martin wrote:TMS wrote:martin wrote:TMS wrote:please, Jordan Hill should have been playing all year just like several other rookies this year... our team was not good enough that we could afford to have our #8 lottery pick wasting away on the bench & playing scrubs like Jonathan Bender... MDA doesn't deserve credit for his handling of Jordan Hill by not playing the kid until now.
except for the fact that the record after Nov kinda proved MDA made some right choices after SSOL and giving everyone on the roster a chance at minutes.
Maybe you could argue that MDA should have gone with a short rotation and slow-down all year, and on top of the given a minute or 2 to rookies (who perhaps were still not ready anyway).
u believe Bender deserved playing time over Jordan Hill?
for me it's not about deserved playing time of one player over the other. Both of their situations are apples and oranges.
Hill is on a 5 year contract and has a long way to go to learning how to play in the NBA. It was clear to me in the beginning of the year that he didn't know where to be on the floor, where to be on the offense, when to pop, when to roll, when to shift on defense, how much intensity he needed to play with. Nothing extraordinarily wrong, just rookie mistakes. You add to the fact that the Knicks were still trying to figure out rotations, bench players vs starters, roles, etc., it's no wonder that Hill, Darko, Landry, Douglas were dropped in favor of experienced vets. Let's face it, after 1-9 start, the Knicks needed wins to build confidence.
Did Lee really lose a lot because he did not play in the first year? Chandler? It's a long process, and as long as those guys practice hard and get better, good things will come around.
Bender is on a 1-year deal and hasn't played in 4 years. Coach can't just play the guy 2 minutes every third game and expect him to do anything. He would need time over a long stretch at 10-12 minutes a game just to get rust off and then start to produce just to see if he is worth playing this year and next. 8-10 games and if he is not consistent or contributing like the coach wants, then either sit him or play him at your discretion.
Bender is not a scrub. Roberson is a scrub. Bender helps stretch the defense with his outside shot. He can cause trouble at his length. he can rebound. block shots. Can he put it together? That's the question. His dribble drive sucks, cause it's like an automatic turnover. And he seems to be able to pick up the MDA offense and defense pretty quickly. Not 100%, but not too bad either.
If I recall, bender got minutes when Harrington was hurt. Hill and Harrington have 2 different rolls on the team, so it's OK IMHO to give Bender those minutes.
Seems like Bender got his stretch and is now on the bench getting DNP's and Hill is not. C'est la vie.
Jordan Hill's playing the same way now as he was when he was getting sporadic action... he's just seeing more minutes now... he always showed tons of energy & was active on both ends of the floor... he was always stroking that midrange J... he still looks a bit unsure of where he needs to be on the floor... sorry, but i don't see eye to eye on this with you at all... yes, these are all rookie mistakes he's making, but the only way he'll stop making those rookie mistakes is by giving him the regular run to learn... watching veterans like Jonathan Bender playing is not helping Jordan Hill's development at all.
btw, David Lee played 67 games his rookie season, started 14 of them & averaged 17 minutes per... to me that's called giving your young player regular run, & he wasn't even a lottery pick... give Jordan Hill that same run & i guarantee you he'd be putting up much better numbers than David Lee did his rookie season... why is expecting Jordan Hill to get a similar run wrong in your eyes?
also you're wrong about Bender getting minutes when Harrington was hurt... he got into the game 3 days after we signed him & Harrington was getting big minutes at the time... MDA wanted to get Walsh's signing in so he could see what he had... i got no problem with that, but when it comes at the expense of playing your #8 lottery pick, then i start to have a big problem with it... matter of fact Harrington played big minutes in the first 8 games Bender saw action & he only missed 2 games that Bender played in all year.
Bender does nothing that Harrington & Gallo don't already do much better, so what's the point in giving him minutes over a kid like Jordan Hill, who like u just admitted brings different things to the table & could have helped to solve the HUGE deficiency in low post defense we've seen all year from this team? the problem this team had was not in 3 point shooting, it was on team defense... IMO if we had this kid in the regular rotation all year, not only would Jordan Hill be at a more advanced stage in his development, but also our record would be better right now... i see absolutely no downsides to have been giving him regular burn this season, & i saw very little upside in having Bender playing instead.
After 7 years & 40K+ posts, banned by martin for calling Nalod a 'moron'. Awesome.
1/25/2010 1:02 AM