Burks have been playing alot at PG this season and its not been going smoothly occasionally. Once DRose returns im hoping Thibs demotes both Burks and walker deep in the knicks bench.

Starting 5

Mitch
Randle
RJ
Evan
IQ/Drose

Bench

Noel
Obi
Cam
Grimes
Drose/IQ

I think the point guard minutes should be shared by IQ and DRose. Just keep walker and Burks glued to the bench. Im hoping before the season emds cam can show wnough flashes to overtake Evan for the starters minutes.

IQ
Burks
Grimes
Reddish
Obi

But the reality is it will be Kemba, EF, RJ, Randle, Mitch --- Rose, IQ, Burks, Obi, Noel/Taj

NYKMentality wrote:C: Mitchell Robinson.
PF: Julius Randle.
SF: R.J. Barrett.
SG: Quentin Grimes.
PG: Derrick Rose.

C: Nerlens Noel (Jericho Sims when he's hurt).
PF: Obi Toppin.
SF: Cam Reddish.
SG: Immanuel Quickley.
PG: Deuce McBride.

(Kemba Walker, Alec Burks and Evan Fournier = 11th, 12th and 13th men off the bench).

Why would you remove our best 3pt shooter?

PG - [B]Rose [25] Quick[3]
SG - [B]Quick [17] RJ[11]
SF - [B]RJ [19] Cam[2]
PF - [B]Cam [18]
C - [B]Obi [20]

Total minutes for bench players
Rose[25]
Quick[20]
RJ[30]
Cam[20]
Obi[20]

Ok this is my 'Let's see what our young guys can do rotation'.
Since we did not trade any vets I had to bench Burks and Kemba.

This is unrealistic and will never happen but it is what I would like to see.

Total Time to the kids is 20minutes a Game.

No one is playing excessive minutes. So they need to play hard while they are out there.
If they are not playing hard I would take it as they are tired so lower their minutes and give to player who are playing hard. No exceptions.

I chose to start McBride and Grimes to pair with EF and cover his D.
I expect initial growing pains with this starting backcourt.
Grimes and EF is good enough shooting since Randle will be doubled.

Teams who have big physical Bigs I would tweak the rotations a bit to add Noel in there.

I want the bench playing small ball. They need to play fast pace and push the ball at every opportunity.
Obi will be playing center so his shooting won't be a problem. Rose and Quick will have a ton of space to operate. RJ will play with his boy Cam and in a fast pace group where he excels. In half court RJ/Rose will be the main guys. If we need a score RJ and if we need someone to breakdown the D then Rose. Both Cam and Obi cuts a lot so everyone on D will need to pay attention or we will be getting easy baskets. No iso in the bench lineup. Straight player and ball movement with some PNRs.

NYKMentality wrote:

Clean wrote:PG - [S]McBride [20]
SG - [S]Grimes [20]
SF - [S]EF [27]
PF - [S]Randle [30]
C - [S]Mitch [28]

PG - [B]Rose [25] Quick[3]
SG - [B]Quick [17] RJ[11]
SF - [B]RJ [19] Cam[2]
PF - [B]Cam [18]
C - [B]Obi [20]

Had to stop reading there.

Evan Fournier starting @ SF over R.J. Barrett?

EF is atrocious @ SG on Defense. Bigger/Stronger SFs would destroy him 10x more than SGs already do...

Understandable. I rather go with fit than names when I choose which players to play with each other. When Randle plays he is going to need shooters around him because he will ISO and pass the ball after double teams. RJ plays better in transition so I put him with the bench because that is what they do.

Grimes was red hot in the 3rd and never put up an attempt in the 4th. If thibs doesn't see anything wrong with that i dont know how this team can grow.

Jimbo5 wrote:Its so frustrating to see Thibs' rotation. Fournier and Burks have been an eyesore. Too bad Cam got injured. IQ should have gotten more minutes. Performance like this one by kemba is detrimental to the sanity of knicks fans. In Thibs eyes for the next couple of games or so he is justified playing Kemba big minutes. Thibs should have given Deuce some minutes early on if he clicked maybe he could have stabilized the team in the 4th.

Grimes was red hot in the 3rd and never put up an attempt in the 4th. If thibs doesn't see anything wrong with that i dont know how this team can grow.

If this was football, Thibs would’ve been demoted to defensive coordinator. I don’t think he puts the same energy into the offense. And relies on his offensive players to figure it out. With thibs, he needs a floor general type PG or player to run the offense, while thibs focus on defensive energy.

blkexec wrote:

Jimbo5 wrote:Its so frustrating to see Thibs' rotation. Fournier and Burks have been an eyesore. Too bad Cam got injured. IQ should have gotten more minutes. Performance like this one by kemba is detrimental to the sanity of knicks fans. In Thibs eyes for the next couple of games or so he is justified playing Kemba big minutes. Thibs should have given Deuce some minutes early on if he clicked maybe he could have stabilized the team in the 4th.

Grimes was red hot in the 3rd and never put up an attempt in the 4th. If thibs doesn't see anything wrong with that i dont know how this team can grow.

If this was football, Thibs would’ve been demoted to defensive coordinator. I don’t think he puts the same energy into the offense. And relies on his offensive players to figure it out. With thibs, he needs a floor general type PG or player to run the offense, while thibs focus on defensive energy.

Which coach doesn't?

Knicks haven't really had a starting PG in the 2 years Thibs has been here and his 2 best players (who are high usage) are not really made or ready to run an offense, and then we wonder why the offense suffers?

DRose has been great for the second unit, especially last year. Maybe that's the only unit Thibs has coached offensively? Or perhaps there is another reason...

HofstraBBall wrote:

NYKMentality wrote:

HofstraBBall wrote:

NYKMentality wrote:

HofstraBBall wrote:

NYKMentality wrote:C: Mitchell Robinson.
PF: Julius Randle.
SF: R.J. Barrett.
SG: Quentin Grimes.
PG: Derrick Rose.

C: Nerlens Noel (Jericho Sims when he's hurt).
PF: Obi Toppin.
SF: Cam Reddish.
SG: Immanuel Quickley.
PG: Deuce McBride.

(Kemba Walker, Alec Burks and Evan Fournier = 11th, 12th and 13th men off the bench).

Why would you remove our best 3pt shooter?

Because of his atrocious Defense.

Yet you include Rose? Off knee surgery?

Please and thank you. Don't you never ever ever ever mention Evan Fournier's name to me within the same breath as Derrick Rose (not even a whisper).

Did you not see the impact despite ACL injuries that Derrick Rose made for our Knicks last year? He was the real MVP.

Please wake me up when a healthy Evan Fournier makes that same impact because have you seen it yet? Because I haven't?

PS: How many rebounds and assists does Evan Fournier average this year? How many made 3s per game? Whopping 2.9? 😆 how's his atrocious Defense?

Plesse never mention the name D. Rose within the same basketball sentence as "Evan Fournier" and never ever again; thank you.

You already know this is not about Rose. Never said Fournier is better than Rose. Nor would I take away from Rose's great year.
Happy Rose will be back and know it will make a big difference. I am just pointing out your constant blame on EF for our failures. Which you do on every thread. And we both know it is just to shift the focus from some blaming your favorite player. You constantly put down EF's defense even though NO ONE expected that from him. Unless your some homer and failed to notice what he has done throughout his career.
EF was brought here to hit threes. And yes, he is doing that at the best percentage for the ones shooting it at a high click.
If you are going to emphasize the defensive side of the ball, yeah you may not want to start a guy that is coming off yet another knee surgery. Btw, missed you advocating keeping Bullock, Frank, Elf or getting a better defensive PF if defense was so important to you.

But let's put forth our true analysis of what is wrong with the Knicks.
1) Randle's drop in play. As the best player on the team we go as he does. And he has not had a good year. He has reverted back to his first year in which he was selfish, a turnover machine and did not make anyone better. He has also added what seems to be a poor attitude with both fans and on the bench.
2) Kemba has not worked. He was brought in here to be an upgrade of Elf and a vet floor general. He has been neither. Elf was a much better defensive player and more aggressive to the basket. Kemba has played below average most of the year.
3) Injury to Rose. To make matters worse, our back up PG, who could have taken over the starting PG role, was hurt. This shifted some of our SG's to a unfamiliar role. SG's that were playing real well in their established roles. It has hurt many of the players on the team.

Think if someone is truly looking at our situation intelligently, they see what the FO sees and what I mentioned above. Which is that we lack having a high level PG. And with all respect to Rose he is not that. Especially after another knee surgery. Think to be fair to ALL of the players, we first need to have a solid PG in the lineup in order to better evaluate their true potential. This includes guys like Randle, RJ, EF, Burks, IQ etc. I can make a case for Bullock being much better than EF. I can make a case for Grant or Turner being better than Randle and Mitch. However, hard to gauge how those players would be doing here if they had the same PG's we have currently. PG's who are not true PG's or shells of what they once were. But yeah, let's keep blaming EF. A guy no one expected much from. At least I didn't.

The blame game is easily won when there is no accountability for alternatives. We can fill in the blanks of what we think the team needs.
Good take. The summery of it is “this team lacks chemistry”.

franco12 wrote:

MS wrote:Have to cut Kemba. Let him go to Bucks, Nuggets, Sixers.

IQ, Grimes, RJ, Randle, Mitch
Rose, Fournier, Reddish, Obi

Push the tempo at all times.

But Thibs can’t do that because it makes sense and would transform the team. IQ I would limit to 15 minutes a night if you have to play Burks to make it work.

That’s actually a nice squad above.

I don't think the FO will cut/buy out Kemba - he will likely be a needed piece in the off season as an ending contract that can be bought out by whatever team we trade him to.

There is strong rumors floating that he will be bought out.. The buy out is up to him really if he wants to play. With trade dealine gone he needs to find a place, a salary, and playin time that makes him happy. We can cut him by paying his full salary owed. Or, he can agree to a price less to a team that he can contribute to.