Posted by Bonn1997:

Posted by sebstar:

Balkman wasnt that big of a mistake and Nate Robinson is an A pick for sure...picks 20 or above are always a crapshoot. We should know, because our '90s teams always picked in those slots and we got nothing for years.

BTW, whats Marcus Williams up to these days?

I agree and I think Solace is being a bit harsh in his grades, but I guess he and I just have different expectations for draft picks.

Solace and I have gone at a couple of time on that subject. He's just not going to give Zeke any credit and is going to take the most negative avenue possible when discussing his picks.

Posted by holfresh:

Posted by islesfan:

Posted by sebstar:

Balkman wasnt that big of a mistake and Nate Robinson is an A pick for sure...picks 20 or above are always a crapshoot. We should know, because our '90s teams always picked in those slots and we got nothing for years.

BTW, whats Marcus Williams up to these days?

The better question is what is Rajon Rondo up to these days.

Playing with three Hall of Famers doesn't hurt either...

Say what you want about Isiah and there is lots to be said, the guy could draft....

i would say the guy can find players late in the draft. he blew the frye pick and he assessed the 2006 and 2007 draft to be not as good as curry.

Posted by djsunyc:

Posted by holfresh:

Posted by islesfan:

Posted by sebstar:

Balkman wasnt that big of a mistake and Nate Robinson is an A pick for sure...picks 20 or above are always a crapshoot. We should know, because our '90s teams always picked in those slots and we got nothing for years.

BTW, whats Marcus Williams up to these days?

The better question is what is Rajon Rondo up to these days.

Playing with three Hall of Famers doesn't hurt either...

Say what you want about Isiah and there is lots to be said, the guy could draft....

i would say the guy can find players late in the draft. he blew the frye pick and he assessed the 2006 and 2007 draft to be not as good as curry.

Yeah, true, but that was the get to the playoffs now and win now mandate...I'm not sure if he could have picked Bynum as a project center that would have taken many years to develop...He had to sign JJ1 because he had no center as well...

Posted by Marv:

Posted by djsunyc:

Posted by holfresh:

Posted by islesfan:

Posted by sebstar:

Balkman wasnt that big of a mistake and Nate Robinson is an A pick for sure...picks 20 or above are always a crapshoot. We should know, because our '90s teams always picked in those slots and we got nothing for years.

BTW, whats Marcus Williams up to these days?

The better question is what is Rajon Rondo up to these days.

Playing with three Hall of Famers doesn't hurt either...

Say what you want about Isiah and there is lots to be said, the guy could draft....

i would say the guy can find players late in the draft. he blew the frye pick and he assessed the 2006 and 2007 draft to be not as good as curry.

maybe. or he might have never imagined in a million years that the knicks would be in those lotteries.

this is the right answer.

Isiah did mess up by not taking Rondo in the draft. Rondo was projected to go right around where the Knicks picked and was taken with the next pick in the draft. Balkman was not rated as even a second rounder on any of the pre draft rankings that I follow. Isiah made the stunning, jaw dropping, out of nowhere pick that would make him the center of attention and possibly solidify his status as a draft guru. It didn't. Look at the guys taken after. Boone, Rondo, and Lowry are already very good NBA players. Rodriguez appears to be at least a starter in waiting and Williams was projected as a lottery pick. You don't pass on any of these guys to take a camp invite free agent. I liked Ro as a Knick but he wasn't even supposed to be a late second round pick. The predraft camp where he did well is generally considered a place for guys hoping to be drafted in the second round or be seen by euro scouts. The Balkman pick was all about Isiah getting attention and recognition for his ability to identify talent. He identified a guy with enough talent to be an end of the bench or rotation player when a team has injuries but ignored the guys with starter and star potential that were available so people would talk about what a great drafter he is.

Isiah did make a great pick with Lee but it is not a surprise Lee has done well. Lee was projected as a first round, possible lottery pick coming out of high school if he declared for the draft. He went to a good school and had a solid but unspectacular career. By his senior year his game had been seen so much by scouts that he no longer had the same 'hidden' potential that gets lesser known guys drafted high. Lee was a good selection but also an obvious one. Isiah did what he was supposed to do with that pick.

Balkman just never developed, but I can see why he drafted him.

so can i... all these draft experts that pine all day long about how we shoulda drafted Marcus Williams, or this past year we shoulda taken Jerryd Bayless over Gallinari... what the hell have either of them done to merit such complaint?

Posted by Bonn1997:

Posted by sebstar:

Balkman wasnt that big of a mistake and Nate Robinson is an A pick for sure...picks 20 or above are always a crapshoot. We should know, because our '90s teams always picked in those slots and we got nothing for years.

BTW, whats Marcus Williams up to these days?

I agree and I think Solace is being a bit harsh in his grades, but I guess he and I just have different expectations for draft picks.

It's not the expectations. It's the style and the reaching. Isiah's style was doomed to failure. On most of his picks, he only picked athletic guys over players who are talented basketball players and high IQ players and disregarded key elements. It's hard to name another GM that took that strategy.

The more obnoxious thing is that he on multiple occasions, severely reached, and picked players way higher then they should've gone. Again, the two more severe instances in my mind were Balkman and Frye. The thing is that if those picks work, you give the GM a B+ at best, because the general perception was that he could've traded down and still gotten those guys. There's been some disagreement on this in the past, but the fact is that it's unlikely that other teams had these guys nearly as high as we took them. They also weren't projected anywhere close to where they were drafted, until the rumors leaked of the Knicks interest, in Frye's case. So, here's the thing. Both picks were utter failures. If the guy made a reasonable pick of a player who wasn't so risky at those slots, it's a lot more understandable, then reaching 20 or 30 slots down to pick an early and then have him be a bust. Those are why those picks are Fs, in my mind.

Then, Isiah repeatedly picked players who were redundant in our system, and because of the glut, wouldn't get a chance to develop as well as they would otherwise. That's a sign of poor drafting strategy. I understand the philosophy on this board of drafting the "best player available", because you can always trade him later -- except it rarely works in practice. Whenever you draft a player who is entering into a glut, a lot of the time he isn't traded, until his value has significantly dropped because of the glut.

I honestly think that if you investigate other teams in the league, I think there's a lot of teams that with one lottery pick and 8 or so overall picks in four years that pulled out talent equatable to David Lee and some role players. That's why I said, Isiah did reasonably well, but he had some serious blunders, so let's not carried away.

Sebstar, I don't agree because I don't see your point of view. I think we simply value our current roster differently. I like Lee, but it's tough to say whether he's a starter or a sixth man. Right now it looks like starter, but I know a lot of the board isn't fully convinced... so I'm waiting to see what his contract is, which will likely determine his role for the next six years. I like Nate, but he's not a starter, mostly because of his size. I like Chandler, but my suspicion is that he's not a starter either -- but it's possible. I suggested waiting longer to truly evaluate Chandler. As many on this board know, almost everyone would've had Frye at or close to an A after season 1. Now, Frye getting a D would be generous.

I also know that you've had a lovefest for Isiah since you've been posting here. The fact that it's not popular to be an Isiah fan in the past six months or so doesn't change the fact that you're not likely to break from that trend right away. I don't think I'm being unfair to Isiah. So far, I'm in the very slim minority that was right about Isiah since the first trade he made where he got owned in a trade just to make Steph happy (prior to that, I gave Isiah the benefit of the doubt, despite some earlier questionable moves). It's tough to buy in that I'm simply hating when history shows that I've been generally right about Isiah.

[Edited by - Solace on Jan 04 2009 02:20 AM]

Posted by Bonn1997:

Fair enough. I don't think he always merely chose the most athletic guy; he wouldn't have picked Lee, Frye, or Mardy then. But he did that at times just go with the most athletic guy. With the late 1st round picks, I can't fault him for just taking who he thought was the best player rather than worrying about fit for the system, but talent vs. fit for the system is an old, unsettled debate for drafting strategy in general. Regarding Frye, I think the majority would have been right to give him a high grade after his rookie year; he had earned it. Now, is it 100% Isiah's fault that something with Frye (perhaps the injury) changed his performance after year 1? I think it's less than 100% Isiah's fault and thus gave him a D- rather than an F. I think an F implies that the player *never* had an extended stretch indicating he could perform on a level to justify being picked where he was (like Fred Weiss). Maybe I just have too much free time on my hands between semesters if I'm actually debating a D- vs. an F!

IMHO, Lee is a very good athlete and was perceived as such coming out of the draft. What I was pointing to is the fact that Isiah drafted so many players whose top quality was athleticism. I don't think Isiah ever worried about whether a player fit the system, which was ultimately a large part of his downfall. From time to time, you make exceptions if someone is just that good... but it's called an exception because it shouldn't happen every time. In Isiah's case, it was just about every time.

As for Frye, the point I was trying to make with grading him an A after season 1 was that I'm hasty to grade any player before at least two full years. We saw the lack of improvement or declines in guys like Frye, Collins, Balkman, etc... in year two. I'm especially hasty to grade an Isiah player early, because his draft picks have a history of fast starts and then not improving at all. My point in the example was to emphasize that it's too early to make a good judgment on Wilson Chandler.

My criticism of Isiah for the Frye pick lies solely in the selection at #8. At #8, you expect a starter, generally one of your top 3 or 4 guys. If the player doesn't turn out to be that much, the pick was bad to start with. I think those were just insane expectations for a guy like Channing Frye, who is really backup center talent. Backup centers have historically gone in the late first round. This is where Frye was projected, before it was leaked early that Isiah had already made a promise -- before even having seen most of the other lottery players (which is moronic, in of itself).