Not a bad player, but not impressive either. Besides, he's a forward at 6'8". No way. We need a center. I'll say it again, We need a center. We passed on Bynum and Lopez and this forward isn't going to answer any of our problems. Forget it.

Posted by 4949:

Not a bad player, but not impressive either. Besides, he's a forward at 6'8". No way. We need a center. I'll say it again, We need a center. We passed on Bynum and Lopez and this forward isn't going to answer any of our problems. Forget it.

i think for the make-up of this team Anthony Randolph would be the type of guy D'Antoni would want at center.

I think more crucial for the style we're playing now is a SG who can fill it. look at the difference in the way we play when QRich is on vs when he's off. If we had a steady performer at SG like say Bayless or Gordon, i think we'd have about 5 more wins right now.

Lopez has shown that he's going to be an above average center for the next decade and could be much better than that. When you're rebuilding, how do you pass on that when he drops in your lap?

And to think Walsh even said that he knew that the team couldn't screw up this pick but he gambles on Il Bustino anyway. D'Antoni's fingerprints are all over that. If not a direct, "I want him", then a nod to the type of player that would fit his "System". A traditional big center doesn't fit, even if he's the better player with the more certain upside. That's a shame.

Posted by BRIGGS:

What a F brutal devastating mistake taking this kid over Lopez when we had no C. Lopez will end up the best player in the draft. He toyed with Celtic bigs today. The second we hired Donnie Walsh and Dantoni was the second we gave up putting two frontcourt posts together. Might as well get ready for Kyle Singler.

And you and everybody here were screaming, yelling for us to pick Lopez, right? No, you all had another favorite player. Ah, some of you are so silly, changing your ming like a girl changes clothes, always jumping in the bandwagon of the rookie with the latest strong game. Lets see where those players are in 2 or 3 years and then we'll be talking.

Funny that in the same amount of time, our pick could be looking as a genius move. Hey, if you can play the possibility game like if they were facts written in stone, so can I.

Posted by islesfan:

Lopez has shown that he's going to be an above average center for the next decade and could be much better than that. When you're rebuilding, how do you pass on that when he drops in your lap?

And to think Walsh even said that he knew that the team couldn't screw up this pick but he gambles on Il Bustino anyway. D'Antoni's fingerprints are all over that. If not a direct, "I want him", then a nod to the type of player that would fit his "System". A traditional big center doesn't fit, even if he's the better player with the more certain upside. That's a shame.

agreed. i seem to remember D'Antoni saying something like "Gallinari's father (who D'Antoni played with in Italy) said he could play, he better be right..."

it really seems like D'Antoni and Walsh made this pick without ever having seen the kid play, which is just bad. and with so much talent left on the board and walsh acknowledging we couldn't miss, it just seems reckless. for all of isiah thomas' recklessness, he could at least draft.

Posted by CrushAlot:

I wasn't for Lopez but I am not paid to make that pick. Walsh said he had only seen limited film on Gallo. D'Antoni said he had to be convinced by Walsh to take the pick. Everybody seems to have set their alibi up early on with this choice.

i really think D'Antoni didn't care after they lost out on Rose and found they couldn't trade for Mayo. that's why you don't let coaches run the draft.

Posted by CrushAlot:

I wasn't for Lopez but I am not paid to make that pick. Walsh said he had only seen limited film on Gallo. D'Antoni said he had to be convinced by Walsh to take the pick. Everybody seems to have set their alibi up early on with this choice.

Oh, so since you get paid you should know exactly every single detail of a player and also run an astrology test to see which ones will have a long career in the NBA and turn out to be more productive than any scout, GM and "knowledgeable" fans gave him credit?

I give you that Walsh didn't do his job well if its true that he said what you claim he did (quote with newspaper link would be appreciated). But the fans always react like if they knew a certain player would turn out a certain way when his stats back them up, but mysteriously never mentioned the player when it really mattered. Lopez is now the man, is now the best player in the draft. Next week, Derrick Rose goes for a quadruple double and he is the next MJ. Next Mayo and so on.

This isn't the quote I referred to but it does give some insight into Walsh's knowledge of Danillo. Isiah's report is mentioned also as part of the info that helped Walsh decide.

If Danilo Gallinari had an N.C.A.A. pedigree, an endorsement from Dick Vitale and a less-exotic name, he might have been greeted with roses instead of raspberries when the Knicks made him the sixth pick of the N.B.A. draft.
Instead, fans at the Theater at Madison Square Garden booed the unknown. The scouting report may not fit the soft European stereotype, but it does, in fact, belong to Gallinari.

He flashed another important trait Friday morning: the prescience to acknowledge that scouting reports mean nothing to a jaded fan base.

“I came from Milan, that has similar fans,” Gallinari said during an informal news conference at the Knicks’ training center. “I will work to prove to everybody the type of player that I am.”
Aside from grainy YouTube videos of Gallinari in Milan, there is little for Knicks fans to base their impressions on. Even Donnie Walsh, the Knicks’ president, has never seen him play in person, although he watched Gallinari work out twice.

But Walsh received in-depth reports from Kevin Wilson, the Knicks’ director of international scouting, and got firsthand accounts from two other staff members: Glen Grunwald, the senior vice president, and Isiah Thomas, the deposed team president, whom Walsh dispatched to Europe last month.

The most comprehensive information came from Wilson, who has been tracking Gallinari for three years, since Gallinari turned professional at 16.

“He was a special kid from an early age,” Wilson said.

It was not until recently that Wilson saw something more. In the second half of last season, “I really zeroed in on how big his heart was, how hard he worked, how much improvement he’d made, how good he could become,” Wilson said. “Because he’s not a finished product.”

According to Wilson, Gallinari has exceptional ball-handling skills for his size, a high basketball I.Q. and a jump shot that is much better than he showed in Europe. He can hit the N.B.A. 3-pointer consistently and is an adept passer with good court vision, Wilson said. But unlike the stereotypical European big man — including his countryman Andrea Bargnani — Gallinari is not content to float on the perimeter.

Wilson said that Gallinari aggressively drove to the basket and averaged 8 to 10 free-throw attempts a game this season. Gallinari was his team’s primary fourth-quarter option, as a scorer and a playmaker.

“He has toughness,” Wilson said. “American guys over there heard that he was ‘the Man,’ so they wanted to put him in his place. They would pop him, they would ’bow him, they would hit him. He would take it. He wouldn’t get mad, he wouldn’t get rattled. Just come down, make a basket on them, look at them, wouldn’t back down.”

Gallinari can play either forward position, although he may not have the lateral quickness to guard small forwards or the muscle yet to guard some power forwards. He is listed at 210 pounds, but the Knicks intend to put him on a weight training and conditioning program immediately. (They will also see his baseball skills — Gallinari is throwing out the ceremonial first pitch at the Mets-Yankees game Saturday.)

Gallinari is staying in the United States for the next three weeks and will play for the Knicks’ summer-league team in Las Vegas next month.

And then there is this: Gallinari is probably still growing. He said that he measured 6 feet 9 inches without shoes and that doctors told him he would grow another inch or two.

“The combination of being able to take it to the goal and to shoot from the outside, for a guy that big, is going to be, I think, a pretty lethal combination,” Walsh said.

Talent and size do not always translate immediately from Europe to the N.B.A., particularly among younger players. Dirk Nowitzki looked like a bust as a 20-year-old rookie in 1999, then blossomed over the next few years

“You might have to wait on him,” Wilson said of Gallinari. “You’re going to have to work with him, wait on him, encourage him, develop him, play him, let him take his lumps. It will make him stronger, it will make him better.”


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Posted by BRIGGS:

What a F brutal devastating mistake taking this kid over Lopez when we had no C. Lopez will end up the best player in the draft. He toyed with Celtic bigs today. The second we hired Donnie Walsh and Dantoni was the second we gave up putting two frontcourt posts together. Might as well get ready for Kyle Singler.

i'm going to go on record right now & say the Knicks will win a championship before the Nets do.

Posted by Knicksfan:

Posted by BRIGGS:

What a F brutal devastating mistake taking this kid over Lopez when we had no C. Lopez will end up the best player in the draft. He toyed with Celtic bigs today. The second we hired Donnie Walsh and Dantoni was the second we gave up putting two frontcourt posts together. Might as well get ready for Kyle Singler.

And you and everybody here were screaming, yelling for us to pick Lopez, right? No, you all had another favorite player. Ah, some of you are so silly, changing your ming like a girl changes clothes, always jumping in the bandwagon of the rookie with the latest strong game. Lets see where those players are in 2 or 3 years and then we'll be talking.

Funny that in the same amount of time, our pick could be looking as a genius move. Hey, if you can play the possibility game like if they were facts written in stone, so can I.

Gallo can turn out to be the best player taken in the '08 draft for all we know... but hey, we all have those 15 minutes of NBA play to judge him on... i guess that's as good a measuring stick as any for all the draft experts here.