SwishAndDish13 wrote:Fields never was going to amount to anything in the NBA. Not selling high on him was a failure and big setback by the Knicks. They similarly overvalued Shump. It was pretty standard from the regime. They were incapable of valuing players.
I am not sure how Fields and Shumpert were that overvalued. I think the true issue here that tends to get overlooked with these knicks teams of the past 5-7 years is lack of player development. Fields was a guy who at 22 years old was one of the best rebounding wings in the league, was a near 40% 3-point shooter, and had a knack for getting wherever he wanted on the floor and reading plays. He was able to put up 15+ points and 10+ rebounds and knock down 3s on any given night, and was starting on a .500 team. There is absolutely no reason he shouldn't have improved from his rookie year, become more efficient, and add parts to his game. He probably didn't have star potential, but to regress each year until he is no longer an NBA player is not excusable. Same with Shump, who was best as an offensive player as a rookie, while showing incredible upside on the defensive end. He regressed on offense, became a good defender, but not the all-nba defender he could have been, and is nothing more than an oft-injured solid role player. We should have sold high on them because of our inability to develop players. And even more-so, not trading Fields and Lin, and not having the foresight to know we weren't going to resign them, was the biggest mistake of all. It depleted us of our top two assets at the time, giving us nothing in return. I never had any issues taking the gamble and making the short-sighted run in 2012-2013, but if you are going to do that, at least have enough foresight to plan ahead and recoup a little value for Lin and Fields.
