Posted by Marv:


Yeah but you also like Fat Ass Jerome. Coming from you isn't a ringing endorsement. It's more like an "oh ****, now I know we ****ed up" endorsement.

Posted by BRIGGS:

Posted by martin:

^ and BTW, my Amare example should be right up your alley.

If I was running the Knick --believe me there would be an emphasis on losing as much as possible from here on in the rest of the year. There are some athletic 4's and one athletic 5 we could use that wont be there at 10-11-12. It's not really rebuilding when you go all out to win 33 games and end up picking 10th. Rebuilding means you have to accept losing a LOT to get a VERY high pick. The LESS the Knicks have to think about things--the better for the team.

Posted by sebstar:

BTW, dont let Briggs' ego hijack this thread. He's going to try to position himself as some sort of drafting guru, when in fact he threw out a bunch of different names concerning who we should draft. Dont fall for that. But a lot of us questioned the Gallo pick. Crazy ass Playa seemed to hit the nail on the head as to why we drafted him.

Imagine if we pushed for Mayo. Imagine the position we'd be in with him wearing the orange and blue. Oh well. What a disaster this decade has been.

Posted by sebstar:

I don't follow your logic at all. I don't know what we were doing in the Isiah years but I don't call that rebuilding.

10 teams passed on Lopez so I don't know how you can say he was projected to go top 3. Maybe at some point in the year 2007, but not at the end. Rose, Beasley, OJ.

With lottery picks you HAVE to shoot for the moon, in the same way you should shoot for selecting Amare in the top 3 instead of a lower ceiling guy like Lopez.

So you think this pick was a pure b-ball decision and not a "look how exotic of a pick we can make because we are smarter than you," sort of deal? Do you think that Gallo's ties to D'Antoni didnt play a role? Do you think that NY's demographics didnt play a role? Do you think that this pick being a referendum on Isiah, in that they tried to draft a player who is the furthest thing from his regime didnt play a role?

And do you think all of this led to them overlooking what is developing into a very serious health or mental problem.

The Knicks passed on some VERY good talent. This was a strong draft.

Gallinari's skills are what intrigued the Knicks. The other stuff is shear speculation. Good ball handler/passer, one of the top outside shooters in the draft, experience against grown men, and a BB pedigree.

Lopez has surprised me, and I am not going to deny that if I knew he would be playing like he is now I might have wanted the Knicks to take him, but l always considered him slow and his footwork suspect. I hope he does well and it is great to see him on a local team, but a lot of teams seemingly made a mistake on him.

Hell, you can make a case that Miami, and especially Minnesota, should have taken Lopez based on what we have seen from Beasley, Love, and Lopez so far.

Gordon has looked good on a terrible team so far, but as some have pointed out, a small shooting guard was not something the Knicks were looking for. Augustin would have been taken if he was 4 inches taller, and Randolph and Bayless have hardly been impressive despite some moments.

Nobody really knows how this draft will rank at this point, and we don't even know how Lopez will be over his career, despite the good things he is doing now,

I could just see people complaining now if the Knicks had taken Alexander, and a healthy Gallo (can't assume that he would have been injured in another setting) was doing good things on Milwaukee or the Clippers, another team he practiced for.

Posted by Marv:

Posted by sebstar:

BTW, dont let Briggs' ego hijack this thread. He's going to try to position himself as some sort of drafting guru, when in fact he threw out a bunch of different names concerning who we should draft. Dont fall for that. But a lot of us questioned the Gallo pick. Crazy ass Playa seemed to hit the nail on the head as to why we drafted him.

Imagine if we pushed for Mayo. Imagine the position we'd be in with him wearing the orange and blue. Oh well. What a disaster this decade has been.

it's time for the glass 1/2 full thing.

i'm not talking about any pollyana crap, i'm talking about drinking!!

Posted by islesfan:

Post 9998

I Told You So Part 9998

Il Bustino

It's incredibly naive for anybody to think this is normal and isn't setting this franchise back. He's a 19-20 year old kid, who may or may not have had a preexisting back injury when the Knicks drafted him. Whatever the diagnosis is that the Knicks are keeping secret, it hasn't healed sufficiently enough after 6 full months of rest and he's still having radiating pain down his leg, never a good sign.

Donne Walsh on the Knicks 2008 Lottery Pick:

"We can't make a mistake with that kind of pick. Case closed."

That pick has spent the last 6 months on the sidelines, save for 2 games that continue to prove that the Knicks medical crack committee is as clueless as ever. Whatever the injury is exactly, we know it was exacerbated by minimal contact in a summer league game. That suggests to me that his back was injured before that game. But even if it weren't, the fact that he would suffer a back injury, in that situation, that would take him out for over half a year is still immensely troubling.

Like others have said, this is not a normal sports injury where you rest or have surgery and that's it. Bad backs linger and surgery is not a guarantee to fix it. So comparing Il Bustino to other draft picks, like Oden, is ridiculous. It's also foolish to say that this is a normal part of rebuilding. Rebuilding has nothing to do with waiting months for your lottery pick to heal from a back injury, to prove that he was worth the pick and can become part of the solution here. As Walsh himself said, they couldn't afford to make a mistake with that pick and as of right now, there's no way to think otherwise.

Because he hasn't played, we can't even get into how shortsighted this pick was. They already have Chandler to play SF and they're targeting LeBron, so why did they draft Il Bustino in the first place? He can't play PF because he can't handle the contact with or without the bad back and he's not a C despite his height. He's a misfit without a position. Walsh could have drafted a good young C in Brook Lopez when he dropped to them, he could have drafted an athletic shot blocking PF in Anthony Randolph and he could have drafted guards who can shoot and score in Eric Gordon, DJ Augustin or Jerryd Bayless. Any of these players would have made more sense than Il Bustino. Regardless of who anybody on this board preferred, it was up to Walsh to get the best player and fit for this team and his choice is dubious so far.

Maximizing their 2008 and 2009 draft picks are just as important to this franchise as getting far enough under the cap in 2010 to sign 2 top free agents. First it helps to attract free agents to have very good young players already on the team. Secondly, they simply need good young players to put around the free agents moving forward. Having a lottery pick only increases that importance and multiplies the effect on the organization if the pick is a bust. As of right now, Il Bustino has been a disastrous bust for the Knicks and it's not debateable.

Posted by islesfan:

Post 9998

I Told You So Part 9998

Il Bustino

It's incredibly naive for anybody to think this is normal and isn't setting this franchise back. He's a 19-20 year old kid, who may or may not have had a preexisting back injury when the Knicks drafted him. Whatever the diagnosis is that the Knicks are keeping secret, it hasn't healed sufficiently enough after 6 full months of rest and he's still having radiating pain down his leg, never a good sign.

Donne Walsh on the Knicks 2008 Lottery Pick:

"We can't make a mistake with that kind of pick. Case closed."

That pick has spent the last 6 months on the sidelines, save for 2 games that continue to prove that the Knicks medical crack committee is as clueless as ever. Whatever the injury is exactly, we know it was exacerbated by minimal contact in a summer league game. That suggests to me that his back was injured before that game. But even if it weren't, the fact that he would suffer a back injury, in that situation, that would take him out for over half a year is still immensely troubling.

Like others have said, this is not a normal sports injury where you rest or have surgery and that's it. Bad backs linger and surgery is not a guarantee to fix it. So comparing Il Bustino to other draft picks, like Oden, is ridiculous. It's also foolish to say that this is a normal part of rebuilding. Rebuilding has nothing to do with waiting months for your lottery pick to heal from a back injury, to prove that he was worth the pick and can become part of the solution here. As Walsh himself said, they couldn't afford to make a mistake with that pick and as of right now, there's no way to think otherwise.

Because he hasn't played, we can't even get into how shortsighted this pick was. They already have Chandler to play SF and they're targeting LeBron, so why did they draft Il Bustino in the first place? He can't play PF because he can't handle the contact with or without the bad back and he's not a C despite his height. He's a misfit without a position. Walsh could have drafted a good young C in Brook Lopez when he dropped to them, he could have drafted an athletic shot blocking PF in Anthony Randolph and he could have drafted guards who can shoot and score in Eric Gordon, DJ Augustin or Jerryd Bayless. Any of these players would have made more sense than Il Bustino. Regardless of who anybody on this board preferred, it was up to Walsh to get the best player and fit for this team and his choice is dubious so far.

Maximizing their 2008 and 2009 draft picks are just as important to this franchise as getting far enough under the cap in 2010 to sign 2 top free agents. First it helps to attract free agents to have very good young players already on the team. Secondly, they simply need good young players to put around the free agents moving forward. Having a lottery pick only increases that importance and multiplies the effect on the organization if the pick is a bust. As of right now, Il Bustino has been a disastrous bust for the Knicks and it's not debateable.

Posted by BRIGGS:

Posted by Uptown:

Posted by BRIGGS:

Posted by martin:

Posted by Cosmic:

He's been on a permanent "will reevaluate in 2 to 4 weeks" schedule ever since July. It never changes. After all this time either go get surgery or retire.

Alright, I'll start the parade of doom.

Gallouch.

Do you think you can rebuild in NY? Cause your patience level suggests otherwise.

Martin--I think you can rebuild in NY--we've been trying to do in for 7.5 years. I can understand why some fans would be mad that we ended up taking a risk on a player--when a 7 footer who was projected to go top 3 the whole time suddenly falls in our lap with our C situation and they decided to bypass it. So we took risk tripled it since we took a player who is foreign and 19 --then bypassed a player who was proven at the highest NCAA level at a position of dire need. Subsequently this player is injured[was he injured prior--we'll never know and they wont tell us] in his first summer league team game and is out for seven months with no ending in sight. IMHO we tried to get fancy and AGAIn we guaranteed a pick and let Lopez go to take this kid. Thats not rebuilding--thats gambling--and weve dont too much of that.

Lopez...top three? You didn't have him in your top three. If I remember correctly, people, including myself, doubted Lopez at this level because he shot a poor FG% for a bigman and was a bit slow of foot. Most people here wanted Mayo (who wasn't available), Bayless, Westbrook and Anthony Randoplh.

02-15-2008 12:16 AM Show Profile Reply with Quote 1. Michael Beasley==KN ST F
2. Jerryd Bayless-- AZ ST combo guard
3. Brook Lopez--Stan F/C
4 Derrick Rose--Memp combo G
5 Blake Griffin--Okla F
6 Darrel Arthur--Kansas F
7 Tyler Hansbrough North Carolina F
8 Eric Gordon--Ind combo
9 Hasheem Thabeet C Uconn C
10 Billy Walker Kan ST wing

http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=25581
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=25863
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=25961
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=25945
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=26072
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=26151
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=26156
http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=26248
3-28-2008 11:00 PM Show Profile Reply with Quote Not a bad prize for us at all. He's enormous--tremendous base strength with good basic post skills that should be able to be tightened up in his process of improving. Not the quickest post defender but still his body strength alone will help any team hurting in the middle. While he does have his awkward points--overall a tremendous prospect. 10Xs the prospect any of these combo guards are.

It's more of a top heavy 3 draft but there there are still potentially some very exciting big players who are unerdevloped physically. I read that Koufus wants to leave Ohio State and he could easily be another hugh level target--but as of now it's a top 3 draft and then the work begins.

To take problem solving out of the Knicks future--we must be a top 3 pick. Even Isiah Channing Frye number 1 pick Thomas could not fck this draft up top 3.


I wont go any further than this other than to say I never thought he was a viable option at 6 until very late in the process. I never thought we could get him. In fact when I had a started to believe we had a thin chance at getting him I said we should.









http://ultimateknicks.com/forum/topic.asp?t=25794

First off BRIGGS thanks for not posting the links. Second, you created so many threads with so many scenarios, you pretty much cover yourself. I just remember leading right to the draft you were pushing McGee and Randolph.