TPercy wrote:

CrushAlot wrote:

nyknickzingis wrote:

Jmpasq wrote:

nyknickzingis wrote:Loved this game. The way we Atlanta came back was scary, but it was also us not respecting their 3 point shooting. Needed to close out on their open bigs more. Outside of that, this was a very good game.

Fisher's 9 man rotation has totally transformed this team. The last 2 games this team has looked like a legitimate top 5 Eastern Conference team. Now Afflalo has been overplayed and playing way over his head, so I expect him to come down to earth a bit - but Melo OTOH has shot the ball poorly. So it should even out hopefully (When AA comes back down, Melo's hopefully gonna raise his shot).

Props to Melo as well, really good team game from him. The efforts have been there before from him, but now we're seeing them truly be maximized. Tonight Atlanta paid dearly for trying to double him or crowd him early.

Porzingis also with a big game. 15.5 points 9 rebounds in his last 2 games.

They played the starters a lot of minutes tonight though. If Melo gets hurt the season goes down the tubes

That's only because they were playing an EC contender, a top 4 team that won 60 games last year. If this were a more typical game, the other 4 guys would get more of a run. We definitely need a go to scorer off the bench or to possibly bring Afflalo off the bench (Start Gallo).

Melo's in his prime being paid 3 starters equivalent money, and he has to play big minutes if the Knicks want to be a good/competitive team this year. You earn that much, you gotta carry that much of the load. I'm hoping Phil is seeing the areas where he can add some help. DWill has been very good, but we need someone more reliable, a veteran with more of a consistent shot off the bench.

Melo will be fired up for the Heat. The team maybe tired though.

We might be in for a run for our money. Melo played 40 mins, and Lopez and Afflalo both played some really heavy minutes as well. In addition, the Heat are coming off a days rest as well.

Deng and Winslow is like Selfalosa and Bazemore. One good maybe is that Whiteside is out

But what you don't know if you're not an established playoff team without a good bench like ours, you can't be resting starters as if we're San Antonio, Golden State or like that. Melo makes the same money as 3 starters combined on this team. Lopez makes 14 M. These guys need to play big minutes. Injuries are a concern for sure - what you do is make sure in games that are winnable is that you can cut minutes there. Games against teams we've been facing recently aren't the sort of games you can even think about resting starters a little more because of a B2B.

CrushAlot wrote:F@ck the Hawks. No way I can go to sleep now.

Refs let Milsap get away with a lot of rough stuff, as well as a number of travels.

This was a game where I thought we might lose in the end, and I was getting ready to be really pissed off because some of the Hawks seemed to be A-holes tonight.

Hate the fact that we have to play a back to back against a very good game after an emotional win in what might have been a statement game for the team.

Swishfm3 wrote:What I love more than anything is that Melo came to KP defense. You don't normally see (at least, I haven't) Melo do stuff like that, so watching him pushing Bazemore off of KP was awesome.

This is a real TEAM and MELO has bought in and taken ownership of this group. He's been playing the TEAM game the way we've wanted to see. He's never passed like this or defended like this before.

nixluva wrote:

Swishfm3 wrote:What I love more than anything is that Melo came to KP defense. You don't normally see (at least, I haven't) Melo do stuff like that, so watching him pushing Bazemore off of KP was awesome.

This is a real TEAM and MELO has bought in and taken ownership of this group. He's been playing the TEAM game the way we've wanted to see. He's never passed like this or defended like this before.

no. this was the biggest challenge that phil had and initially it looked like melo was not gonna go for it but it seems like phil finally got to him.