than later.

Now, I'm not saying that AI and TMac would get us a ring, i'm saying that the remarkable patience thad Donnie has exhibited will garner stability, even respectability. But you have to courageously swing for the fences to win it all.

A move like you described would show me that Donnie can be aggressive enough to get it done.

Finestrg wrote:

TMS wrote:Isiah would be trading future 1st round picks & signing those guys to multi year huge money extensions... getting AI & trading for T-Mac actually fits perfectly under the 2010 plan that Donnie Walsh supposedly wanted to implement when he got here.

I agree totally. Should've signed AI and traded for T-Mac already. Can't understand for the life of me the logic in not going after both of these guys. This team is beyond terrible right now. Getting AI and T-Mac would've gone a long way with trying to salvage the rest of this season plus it wouldn't have interfered with the 2010 plan IN THE SLIGHTEST. So what's the problem?? Shame on them for passing on AI and shame on them if they don't at least make an offer for T-Mac. I don't even care if we had to include Chandler to get McGrady, not a problem, get it done. Maybe I even give them Gallo to get it done (I'm still against giving up any future picks in a deal -- as a rebuilding team with an uncertain future, I can't justify giving up any future 1st round picks at this point -- we have enough available assets already on the roster to sweeten up a McGrady deal for Houston if need be, starting with Mobley's expiring contract, Gallo or Chandler)..And F all this "monitoring the situation" nonsense with McGrady -- they should've traded for this guy ALREADY and concentrated on nursing him back to health in a Knicks uniform. Now Curry's hurt again (knee)..Complicates things again just a tad, though I don't think it's believed to be serious. He's only expected to miss one game (MRI was clean). Curry's weight is down, he appears in the right frame of mind and he's shown flashes of production since he's been back...Man, getting T-Mac to play with Allen Iverson for the rest of the year AND also possibly getting Curry off the books in one big swoop?? What the hell is wrong with that Donnie and Mike?? Tell us. They're both no-brainer moves to make. It's exactly what they should be doing. If it didn't work out either because AI turned out to be some kind of problem or T-Mac never got healthy, hey whatever man, they tried and as a Knick fan I'll respect the attempt to try and salvage this lost season & live with it. They both expire at the end of the year and come right off the books. No harm no foul.. Even if both players did nothing, they still would've gotten Curry off the books for next year in this scenario which would be a HUGE positive..

You make those moves and for the rest of the year you go to war with this lineup:

1 - Douglas/Nate
2 - Iverson/Hughes/Nate
3 - McGrady/Harrington
4 - Lee/Hill/Jeffries
5 - Hill/Darko/Jeffries

I'd start my two prized rookies and begin to lean on them a little bit (the experience would be invaluable for both guys) and I'd finally move Lee to his natural position where he belongs..Incorporate either Gallo or Chandler into the mix, whoever doesn't go in the T-Mac deal. If it were up to me though, this leftover asset would be shipped off in a seperate deal to try and land Ricky Rubio. And if Duhon and Jeffries got fazed out, SO F'ing what. Duhon's been terrible and has nobody to blame but himself if he lost his spot and Jeffries hasn't done a thing in the world to deserve any of the PT he does manage to get (never did anything to even get the damn contract Zeke gave him in the first place). If both of these guys never played again in a Knicks uniform I wouldn't care at all..

This is what you do. End of story. If nothing worked out with that lineup this year, OK, I'll be fine COMPLETELY starting over next off-season with Douglas, Hill, our 2 2nd round picks and a boatload of cap room, enough for 2 max. FAs minus Eddy Curry..It's the only plan that makes any sense right now, for this year, next year and beyond...Shame on them for not realizing it and going after it.

Per my original post, I'm obviously in favor of taking a shot at both Ivy and T-Mac but not at Gallo's expense. There should be no thoughts of including Gallo in any of this. He is obviously a part of the future and the whole point here is to get T-Mac and Iverson without sacrificing anything in the long-term.

Chandler, sure. I'd give him up in a heartbeat to get rid of Curry's contract. But I wouldn't give them Wilson if we aren't getting rid of either the Jeffries contract or Curry. I don't like Wilson much but he is still a young prospect and there is no use giving him up for a player that we will be renting for less than a season, unless we are helping our future out in the process (i.e. giving up Curry or Jeffries).

Plus, if we really want T-Mac, we should be able to get him without giving up Chandler or Gallo in my opinion. If they won't take Chandler, Curry, and Mobley, fine. Then the next offer you can give them is just expirings only (but no young guys).

If being able to shoot stand-still 3s is all we're looking at here, if that's all he's willing or able to do in the NBA, it's a big problem guys. I mean every damn game it's the same thing -- he starts, maybe hits a deep jumper or 2 (maybe not), then he sits for long stretches, including the end of the game (was he a factor down the stretch in last night's close game??). There have been a few exceptions where he's been on the floor producing toward the end of competitive games this year, but for the most part, this has been the MO -- hot start or not withstanding, he fades into the background and either isn't work hard enough to re-establish himself or MDA ignores him for long stretches. Now you wanna say he'd benefit from a much better PG than Duhon, I can buy that. You wanna say Mike should play him more and go back to him a lot sooner to re-establish him after his first breather. OK, I buy that too. You wanna say he's only a baby and needs more time, I agree with that as well. Bottom line is this guy was thought to have the tools to create for himself and I just don't see that. When he trys to, it's usually results in an awkward outcome...All I'm saying is that I'm no longer 100% sure we got top value picking this kid 6th in the draft. If I had a chance to cement a Tracy McGrady deal and get rid of Eddy Curry in the process and Houston would do it only for Gallo and not Chandler, I'd have to look at it. All I'm sayin'...Unloading Eddy Curry all but guarantees a 2 max FA off-season. That'd be huge all around for this franchise..You know how much better LeBron would feel about coming here if he knew Chris Bosh was coming with him?? To me, maybe it's because I watched him closely in college and was a big fan, but Jordan Hill clearly has the better upside than Gallinari..Again, I'm willing to wait and be patient with Gallo but in my mind there's no way you can call this guy untouchable if the right deal ever presented itself..

In the beginning of the season, they featured Danilo and kept going to him throughout the game. Moreover, D'Antoni was actually playing Gallo over 30 minutes. Something must have happened that we don't know about (i.e. Gallo was getting fatigued or maybe his back started to act up again) because out of left field, D'Antoni started to play him less and no one was looking to get Danilo involved anymore.

I think Gallo has shown that when he has the ball, he can make good things happen and isn't just a guy that floats around the perimeter and tosses up threes. He is a very good passer and can drive past defenders who have to stay up on him because of his dangerous shot.

This is one of the reasons why I'm so unhappy with the current situation. Donnie has been telling us that the plan is to attract free agents by winning and developing our young guys. If you want to tell us that adding Iverson would be detrimental to developing the young guys, that is fine. With that said, you have to play the young guys then and showcase them to the league, something we aren't doing at all. This current path we are on, playing veterans that can't win anything for us, makes no sense at all.

Here is where Donnie went wrong. He wanted to be competitive this season but he has been very picky in terms of which guys should be added. The problem is you can't be picky if you want to upgrade the talent level for only one season. Guess what, star players with great character and no issues whatsoever will not be available to a team like us for one season at the minimum. We are not in a position at all where we can select from an abundance of great talent. I'm not saying that we should re-create the Jailblazers or anything, but why not add guys that you know will compete night in and night out? Think about this for a second, we could have Ron Artest and Allen Iverson on the roster right now. Furthermore, we could make the trade to bring T-Mac over. With Artest, Iverson, and T-Mac, I like our freaking chances of being competitive this season and it all comes at low-risk (meaning we could rid ourselves of them at the first sign of trouble). Yes, to get Artest, we would have had to make it a multi-year deal, but the guy would be tradeable as hell either way at an MLE contract. So at the end of the day, we could have been a competitive team this season with our 2010 plan still intact. Instead, we are here watching a group of veterans pad their stats in an attempt to get another contract.

McK1 wrote:

Let's put the Danilo Gallinari freeze-out conspiracy theory aside for one second -- not saying it doesn't exist on some sublevel, but humor me -- and consider a different perspective as to why the best shooter on the NBA's fourth-worst shooting team (43 percent) goes for long stretches without seeing the ball.

Mike D'Antoni has been Gallo's biggest fan and even he points out what is very noticable about Gallinari during games: he does a lot of watching. So when D'Antoni was asked if the team needs to incorporate Gallinari more in the offense, D'Antoni replied, "You incorporate yourself into it."

In other words, Gallinari is freezing himself out.

"Obviously we need to get him more shots," D'Antoni said. "He's our best shooter and the more time he shoots the better it is for us. A lot of times that should come in the flow. He could be a little bit more aggressive and we could be a little bit more aggressive with getting him the ball."

The most noticable problem is that Gallinari isn't active when he doesn't have the ball, therefore he is not making himself a target. Now part of this is because he often winds up on the weak side -- that much is decided by the ball-handler -- and he can't break the play by making his own cuts just to get the ball.

Still, as the D'Antoni philosophy goes, "The ball finds energy." Gallinari needs to run harder in transition and then be more assertive within the offense, especially when he gets into a groove.

It's all a part of the development of a young player and something the coaching staff works with him. In the pregame workout in Sacramento, assistant coach Phil Weber would push up tight on Gallo -- which is what opposing defenses are starting to do to take away the time and space for his jumper -- and play him physically as he drove the ball to the basket.

http://www.newsday.com/sports/basketball/knicks/the-knicks-fix-1.812055/gallo-needs-guidance-1.1624381

I guess Mike is too busy at night counting the millions he is stealing to draw up plays for Gallo and make Duhon run them during the game.

I agree with some of that. I do think Gallo could be more aggressive in demanding the ball but like D'Antoni himself says in that post, they also need to get him the ball more.

We don't swing the ball around the perimeter at all and consequently, it looks like Gallo is just watching the game on a bunch of occasions. In reality though, he is also creating good spacing by staying on the opposite side of the floor. The team has to do a better job of swinging the ball to him in those situations and letting him go one-on-one with his defender.

I agree though, Gallo also needs to work on being more assertive, especially with this current cast of guys.

kukoc was never an all star i don't think, i think gallo will be for sure, and that's mostly due to gallo's scoring. i can easily see gallo at 20+ per game for most of his career.

JohnWallace44 wrote:The Chandler hate is amazing to me on this board. Its as if last year never happened. I get that he's having a terrible year, but to say that he has no trade value is far fetched. He began the year as our best player, and he's still that guy, just needs to get settled in a role with this chaotic team.

If a TMac deal doesn't get done then Curry and Jeffries are much more untradeable. Houston and TMac's contract makes a ton of sense as a landing spot for those guys. If we need to put prospects in the deal to make it work, do it.

Something interesting would be to add Lowry and Douglas into a deal like that, Knicks get a more capable point, Houston gets another scorer and defender - fits their identity.

chandler has tons of trade value. i doubt that any knowledgeable GM in the league would look at these first 16 games and think chandler sucks. chandler's body of work, albeit brief, is more than enough to convince me that he is a very solid player already and has the potential to be plenty more.

he has trade value, 16 games on this mess of a squad cannot do enough damage to the kid. he'll be alright.