WaltLongmire wrote:

fishmike wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

Splat wrote:Sounds like the lineup I predicted is going to be the starting 5 if this is true.

Dalembert
Calderon
Shump
Melo
Acy

http://nypost.com/2014/10/15/gritty-acy-has-good-chance-to-be-knicks-starting-power-forward

The article cites many of the basic reasons speculated on here by myself and others.

Acy's a classic workhorse PF fit next to Melo. Acy knows his role and fills it.

Acy + Shump = high energy tone for 1st unit D. With Dalembert and more D from Melo, its a competent defensive starting 5 that is enough to compensate for Calderon's inability to contain penetrators.

Bargs is muffing it so Acy has stepped in. I think that is good luck for the team to not to have to start Bargs. Fish is definitely using this as a way to excuse himself from starting Bargs. You can see the political usage of the media already being deployed. They made some puffy comments earlier about how great the expiring vets will be, but they always have their out clauses as the coach.

What this does puts poor balance in the roster. Essentially you have three highly inconsistent players on offense to start the game which gives the opponent leeway to key on Melo. I will defintely take my chances with Acy Shumpert and Dalembart shooting the ball. And the next unit--we took the defensive players and put them all in unit 1--so you would have Smith Bargs JR and Hardaway and they all are shooters. Maybe it goes well a few games? but give it time and they will key hard on Melo if that is the starting unit.

this... they have a gravity metric now in the NBA. It measures how much attention a players gets away from the ball. Its a pretty cool stat because it spells out which player opposing teams target the most. The two guys in the NBA who had the highest score were Melo and Paul George (I honestly forget who was 1 and 2). Last year we saw Melo chased constantly and worn down by the end of games. Now are going to surround him Acy and Dalembert... two guys who are total non entities on offense, and Acy is totally unproven as far as even being a rotation player in the league. Shump is a wildcard but we have seen when he's asked to do too much he's wildy inconsistant at best. Last year Shump had 37 games where he scored five points or less. He had 7 games he didnt score at all.

Hard to see that lineup working for any extended period of time.

It's a obviously a lineup that will live and die on how Shumpert and Acy shoot the ball.

They seem to like what Acy brings to the table on D, and remember, he can also switch with Anthony and play D at the 3 if Melo is having problems. You cannot do this with Smith or Amare. If Acy can actually hit the midrange jumper on a somewhat consistent basis and can give you 7-8 rebounds/game, + give you the toughness, hustle, and D he is known for, he is going to get 25-30 mpg, IMO.

On the other hand, Acy might also be a guy who starts, but gets his minutes adjusted if his shooting is off and we want/need more offense. Jason Smith will get his minutes, whether at the 4 or 5. His jumper is solid and he seems like a smart player who finds ways to compensate for his limited athleticism.

Have to think that there will be a lot of shuffling in the first part of the season as Fisher experiments. We seem to have some frontline flexibility, since Amare and Smith can both get minutes at the 5 if they want to go with a more offensive minded and defensively challenged lineup.

I don't think anyone knows what the starting lineup of the Knicks will be 30 games into the season- just have to hope that everyone plays to their capabilities, and trust that Fisher and Jackson know what they are doing.

Big thing right now is that everyone buys into the offensive scheme and shows some f'n pride and tenacity on the defensive end.

Yea kind of like the switching Indiana used to do with David West & Paul George

Maybe you guys haven't noticed but Acy can actually shoot. Its part of the reason he is here. Watch the games

gunsnewing wrote:

WaltLongmire wrote:

fishmike wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

Splat wrote:Sounds like the lineup I predicted is going to be the starting 5 if this is true.

Dalembert
Calderon
Shump
Melo
Acy

http://nypost.com/2014/10/15/gritty-acy-has-good-chance-to-be-knicks-starting-power-forward

The article cites many of the basic reasons speculated on here by myself and others.

Acy's a classic workhorse PF fit next to Melo. Acy knows his role and fills it.

Acy + Shump = high energy tone for 1st unit D. With Dalembert and more D from Melo, its a competent defensive starting 5 that is enough to compensate for Calderon's inability to contain penetrators.

Bargs is muffing it so Acy has stepped in. I think that is good luck for the team to not to have to start Bargs. Fish is definitely using this as a way to excuse himself from starting Bargs. You can see the political usage of the media already being deployed. They made some puffy comments earlier about how great the expiring vets will be, but they always have their out clauses as the coach.

What this does puts poor balance in the roster. Essentially you have three highly inconsistent players on offense to start the game which gives the opponent leeway to key on Melo. I will defintely take my chances with Acy Shumpert and Dalembart shooting the ball. And the next unit--we took the defensive players and put them all in unit 1--so you would have Smith Bargs JR and Hardaway and they all are shooters. Maybe it goes well a few games? but give it time and they will key hard on Melo if that is the starting unit.

this... they have a gravity metric now in the NBA. It measures how much attention a players gets away from the ball. Its a pretty cool stat because it spells out which player opposing teams target the most. The two guys in the NBA who had the highest score were Melo and Paul George (I honestly forget who was 1 and 2). Last year we saw Melo chased constantly and worn down by the end of games. Now are going to surround him Acy and Dalembert... two guys who are total non entities on offense, and Acy is totally unproven as far as even being a rotation player in the league. Shump is a wildcard but we have seen when he's asked to do too much he's wildy inconsistant at best. Last year Shump had 37 games where he scored five points or less. He had 7 games he didnt score at all.

Hard to see that lineup working for any extended period of time.

It's a obviously a lineup that will live and die on how Shumpert and Acy shoot the ball.

They seem to like what Acy brings to the table on D, and remember, he can also switch with Anthony and play D at the 3 if Melo is having problems. You cannot do this with Smith or Amare. If Acy can actually hit the midrange jumper on a somewhat consistent basis and can give you 7-8 rebounds/game, + give you the toughness, hustle, and D he is known for, he is going to get 25-30 mpg, IMO.

On the other hand, Acy might also be a guy who starts, but gets his minutes adjusted if his shooting is off and we want/need more offense. Jason Smith will get his minutes, whether at the 4 or 5. His jumper is solid and he seems like a smart player who finds ways to compensate for his limited athleticism.

Have to think that there will be a lot of shuffling in the first part of the season as Fisher experiments. We seem to have some frontline flexibility, since Amare and Smith can both get minutes at the 5 if they want to go with a more offensive minded and defensively challenged lineup.

I don't think anyone knows what the starting lineup of the Knicks will be 30 games into the season- just have to hope that everyone plays to their capabilities, and trust that Fisher and Jackson know what they are doing.

Big thing right now is that everyone buys into the offensive scheme and shows some f'n pride and tenacity on the defensive end.

Yea kind of like the switching Indiana used to do with David West & Paul George

Maybe you guys haven't noticed but Acy can actually shoot. Its part of the reason he is here. Watch the games

Maybe he plays himself into that role and that would be great, but as with the good he's got a lot of shortcomings:
He's smaller than Melo at 6'7 230 ish.
He's never been a rotation guy and was on bad teams
He's a TO machine so far this preseaon

Hey... I like him. I would love to have a cheap guy rise up and take a big role. Its exactly what the Knicks need to get better. Im just far from convinced. I think in live NBA action if you play him more than small stretches he's going to get exposed.

We actually have a system now, its called the triangle. Role players will flourish and exceed expectations.

Phil picked these guys because of their skill sets. Each guys skill will form the BIG PICTURE

gunsnewing wrote:I was down on this team because of guys like Amare, Bargnani and JR Smith
I was looking towards the future and replacing them via draft and free agency

but now that I can clearly see Phil's vision of replacing those guys with cheap acquisitions who's skills fit the big picture that is the Triangle.
I feel we are closer to winning now and will be closer as we continue to utilize the draft and free agency

With the exception of Cleveland the league is wide open, we might have a chance

I feel the same...I'm thoroughly enjoying everything that's playing out.

I prefer to have that scoring punch at the 4 with Dalembert, who in my opinion has been better than Chandler was last year and projected to be heading. Also, i like that dalembert hits his free throws and can hit an open jumper.

With that in place, and the defense focus on team defense over woodson's "every man for himself" approach.

And as soon as Amare is not effective, replace him with Acy for that energy off the bench.

In the preseason, i've liked the chemistry amare has generated with Shump, looking forward to seeing how he meshes with Calderone.

Right now there seems to be healthy competition for starter spots. If Jason Smith beats out Acy for the spot, I can see some logic behind it. If he wants to start THJ over Shump, it's entirely his call. Acy is bringing intensity, and if he gets the nod, he's earned it.

Sic 'em Bears - err - Knicks!

TripleThreat wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:...I can clearly see Phil's vision of replacing those guys with cheap acquisitions who's skills fit the big picture that is the Triangle.
I feel we are closer to winning now and will be closer as we continue to utilize the draft and free agency

With the exception of Cleveland the league is wide open, we might have a chance

I don't see it as some product of Phil Jackson's vision at all.

He walked onto a roster and franchise that had gutted itself of it's own draft picks. The first rounder this coming offseason probably only still exists because of the Ted Stepien Rule. Otherwise Dolan would have likely traded it if he could have done it.

He had several highly paid guys who he just couldn't dump in trade ( they had no stand alone value and he had no real assets to move them, guys like STAT and Bargs and JR Smith)

It wasn't a huge secret that even after the Dallas deal that he was open to re-flipping Calderon and Larkin if he could have done it.

I don't see it as vision. A guy with no draft picks and little to no cap flexibility after giving Melo his monster extension pretty much dug deep to see if he could find serviceable back of the rotation players on short term cheap contracts.

Don't get me wrong, I like Acy a lot. It's nice to see real effort after a couple of years of Felton and STAT and Bargs. But like the rest of the collection of power forwards, they have limitations. No one is a complete solution, all force different trade offs.

IMHO, it doesn't matter who "starts" at PF. Sometimes being a "starter" in the NBA is merely ceremonial. Jarrett Jack isn't a "starter" , but for the last few years, probably logged more minutes as reserve playing than some league starters did.

Calderon and Melo are locks to start. Odds are Dalembert and Shumpert will roll too to counterbalance the defense. IMHO, the rest, Fisher is going to throw it like spaghetti on a wall and see what sticks. This is a treadmill team, meaning whatever juice Zen Master and Fish can get out of the veterans will be needed/desired. IMHO, this is all just fluff for the NY Post to write something, anything, and for Zen Master to start pushing some buttons in the media like he did in Chicago and LA.

If Acy gets the starting job, it's a good leverage point for Jackson to use in the offseason ( i.e. to push for undrafted free agents, some of which might have been decent 2nd round prospects, to show that UDFA and roster churn can get a chance on the Knicks roster to play and possibly compete)

I don't see much "vision" to be honest, I see a GM who made as much as he could with some very restricted/limited scenarios.

This is a punt year. Too much past damage has been done up to this point. The Knicks are in a better place and hopefully in a better direction, but they aren't anywhere close to being where they need to be to really win consistently and contend.

That being said the league is littered with examples of players who were energized or invigorated by a coaching and culture change. Could it go the other way? For sure... so fingers crossed. I dont think its ALL spagetti, although there is certainly a lot of noodles in this bowl

gunsnewing wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

Splat wrote:Sounds like the lineup I predicted is going to be the starting 5 if this is true.

Dalembert
Calderon
Shump
Melo
Acy

http://nypost.com/2014/10/15/gritty-acy-has-good-chance-to-be-knicks-starting-power-forward

The article cites many of the basic reasons speculated on here by myself and others.

Acy's a classic workhorse PF fit next to Melo. Acy knows his role and fills it.

Acy + Shump = high energy tone for 1st unit D. With Dalembert and more D from Melo, its a competent defensive starting 5 that is enough to compensate for Calderon's inability to contain penetrators.

Bargs is muffing it so Acy has stepped in. I think that is good luck for the team to not to have to start Bargs. Fish is definitely using this as a way to excuse himself from starting Bargs. You can see the political usage of the media already being deployed. They made some puffy comments earlier about how great the expiring vets will be, but they always have their out clauses as the coach.

What this does puts poor balance in the roster. Essentially you have three highly inconsistent players on offense to start the game which gives the opponent leeway to key on Melo. I will defintely take my chances with Acy Shumpert and Dalembart shooting the ball. And the next unit--we took the defensive players and put them all in unit 1--so you would have Smith Bargs JR and Hardaway and they all are shooters. Maybe it goes well a few games? but give it time and they will key hard on Melo if that is the starting unit.

They will key in on Melo and the rest of those guys will get good shots and hit them

Welcome to the Triangle

we finally got a pg that won't just give the ball to melo and run away, in fact i have already saw calderon waive melo off cause he wasn't where he was suppose to be. What made it even better was the fact that the particular possession turned into a easy score for jason smith.

MaTT4281 wrote:I just want intensity from the starting unit. I want the bench to be responsible for matching the intensity of the 1st unit, not digging us out of a double digit, 1st quarter deficit because the starters forgot tipoff was at 7. (How many Sunday matinee do we have this year? )

Right now there seems to be healthy competition for starter spots. If Jason Smith beats out Acy for the spot, I can see some logic behind it. If he wants to start THJ over Shump, it's entirely his call. Acy is bringing intensity, and if he gets the nod, he's earned it.

Sic 'em Bears - err - Knicks!

It's going to be Acy's job to lose. Last 3 seasons Jason Smith has only played 40, 51 & 31 games. He's injury prone. His minutes will be monitored