Rautins--I like the Reddic lite comparison--no PG at all not even close--question with rautins can he hit that three in the 43-45% range because that is his skill either he can or he cant

Fields--his dribble is to high and his shot is somewhat flat played hard/opportunistic had some nice moves-- one where he got away with a blatant travel. He is no where near the class of Wilson Chandler right now--not in the same class or even close. Something the Knicks should consider with this trade Chandler stuff I read today--to be honest--there is too many question marks to trade Chandler

Overall not very impressed--they looked like 2nd rounders

scoshin wrote:Toney Douglas shot the ball well, but he's definitely not a PG. He was chucking a lot of shots, and while he did record 5 assists, only one of them (a drive and kick out to Andy Rautins) seemed like legitimate playmaking.

Andy Rautins...I dunno, I'm not that enamored with him as others on the board. Seems really one-dimensional, but I suppose he can be a role player off the bench in D'Antoni's offense. But we have so many shooters on this team now that I don't see Rautins getting any play time.

Bill Walker did not look good out there, but he had a few moments where he'd make a nice pass into the post. But it's only one game, and we know he can play better than this.

Jerome Jordan flat out sucked. Didn't protect the paint like a 7' should, was foul prone, and seemed a bit lost on offense, not really giving Toney any good picks.

Landry Fields -- this guy may turn out to be the biggest surprise. Had a lot of poise out there, which reminded me of David Lee's summer league games, especially the way Fields was able to slip in for a few offensive rebounds late in the game. He also showed some nice iso moves, one where he split two defenders, and maintained his dribble for the layup; another where he did an Al Harrington-esque spin move into a turnaround jumper. Don't want to get too ahead of myself, but he has the look of a second round steal. Biggest knock though is he doesn't look like much of a shooter.

re PG--you and I agree and I cant see how the Knicks cant. Douglas is more of a 6th man type--if we haev to count on him to play lead PG--were going to get killed in the halfcourt. Right now this is a situation--I would do what i had to to bring in Livingston--I actually said that the other day--if we were able to trade for Parker I would have still brought in Livingston. If Felton went down we would simply not have a guy who could be a lead PG. Its almost a lock that we are going to have to do something about it--Livingston is out there and he makes the most sense by far--I don't know how much cap space we have or roster spots but we need to make room and we better do it before someone else does

Knicksfan wrote:Felton is the lead guard, definitely.

They should push Douglas and even Rautins to look to organize the offense more next game. I don't know about Rautins, but Douglas has had a few solid games being point guard and running the team. He supposedly worked on running the pick and roll, so he should show that starting in these games. He can definitely be a solid backup point guard for this team.

Then you are setting his bar to low. He can score--he is a sixth man or a third guard in a 3 guard alignment. To set the bad as a shaky back up PG is NOT getting the most out of him. He can play some PG but were going to have to bite the bullet and bring in an additional PG--I thi9nk Livingston is the right choice.

Toney still doesn't look like he can run an offense. Bring the ball up slow and hovers at the 3point line. No diving down to the hole, very little movement. Shoots the 3 really well.

Jordan is indeed a D-League guy for at least a year.

Rautins looks like he can knock down the open J. Fields looks like a cross between Chandler and Rautins.

Not much else to report.

Denver had already played 2 games before this one and it was the Knicks' first, so take it for what it's worth.

Walker seems like someone who can be a complimentary player, but not a starter- folks should not think that having him on the Knicks makes Chandler expendable. I actually think he will be more valuable playing with our regulars. but I don't see him getting more than 15-20 MPG.

Rautins- He played the way I expected him to play. He is a sniper. Did not see any point guard ability, but they may let him do that later in the summer. He is going to have to make adjustments to his game so he can deal with the speed of the NBA and his own lack of quickness. He did make a few decent defensive plays, if I remember correctly. Reddic is a good comparison at this point, and if Rautins can be that good I will be happy.

Jordan- much of the criticism of him as a player coming out of college was about his motor, and you can why analysts said that was an issue. I expected to see a little more strength and some polish around the basket. I was disappointed. He may end up starting in the DL. This is why we picked up the Russian.

Landry Fields- the biggest surprise of the game. He showed a lot of creativity around the basket, some quick jumping ability, and he knows how to move the ball around effectively. Needs to work a bit on his ball handling and defense. His foul shooting did not look too good- maybe Houston can work with him now that the hunt for LeBron is over, but he hit 1 of 2 jumpers and I think he hit another one immediately after a whistle at one point. It did not seem like Toney was looking for him. There were times when Fields was moving around for position, and should have gotten the ball, but didn't. He has good length- comes in a 6'8" with shoes, but I thought he looked less muscular today than in his Stanford senior year- very strange. He needs to get a little stronger.

This came from his Portsmouth Tournament journal earlier in the year, and pretty much describes how he chose to play today:

Therefore, banking on the fact that scouts and general managers are pretty smart guys when it comes to this whole basketball thing, they want to see characteristics of players other than scoring. Think about it, if you are invited to an event such as this, you had to have been a decent scorer on your respected squad, so everyone knows you could score already.

With all of that in mind, my plan was to play every play as hard as I could, do little things to help the team win such as rebounding, playing good defense, talking on the court, sprinting the floor, find open guys for the best shots, and if I had a decent look, shoot/score the ball.

Overall, I felt I did all of what I wanted to accomplish pretty well. I averaged 13.3 points, 6 boards, and 3 assists. While those numbers don’t strike out as remarkable, after doing all the stuff that doesn’t show up in a box score along with that stat line, many felt I had a very good tournament. I definitely felt it was a success, and definitely didn’t hurt me in anyway in terms of my stock.

Final consideration- it is game one. We went through this last year when Douglas had a so so SL- you can't make a final judgement on a player based on the entire SL, let alone one game. Of our rookies- I see Fields and Rautins getting better as they feel more comfortable, but I think Jordan should be in the DL.

Disappointed that Charles Garcia and Wittman rode he bench- don't know if that was the plan, but I wanted to see both of them play.

Nyballa561 wrote:hey, question, i watched the SL game today on atdhe.net, somebody on here suggested it

will i be able to catch all the games on this site?

I have watched a number of games on the site- I think that most of them have been on. You have to keep trying if you come up with a test pattern- use the link on the main page.

Landry Fields has no handle but he's smart. But he's definitely a project.