shinmen wrote:I don't understand some of you. Anybody and everybody is saying we need to groom our youngs but when we draft someone and he doesn't necessarily reach stardom during their rookie season, he's a bum. Early was regarded a steal last year, there must be some reason. Plus, he was injured last season.
He doesn't cost much.
He's not clearly in the rotation. There is no practical path to playing time other than multiple injuries in the front court, the one place where the Knicks have more players than minutes available. When he does play, it's painfully clear he is not suited for the Triangle Offense and, moreso, he has not established any kind of "trust" with his play with Derek Fisher.
He does have a nice young talent base. However there are two "taxes" at work here.
There's a Melo "tax" which dictates the team should choose empty wins to treadmill than a true full on rebuild. In a true full on rebuild, the team doesn't sign a Derrick Williams. On the flip side, if Early wanted the job, he should have simply earned it by dominating the D League when he did play there and shown more in limited minutes. Some will say, that's not fair. Well some UDFA corner for the Jets might only get 10 snaps to show what he can do before getting cut. I'm sure someone will say that's not fair either. It's not about fair. If you have higher draft pedigree, you will get more opportunity in your career to show you can be something compared to lower drafted and undrafted counterparts. Not conjecture, not opinion, but pure hard lockdown fact across all modern professional sports.
Then there's the Phil Jackson Triangle "tax" where the kid is forced to not just assimilate to the NBA, but to a complex offense and have massive and key responsibilities to run said offense at times based purely on positional value. Hence why I keep saying over and over - THERE IS A REASON NO OTHER TEAM IS USING THE TRIANGLE OFFENSE IN THE NBA RIGHT NOW. When the offense plays to Lou Amundson traits and experience but not to Clem Early's, then you start to see there is a massive "disconnect" between the idea of the Triangle and a practical team rebuild.
Early simply doesn't have, by draft pedigree, enough practical team controllable years to keep hoping he will "show up". When you are cheap to get, great if you break out, but if you are cheap to get, then you are also cheap to let go if it doesn't work out for the team. WORKS BOTH WAYS.
I doubt anyone here has a "glitch" against Early personally or Knicks rookies in general. This isn't about absurd expectations. The kid CANNOT function in the Triangle Offense and has no practical path to minutes. That's not a failure to be "optimistic", it's simply the kid CANNOT FUNCTION in the Triangle Offense and has NO PRACTICAL PATH TO MINUTES.
You CANNOT DEVELOP A YOUNG PLAYER UNLESS HE GETS ACTUAL ROTATIONAL PLAYING TIME. HE ISN'T GOING TO PLAY IF HE DOESN'T EVEN UNDERSTAND THE BASIC OFFENSE AND BASIC SETS OF THE TRIANGLE OFFENSE AND WOULD NEED MULTIPLE INJURIES AS A PATH TO EVEN BACK END ROTATION MINUTES.
NO UNDERSTAND OFFENSE = NO MINUTES
NO MINUTES = NO DEVELOPMENT
" Tell me when do you think Early should've been able to fix all of his flaws?"
NO UNDERSTAND OFFENSE = NO MINUTES
NO MINUTES = NO DEVELOPMENT
Nixluva, you were at the forefront to blindly defend Phil Jackson ( well for pretty much everything) when he signed Lou Amundson and Lance Thomas and Kevin Seraphin and Derrick Williams. Did you think signing those players had no ripple effect on Clem Early's chance to get minutes and playing time and a chance to develop? What do you think people were saying in all those posts when you kept ignoring their points? You can't ignore it now.
DO NOT BLAME CLEM EARLY'S LACK OF MORE OPPORTUNITIES ON UK MEMBERS YOU CALL "IMPATIENT"
Your beloved Phil Jackson did so when he kept signing fringe front court player after player.
Please do not go running like a snitch again saying I'm here bullying you. You want to defend every Phil Jackson move like he carries the Hand Of God? Fine, do it. Your prerogative. But every move Phil makes comes with some consequence. A reality of the job. None of us squeezed Early out, Phil did. It's not optimism to ignore the basic concept of "tradeoffs"
