Winning all the time does wonders for team morale. Smith publicly complained about coming off the bench before the season started, but recently told The New York Times’s Nate Taylor that he’s “loving” his sixth man role. Smith is right when he says, “What they really needed was for me to come off the bench,” because no other Knick besides Anthony and Felton can create offense for himself and others.
When there is agreement throughout the team and coaching staff about the role of each player, it lends a sense of calm and assuredness to the team’s play. Regardless of whether letting Jeremy Lin go was the right decision, the result has been a team that knows its identity on a possession-to-possession basis.
That paid big dividends Thursday night when, in the final five minutes, the Knicks outexecuted the typically fastidious Spurs in a way reminiscent of that 2011 Dallas team. Chandler anchored the defense and vacuumed up rebounds. Raymond Felton made perfect reads and sliced through the Spurs defenders off pick-and-rolls. Smith was positively Terryesque as he made prescient defensive rotations that forced turnovers on one end, then came down on offense and confidently drilled a backbreaking 3-pointer.
It was almost shocking how secure and at ease the Knicks looked even in those pressure moments.
Right now, the Knicks know their individual responsibilities, and while the hot shooting and historically low turnover rates will inch back toward the mean as the season goes along, there is little that seems out-and-out unsustainable about how New York approaches each possession.
Of course, it’s not all sunshine and backdoor lobs. Two rotation players, Iman Shumpert and Amar’e Stoudemire, have yet to enter the team’s fragile ecosystem.
Shumpert, who is set to return sometime around the start of February, had a wild first season. As a defender he offers real potential, but he lacks the nuance and discipline of Brewer. He is not a good decision-maker as the primary playmaker, though he does offer offensive value as a dynamic, slashing wing.
It’s a trick to imagine him fitting in seamlessly into Coach Mike Woodson’s rotation, but he is of far less concern than Stoudemire, who is only weeks away from playing after rupturing a cyst in his left knee just before the start of the season.
Figuring out how to reintegrate the former superstar, possibly into the starting lineup, will test Woodson’s skills as both an X’s and O’s coach and a leader. Many have noted the number of redundancies between Stoudemire and Anthony, and Anthony playing at Stoudemire’s position, power forward, to start the season has only formalized this issue.
Whatever role Stoudemire inhabits upon his return, odds are that it will be a reduced one compared with his Knicks heyday during the first half of the 2010-11 season. Woodson will have to determine exactly how much Stoudemire can provide, and how to craft a role that allows him to provide value without diminishing the impact of others.
Perhaps separating Stoudemire from Anthony and making him a 25-minute-per-night bench superstar, with Novak and Smith as high-scoring running mates, will do the trick.
But all that is a few weeks away. For now, the Knicks are picking one another up on both sides of the ball and playing a fun, free style of hoops. Difficulties loom in the future, which is why it is so important that they are establishing their identity now, both at the player and team level.
http://offthedribble.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/16/how-the-knicks-mirror-the-2010-11-champion-mavericks/
Let's go Knicks. That's amare
11/16/2012 4:17 PM
