elmaestro33 wrote:This game tells me two things: 1) Trey should have been our starting pg for the last month and 2) WTF!!! we’re absolutely going to screw this tank job. We’re literally playing for nothing except lotto balls and we decide to beat another key tanking team. We’re doomed to pick 10.
Agreed, I think Trey should have been starting for us a while back. He is 25 years old and could still have a future in this league as a starting PG in the right situation. As nice as it is to have a veteran like Jarrett Jack, realistically he should have been traded before the deadline for whatever we could get in return to free up minutes for Burke and Frank.
As for the second point, I don't think you can blame them last night for winning the game. The Knicks were consistent throughout the game and that shows on the box score: 31, 32, 30, 27. The difference with Orlando is they started hot in the first quarter (41) and played pretty well in the second quarter (28), then remembered they were tanking in the second half and their production fell (21 and 23) but also our defense turned up. So the difficulty last night was that our team played consistent basketball all night whereas Orlando didn't, the only way you can change that is if you bench players like Burke, Hardaway and Kanter for the fringe players. The problem with that is approach is it removes the incentive for players to get too hot or play too hard because they would get benched, so they might tone back their performances to stay on the court and that hurts the team's evaluation process because we don't get to see what they can really do. For me, the Knicks handled things correctly last night by letting the players play. If the team wants to lose games then they need to bench difference making players during key stretches, and they could also benefit from doing what Sacramento do and that's rest a couple of veteran players each night (e.g. one night Lee and Kanter player, with Hardaway and Beasley sitting) and that could reduce some of our scoring potential and help us lose more games, but the counterpoint to that would be it could send the wrong message to our players.
Regarding our draft pick. It will be incredibly difficult for us to increase our odds and get in front of some teams in the tanking race. Currently there are six teams tied on 18 wins, one team on 19 wins and they send their pick to Cleveland, one team on 20 wins, one team on 23 wins and they send their pick to Philly, and then us on 24 wins. Now I think there is a good chance we can finish with a worse record than the Lakers because they are actually trying to win games. We might be able to finish ahead of Chicago if their "big three" (Dunn, Lavine, Markkanen) take the next step but they benched two veteran starters last night for younger players. And maybe we can get ahead of the Nets as well since they have no incentive to lose games with their pick heading to Cleveland. However, unless we lose on purpose in all of our remaining games, I am not convinced we can boost our odds significantly more than being the 9th or 10th team.
nixluva wrote:Jeff was straight up trying to win this game. That's just the reality of the situation. Players will play hard for the sake of their careers and coaches will try to win for the same reason, UNLESS they get the order from the top to call off the dogs. They'll win a few games like this.Burke was always capable of doing this and only Jeff held him back. Frank showing why you need to let him play thru mistakes. Troy flashed his athletic ability on drives and defense!!! Some good things.
The question I have is if Hornacek benches Burke during his hot streak, does that remove the incentive from Burke trying as much as he did last night? For example, if he knows that knocking down a trio of three pointers and getting a turnover on the defensive end is going to get him benched, does he pass up one of those shots, perhaps two of those shots because he wants to stay on the court or does he take them and get benched? It might hurt the evaluation process of certain players because they might in Burke's case decide to pass the ball to someone else rather than take a shot they know they can make. Perhaps I'm overthinking, but if players have too much success in a tank, they are going to get benched far quicker than if the team is letting them play.
nixluva wrote:Knicks played the kids and they played well and won HONESTLY. You can't be mad at the fact that the kids actually played well enough to beat a bad team. The Knicks were never going to go winless the rest of the way. We need talent but we also have to develop talent we have and get a good look at guys to see if they deserve to stick.
Agreed, I think the Knicks handled things correctly last night. Let the players play and prove whether they have a future on this team long term or not. Realistically we are unlikely to get ahead of the six teams currently tied on 18 wins, and I am not convinced that we are going to have a worse win loss record than the Nets, Bulls and Lakers. We might get in front of the Lakers because they are trying to win, but the other two might stay in front of us. I would say we are more likely to have the 9th or 10th best odds than the 7th or better odds in the lottery. So let the players play so they can be evaluated on what they do, I would say that is better than benching them when they get hot, or having rest nights.
2/22/2018 9:20 PM
