FireHornacek wrote:WHY DIDN'T FIZDALE START KANTER AGAINST ADAMS?
From what I'm hearing around the league, Kanter tried in the off season to get a long term extension done. There was even some ridiculous flash in the pan articles planted by his agent that he might opt out and test the market. Once he's clear he's gone after this year, he's looking to drive up his counting stats to try to get a long term deal in FA. He's ignoring Fizdales game plan and directives on the court. It's basically mutiny.
The reason he's doing is the Knicks are short handed, so it's not like they can bench him forever. Also he has nothing to lose, if the coach and franchise sours on him, why does he care, he knows he's gone anyway. Both sides also know he's not going to move in any trade. barring some crazy ass Vlade Divac type **** at the last minute.
You'll see the same problem from Burke and, to a lesser degree, Trier. These guys want long term security. If they were two way players, they'd have it already, so the only strategy is to try to max out the raw numbers on the things they do well now.
You can't reward mutiny. I don't give a **** how bad things are on the court.
I wanted the Knicks to keep Pringles. Barring that, I think they just missed the boat on Kenny Atkinson. The Erik Spolestra story really shows much of the problem of coaching talent in the NBA. Players have a lot of power, esp the star players. Teams are hesitant to go for coaches who have never played in the NBA before. Because former players aren't treated with same disdain as non former players ( though they still get treated like ****) Word got out fast on Spolestra when he was a video assistant for Riley. Players would meet with him and want him to go over film with them. Players on OTHER TEAMS wanted to meet Spolestra and have him go over film with them. Spolestra is the best coach in the NBA right now and he's only there because Riley picked him out of the crowd, then protected him all throughout his career.
The problem is not Fizdale RIGHT NOW, it's the salary structure and format. Widespread use of non guaranteed contracts and a hard cap would curb much of these issues. Under the NFL model, Kanter would have been cut long long ago, and be in a team he could probably help, while other teams could address real needs and not play the game of waiting for a bad contract to die off.
The players have far too much power and it's creating massive problems in terms of teams trying to get better. There are no real consistent mechanisms for market correction.