crzymdups wrote:

AnubisADL wrote:

fishmike wrote:

AnubisADL wrote:We are not missing the playoffs with Amare, Carmelo, and Billups man.

in 2 games we are .500 with other teams breathing down our necks. We are back to making guys like Session and JJ Hickson look like Alonzo Mouring and Tim Hardaway.

this is not a panic thread. We have a serious problem. Before we had the depth to overcome it a bit.. do we now? Time will tell.

This is the NBA man any team can lose on any night. Cleveland played way above their level all night. Anthony Parker and Hickson throwing up straight garbage that went in.

We are CLEARLY better than Philly and Indiana. I will take Orlando or Chicago in the first round.

yup. people here like to ignore the fact that cleveland beat the lakers two games ago, too. i guess the lakers aren't making the playoffs either?

if anything, last night had all the hallmarks of a let-down game for the team. coming off the big debut at MSG and gearing up for the big game in Miami on Sunday - the team looked like it thought it could cruise through this one without too much effort.

cleveland had different ideas and showed more effort.

these things do happen over the course of the nba season.

I'm fine with that, but the Lakers are established and deep. We have 3 shoot first guys and very little rebounding and playmaking. Its hard to win night in night out like that, especially when your getting beat on the boards nightly

fishmike wrote:

JrZyHuStLa wrote:

fishmike wrote:

JrZyHuStLa wrote:

fishmike wrote:

JrZyHuStLa wrote:Fish, if you want to say that we're "not a second round team" because our rebounding is weak, that's fine.

Don't over exaggerate by saying we're not making the playoffs, because time will only prove you wrong.

why? Knicks have a 4 game lead over the 9th placed team. We got 58 points and 19 boards from Melo/Amare and lost by 6. I'm simply talking about winning games. The solution I am hearing from guys is Sheldon Williams and he is a VERY poor NBA player and has been on all 6 teams he's played on. Sheldon Williams isnt good at anything.

Yes... this has been a problem all year, and we are even thinner in the rebounding department than we were before the trade

We're thinner in the rebounding department. But don't you think we've strengthened our team in other ways? Is it only rebounding that gets all 16 teams into the postseason?

I would say the talent has been upgraded. But Zach Randolph and Marbury also did that. You need to play TEAM basketball, and our PG is a stop gap 34 year old player.

As for rebounding and playoffs show me any solid playoff team that gets beat on the boards every night. Rebounding is just as important as any facet of the game. you saw last night and many other nights before the trade that this can lose us games.

Amare and Melo are bigtime players but a tier below the Lebron/Wade level. If you think you can just put Amare/Melo together and give them 10-20 games and they will figure out how to play .800 basketball your kidding yourself.

I'm not on of the "I told you so" people on this board. I dont do that anywhere in life, I wont do it here. This is my team. Its got massive problems. I was in favor of building with depth. Getting 7-8 skilled athletic 2-way players. Now we traded 4 of those type of guys for one guy who can score. Billups is really good and will help get things straighted here, especially on D when JJ gets here.

Felton wasn't a part of the future either. He's set to expire when Chauncey is. And calling him a stop gap PG isn't really fair when you had Felton chucking up shots thinking he's Derek Rose. I can't even recall the last time we had a PG with the basketball IQ and intangibles that he has. Billups over Felton is a CLEAR upgrade.

I never once said Stat and Melo are Lebron/Wade/Kobe level tier talents. They're not. Those 3 are better defenders than our guys, sure. But one thing we have in common with the elite guys is the offensive firepower. If you're going to say rebounding is weak, you can also say our defense is as well. Melo and Stat don't put a premium on defense, I'm willing to admit that. But not a lot of guys are willing to admit D'antoni's lack of emphasis on it. This is my problem with him. Telling the media you care and actually holding a team like Cleveland to 80 points instead of 115 is night and day.

Who cares about the "I told you so"? We're all here as Knicks fans who just want to see our team do well. I have to respect posters like yourself or anyone with different views, that's what makes having discussions and debates great.

I disagree... Felton was in a downslide but he was pretty solid all year and was playing hurt. His contract allowed us to make a play for CP3 or Deron but if we missed those guy we could have extended Felton and been pretty solid at that position.

Billups is a solid but do you see the same player that won a finals MVP? He's not the same defensive player, which is what we need the most from him, that and a floor general.

When you have two stars, having a PG with better IQ and playoff experience is more valueable to me than a younger PG like Felton, even though he's much older. Dont write off Billups. He has 2-3 years of solid basketball left in him.

fishmike wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

AnubisADL wrote:

fishmike wrote:

AnubisADL wrote:We are not missing the playoffs with Amare, Carmelo, and Billups man.

in 2 games we are .500 with other teams breathing down our necks. We are back to making guys like Session and JJ Hickson look like Alonzo Mouring and Tim Hardaway.

this is not a panic thread. We have a serious problem. Before we had the depth to overcome it a bit.. do we now? Time will tell.

This is the NBA man any team can lose on any night. Cleveland played way above their level all night. Anthony Parker and Hickson throwing up straight garbage that went in.

We are CLEARLY better than Philly and Indiana. I will take Orlando or Chicago in the first round.

yup. people here like to ignore the fact that cleveland beat the lakers two games ago, too. i guess the lakers aren't making the playoffs either?

if anything, last night had all the hallmarks of a let-down game for the team. coming off the big debut at MSG and gearing up for the big game in Miami on Sunday - the team looked like it thought it could cruise through this one without too much effort.

cleveland had different ideas and showed more effort.

these things do happen over the course of the nba season.

I'm fine with that, but the Lakers are established and deep. We have 3 shoot first guys and very little rebounding and playmaking. Its hard to win night in night out like that, especially when your getting beat on the boards nightly

they out-rebounded Milwaukee who is a better rebounding team than Cleveland and a top 5 defensive team. the talent is there, they can do it. they got beat by cleveland. it's not they CAN'T outrebound cleveland, they just did not outrebound cleveland. there's a big difference there. Cleveland had what, almost 30 second chance points??? crap. that's the game. cleveland wanted it more - the knicks were looking forward to miami or back to MSG and got blitzed. and when they realized they were blitzed, they had zero background of practice or repeated experience together to fall back on. so they went solo. chauncey billups single-handedly saved that thing from being a blowout in the early 4th quarter.

Uptown wrote:Boring wins playoff games.

That's what I was thinking too. All this great teamwork was only netting us indecisive play and .500 performance.

Knicksfan wrote:Anything is possible, but you have to be fair analyzing the situation. This team is still getting used to each other and to the system, so some of the action we saw last night will be fixed with time. But yeah, returning to the main point of this post, rebounding is a huge issue and that depends more on the talent available than time.

I completely agree with you that we have to fix the rebounding issue and the only realistic way to do it would be to bring in two big men that can focus mainly on that task and on defense. But then the issue is the coach, since he may have right now a guy that could've helped last night with the rebounding in Sheldon Williams, but it seems he won't play him. So, who can help?

Jeffries won't, thats why I really hope we can convince Murphy, Barron and the best of the D-League to come here.

Totally agree with what you guys are saying. To me the rebounding issue is the # 1 problem that we need to rectify IMMEDIATELY if not sooner -- I can't believe it hasn't been addressed sooner. And you're right -- Jeffries isn't going to fix that. Jeffries isn't going to fix much of anything to be honest but I digress..

The other parts to the team are more or less in place: 2 very good scorers (2 star players), a very good veteran PG, and actually some halfway decent defensive players at all positions pretty much (hopefully Mike can bring himself to use all of them)...What we need now to augment what's already here is rebounding -- legit 7'...undersized but effective... it doesn't really matter, just someone that's gonna go in there and compete for rebounds. Amar'e/Turiaf is our primary inside tandem right now and they're flat out not great in this area. Sub par..Rebounding been an obvious flaw with this team since the first couple of games of the season. Since pre-season in fact..I thought Turiaf would offer more on the boards--he can't. I thought Amar'e was easily gonna be over 10 rpg this season for the first time in his career---he hasn't been..If we all saw that from day 1, didn't Donnie and co.? To me this never required big moves to fix -- we can still fix it even though the deadline has passed...Where they're going wrong is instead of looking at some of the standout rebounders out there, they instead seem to be fixated on this Jared Jeffries, acting like he's some magic piece that's suddenly gonna transform this team into something special...Hello? He's not that guy...If, however, we go out an get a solid rebounder to cover that weakness, then maybe we can resemble something closer to a complete team..

Here's some guys that could immediately address the rebounding problem off the top of my head:

- I'd immediately call up Marcus Cousin, the most promising rebounding/scoring C in the DL at the moment. This is the guy I want the most -- big, skilled, young and just coming into his own now..There could be a nice future here. His 6'11" 255 lb. size, athleticism, rebounding, ability to can mid-range jumpers and overall ability to play both power and finesse would be a huge addition to our frontcourt.

- Call GS up on the phone and see if they're gonna move Troy Murphy or not..Word is they may not now..but get an answer..If they are ask for permission to speak to him about coming here...Shit, if we had any workable assets left I may have traded for this guy at the deadline--that would've insured he wouldn't go to Boston. What else might help Murphy choose us over the Celts is if we tell him that we can offer him regular PT and a starting role at center. Donnie's had him as a player in Indy -- hopefully there's a relationship there. Need to find out right now what GS's plans are for him. If he's available, do whatever you can to add him as long as he's healthy..Very good rebounder and he can shoot the ball.

- It's spilled milk a little bit, but come on, we should've reached out to Jeff Adrien weeks ago and told him how much we wanted to add him to the mix here..I'd be willing to bet that never happened. You think he would've liked playing for the Knicks at the Garden than in GS?? GS got him so that's that..Big loss for us. No longer an option but I have to mention him here because he's just a huge missed opportunity for us.

- DL C Courtney Sims is the 2nd best C left in the DL right now. Danny Ainge already grabbed Chris Johnson outta the NBDL, a nice move--Looks like Doc's gonna play him too..He'll help them. We should've been very much involved for his services. At least Sims is still available.

- Sean Williams looks a lot better than when the Nets had him..Looks like he's taken the DL experience serious. Give this guy a shot as a shot-blocker/rebounder. Why the F not?? Looks like his scoring may be improved as well..He was putting the ball on the floor a little bit in the NBDL all-star game..I don't remember him being able to do that.

- Joe Alexander like Sean Williams looks improved from his time in the NBA. Doesn't have true big man height (he's more of a big 3 that's been playing 4 in the DL), but he's sneaky athletic, he can shoot/score and he's been a very good rebounder this year in the DL.

- Bring back Earl Barron. It's obvious they like him..What the hell are they waiting for? If this is the guy they really want, they should've gotten him weeks ago..WTF. Why wait?

- Not sure what Dwayne Jones is up to...Dude led the DL in rebounding last year at near 16 rpg..I couldn't care less that he can't really score (neither can Turiaf and Jones is probably better offensively than Ronny)..Bottom line is he can grab rebounds, that's his specialty..That's enough for me..If he's been keeping himself in shape, I'm interested.

- Give Shelden Williams a chance..Let him prove that he can't help in this dept. We need to see it...Mike should want to see it.

- What the hell happened with our interest in Vernon Goodridge? I thought they loved this guy? Why the F wasn't he added weeks ago? There are guys that stand out more in the DL but F it, if they think he can help as a rebounder/shot-blocker, why not??

ramtour420 wrote:

Killa4luv wrote:Melo is the #1 rebounder among SFs, so he isnt only above average, hes the best at his position.

And that really doesn't matter. Why doesn't it matter? Because he is playing PF for us. . .

ROFL. I'm speechless.

I always find it funny when people talk about Mike's spread offense and not getting rebounds when majority of the percentage of rebounds are on the defensive side.