LivingLegend wrote:- Brunson bad tonight - continuing to hunt his own shots. 4 assists and 3 TO's but many hopeless possessions.
- Hart out of control - destroyed by French rookie
- Mikal invisible
- Sims invisible
- Towns I thought was great BUT with less than attractive D
- Deuce nice shooting but lost 2 balls just carelessly
- Hawks young wings were LONG and tough on D --- TBH they were more impressive than Mikal/OG. Mikal getting beat all over.

Offense moved well without Brunson on the floor - it's bogging down when he's on (clunky, clogged). Kolek with 2 nice buckets but beat back-door and yanked immediately -- meanwhile everyone else on floor beat all night.

Far too sloppy on D, we seem small on the boards even with Kat grabbing 16 boards --- I don't like the Hart fit with starting group (too sloppy) and if you start running Hart out their for 35/40 every night I think there are declining returns

This was always my problem with Thibs as a coach- rookie makes mistake, and he is out. Other veterans make same mistake, they’re playing 40 minutes.

I guess we don’t have enough players for Thibs to do this.

Randle was not good on D- but the dude was intense. I think that is what this group is missing.

Too soon to blow this up?

HofstraBBall wrote:

franco12 wrote:

LivingLegend wrote:- Brunson bad tonight - continuing to hunt his own shots. 4 assists and 3 TO's but many hopeless possessions.
- Hart out of control - destroyed by French rookie
- Mikal invisible
- Sims invisible
- Towns I thought was great BUT with less than attractive Dfor
- Deuce nice shooting but lost 2 balls just carelessly
- Hawks young wings were LONG and tough on D --- TBH they were more impressive than Mikal/OG. Mikal getting beat all over.

Offense moved well without Brunson on the floor - it's bogging down when he's on (clunky, clogged). Kolek with 2 nice buckets but beat back-door and yanked immediately -- meanwhile everyone else on floor beat all night.

Far too sloppy on D, we seem small on the boards even with Kat grabbing 16 boards --- I don't like the Hart fit with starting group (too sloppy) and if you start running Hart out their for 35/40 every night I think there are declining returns

This was always my problem with Thibs as a coach- rookie makes mistake, and he is out. Other veterans make same mistake, they’re playing 40 minutes.

I guess we don’t have enough players for Thibs to do this.

Randle was not good on D- but the dude was intense. I think that is what this group is missing.

Too soon to blow this up?

Don’t see why it’s surprising that a first year player has less rope than multi year producers?

Blow this up? That’s a pretty big knee jerk.

Was not a fan of the big trade. Thought we lost two dogs that were gamers.
However, Watching the first unit , we are a better team. Lots of positives.
KAT is starting to get comfortable and looking for his offense more. JB is JB. May need to get some more PG duties on his mind. Ie. Getting others going early. Side pieces have been looking and getting their shots. (OG, Bridges, Hart)
Was Not a fan of what we gave up for Bridges or what some pegged Bridges to be.
However, very impressed with his Defense and his mid range. Feel he just has to stop with the quick contested threes.

Right now the key is depth. We came of a night where our bench scored 3 points?
Simms has been absent, Deuce inconsistent and Payne hurt.
Team needs depth to get healthy and first unit to continue to gel.
Both things that are sure to happen.

knee jerk, or ahead of the curve?

I keep forgetting that in addition to sending Randle and Dante out, we lost iHart.

I'd like to see Thibs put Bridges on the bench, maybe start Simms for some better balance & size up front.

I know we need Prescious and MRob back in the biggest way and both should offer immediate impact.

But - why do our guys (except for McBride) look gassed? We've barely played any games.

franco12 wrote:

HofstraBBall wrote:

franco12 wrote:

LivingLegend wrote:- Brunson bad tonight - continuing to hunt his own shots. 4 assists and 3 TO's but many hopeless possessions.
- Hart out of control - destroyed by French rookie
- Mikal invisible
- Sims invisible
- Towns I thought was great BUT with less than attractive Dfor
- Deuce nice shooting but lost 2 balls just carelessly
- Hawks young wings were LONG and tough on D --- TBH they were more impressive than Mikal/OG. Mikal getting beat all over.

Offense moved well without Brunson on the floor - it's bogging down when he's on (clunky, clogged). Kolek with 2 nice buckets but beat back-door and yanked immediately -- meanwhile everyone else on floor beat all night.

Far too sloppy on D, we seem small on the boards even with Kat grabbing 16 boards --- I don't like the Hart fit with starting group (too sloppy) and if you start running Hart out their for 35/40 every night I think there are declining returns

This was always my problem with Thibs as a coach- rookie makes mistake, and he is out. Other veterans make same mistake, they’re playing 40 minutes.

I guess we don’t have enough players for Thibs to do this.

Randle was not good on D- but the dude was intense. I think that is what this group is missing.

Too soon to blow this up?

Don’t see why it’s surprising that a first year player has less rope than multi year producers?

Blow this up? That’s a pretty big knee jerk.

Was not a fan of the big trade. Thought we lost two dogs that were gamers.
However, Watching the first unit , we are a better team. Lots of positives.
KAT is starting to get comfortable and looking for his offense more. JB is JB. May need to get some more PG duties on his mind. Ie. Getting others going early. Side pieces have been looking and getting their shots. (OG, Bridges, Hart)
Was Not a fan of what we gave up for Bridges or what some pegged Bridges to be.
However, very impressed with his Defense and his mid range. Feel he just has to stop with the quick contested threes.

Right now the key is depth. We came of a night where our bench scored 3 points?
Simms has been absent, Deuce inconsistent and Payne hurt.
Team needs depth to get healthy and first unit to continue to gel.
Both things that are sure to happen.

knee jerk, or ahead of the curve?

I keep forgetting that in addition to sending Randle and Dante out, we lost iHart.

I'd like to see Thibs put Bridges on the bench, maybe start Simms for some better balance & size up front.

I know we need Prescious and MRob back in the biggest way and both should offer immediate impact.

But - why do our guys (except for McBride) look gassed? We've barely played any games.

Super uber duper knee jerk. Knicks are barely 7 games into the season with 2 major rotation players missing. Only 6 guys returning from last year roster.

Knicksfan wrote:Troubling result. It’s still early, but these are the efforts that lower your expectations as a fan.

-Brunson hasn’t adapted to his new team. With the weapons he has now, he should be looking to pass so much more than ever, yet the constant forced shots like it’s either him or nothing are really not cutting it.

-Mikal worries me. The potential is there on both ends, but it’s been inconsistent so far and he still seems to not have a clear role on offense. Tonight was bad.

-Defense has been bad. At first you put it on how early it is, but the last two games has been embarrassing. A lot seems to be on effort and that really infuriates me. Sims has been a huge disappointment too. Thibs needs to use players according to how they might impact the game and not their experience because right now Huk projects to do better for us on defense than lost Sims can.

-KAT is better than advertised, but this team, especially the “wingstop” needs to actually help. He is working on defense, but he isn’t obviously a Mitch. Many are expecting the pairing, but I’m sensing we might get more KAT-Precious pairings. I think that PF right now is a problem, but don’t think that sliding KAT there solves it.

The game against the Rockets was alarming to me, but this one is straight up unacceptable coming of a loss as a “contending team”. So far, we are exhibiting the same lack of focus, effort and want that lesser versions of us have. But this team has so many weapons that a game like this is very disappointing.

And let me just add: you play like this against a sorry-*** player like Trae? You should always come to down this clown, yet they always let him talk his crap. This was really infuriating. Talking about the Celtics and contending? Nah, this team is very far away from that right now.

At beginning of season I was on the start Precious bandwagon --- think it gives us more length/size on wings / next to Kat. Also lets Hart move to bench and provide spark where/when needed.

At this point Thibs seems fixed on starting Hart and TBH the more I watch us early in season I see 3 issues - size/length, ball-handling, rebounding.

Goes back to our need last season for someone to take pressure off Brunson - another person to get in the paint (Hart isn't the answer).

Want to see what Precious/Kat look like --- Precious would also push OG to 3, Mikal to 2 while adding a rim protector and 3rd wing defender. Hart is gambling too much IMO and I am a BIG Hart fan.

martin wrote:

Clean wrote:I think they are personally invested in Sims. They thought they would have to rely on him so they put in a lot of work to prepare him in the offseason. They will give him every chance to figure it out before they give Huk consistant minutes. I am just glad we got a decent player out of our late 2nd in Huk who will eventually takeover.

You have to be, and the Knicks have a script for that type of guy and opportunity. Same with Grimes, Cam, etc. Guys will get 10+ games when the coaches think they are ready, and they will get pretty much the same minutes and role and expectations.

This is Sims' chance. Huk is their long game. This is what everyone really should want for our players.

Some times, Deuce takes 2+ years of this type of thing before something clicks. Maybe that is the same for Sims.

In season development.

It's obvious Thibs is in Sims corner and giving him a chance but Sims looks almost exactly same as 1st day on court as a rookie.

He is a big that can't score and does NOT protect the rim. He's always in the area but rarely impactful. Criticize Kat defense all we want but he's hauling in +12 boards and putting up nights of 34, 44 - etc. Sims is also I think 6'9" -- with his hair.

Maybe Precious is the key - not sure.

We need to define and establish roles on this team and figure out what is going to be the identity. Thibs has been coaching for 35 years and has seen it all and I know he will get it right. Not worried at all about Brunson either.

It always starts with defense and rebounding. You can have all the offensive toys in the world but if you don't defend and rebound, you're a pretender. We got outrebounded 48-41 last night and gave up 14 offensive rebounds and got outrebounded 50-39 against Houston. Even that little ugly rat looking Trae Young got an offensive rebound off a missed FT. That's not a size or personnel issue! That's a player attention to detail and 'want it' issue. KAT can rebound as a Center and Hart is undersized but he's the best rebounder in the league so we got enough! We may not have Mitch, Randle and Hartenstein out there but we can def rebound the ball a lot better. There have been too many long rebounds lost that we could've and should've gotten.

And we have to learn how to close out games. We had leads in both games in the 4th quarter. Last night Hart in particular was horrendous. We were up 5 with 2:46 to go afer KAT's block was overturned. We then fail to run a good play and end up with a Hart 3pt attempt and he gives up a corner 3 to Risacher, who was very impressive. Then OG misses a wide open 3pt and Hart goes to double Young 30' from the basketball and nobody rotates to Risacher, who hits a FT line floater and KAT can't challenge cause of Capela. Young was 7/21 ad 3/9 from 3pt so WTF are we doubling him?! KAT then missed a corner 3pt, which is fine and I'd take that shot anytime but then we don't get back and Capela get's a transition dunk and that's the ball game. Just poor execution at both ends.

We got to learn from these. And quit complaining about Mitch, Hartenstein and Randle. They are gone and not walking through the door. We have enough! We outrebounded Indiana 43-33, Cleveland 43-41, Miami 42-39 and Detroit 45-38.

DLeethal wrote:In general I worry about trying to transform a Thibs team into a high octane offense. Different rosters but it's never worked, incorporating finesse players never worked and trying to become a more uptempo finesse team never worked. Watching them pick apart KAT on defense two nights in a row (Senguin on Monday and last night the PnR) is hard to watch. It's not KAT's fault, it's just who he is, he's been everything we could have wanted on the other end. But can Thibs make it work without rim protection and elite physicality? I don't really see a top 3 offense out there despite the talent, and that's what we need to make up for the losses in the D and rim protection department.

Knicks are a top 4 offensive team today. And that is playing really crappily on that end?

https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/advanced?dir=A&sort=OFF_RATING

Nalod wrote:and Quinn is a really good coach and his team had a good night.
2-2 on road trip. KAT offense is unleashed. Jalen is out of sorts. He on record saying he was more concerned with getting KAT more touches.
Looking good.
He is not getting the calls from last year,, nobody is. They have to figure out how to make the game easier for him.
After 0-3 start you got the typical OG output.
Hawks made life hard for Mikal.
10min for Sims, 9 for Kolek and 28min for Deuce. I'd say knicks got tired and thus sloppy.
Thibs being Thibs or Thibs seeing his bench is quite thin. Why they there if not to play?
Thibs plays to win.

1. Blow it up? Two bad road losses after two wins? Naw. Wait a week or so? LOL.
2. Blame Thibs? Matt Ryan not ready to play and needs more practice time I suppose.
3. Not going to beat Celtics? Not sure that was ever in the cards this season as teams need time to gel and get depth.

How are we tired? Honestly, I agree - they have no energy out there.

We’ve played 7 games. Cleveland is 9 & 0.

I admit we are short handed and guys might still be trying to work themselves into shape (Brunson?).

But if this is happening now, 7 games in, what the F happens in January? Are we counting on M Rob to put up big minutes? Because he’ll be winded after 5 minutes on the court?

We haven’t had any back to backs or rough stretch’s of multiple games in a few nights.

Inexcusable that anyone is ‘tired’. And I’m not directing this at you Nalod- just using this as yes- they have looked tired.

And the road trip is 4 games and most were in the eastern half of the country. What happens when they go to the west coast and Texas?