marshall plumlee

2017-18 Knicks Talking Points, a Brief Look Ahead

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2017-18 Knicks Talking Points, a Brief Look Ahead

Written by Declan Ryan – Follow Declan on Twitter and on Instagram

Far removed from the malcontent of last season, the Knicks finally seem to be settled with a core group of players that should both intrigue and excite fans and coaches alike. Carmelo Anthony has said goodbye to New York and hello to Oklahoma, and whilst the destination for Melo caught most off guard, the move itself was undoubtedly a long time coming, and sees the Knicks removed from the largely unproductive vision of recently let go team president Phil Jackson.

The exit of Melo has a brought a fresh and excitable atmosphere to the team, with the focus seemingly solely on the youthful core that fans have been wishing for since the team’s 54 win season and subsequent Eastern Conference Semifinals exit in 2012-13. Yet, despite the newfound optimism, coach Jeff Hornacek will find his hands full this season with the infamous New York media looking for a new scapegoat post-Melo.

Confirmation that Kurt Rambis will no longer run the Knicks defense will surely create
mounting pressure on the ex-Phoenix coach to prove to fans that the terrible effort on the defensive end of the court last season was far more to do with Rambis, and to a lesser extent Melo, than it was with his own ability to coach and motivate the team. Three major points of criticism from the media last year are now gone: Melo’s place in a rebuilding squad, Phil Jackson and the the triangle offense, and Kurt Rambis and the team’s tepid defense – the focus now switches to the team’s overall cohesion and the ability of Hornacek to produce a product on the court that is visibly improving despite the star power and perceived talent that the team has.

Day one of training camp has passed, and all reports so far are positive towards the
relatively unknown quantity that is rookie guard Frank Ntilikina. Veteran Point guard Ramon Sessions didn’t hold back when he described the 19 year old Frenchman as looking like a ‘young Kyrie Irving’, a seemingly odd comparison at first given Frank’s apparent weaknesses at both ball handling and finishing at the rim – but it’s hard to disregard completely the words of a vet such as Sessions who has bounced around the league and seen countless high level NBA talents.

Further optimism should be on the cards for the Knicks, with the three Euros Hernangomez, Kuzminskas, and of course Porzingis putting in convincing performances at the most recent Eurobasket tournament. The team does have an overabundance of big men, and on the surface it seems unlikely that all of them will see regular minutes, but there are worse problems to have on an underpowered squad. If Maurice Ndour and Marshall Plumlee were able to find good minutes during stretches of the 2016-17 season, then there’s no reason to think that Hornacek shouldn’t be able to get these guys on the court to get valuable game time.

That being said, with luck, the tank race for a top pick at the end of this season won’t be as stressful as the ‘useless’ wins we saw at the end of last season. Why? Because truth be told, I’m all in on Knicks’ games actually having some relevance come the final stretch this year, even if it means not getting a top 3 pick in the draft – after all, we all know how much the draft lottery hates New York.

New York Knicks at Orlando Magic – 3/1/17 – Game Recap

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New York Knicks at Orlando Magic
March 1st 2017
Knicks 101, Magic 90

Written by Eric Weinstein – @ericcweinsteinn

The Orlando Magic are a bigger mess than the New York Knicks, if that’s possible.

The Knicks began a stretch of road games in Orlando on Wednesday to take in the Magic, and what a thrilling game it was. If you couldn’t pick up the sarcasm, the Knicks won a snoozer in the amusement park capital of the world and defeated the Magic, 101-90. Kristaps Porzingis returned from a two game absence to lead the Knickerbockers in scoring with 20 points and 9 rebounds. KP pulled down 9 rebounds, knocked down 2 three pointers, and showed little rust in his return to action. Carmelo Anthony had another off game, scoring 17 points on 4-16 shooting.

Derrick Rose finished with 19 points. Evan Fournier led the Magic with 22 points.

If you watched this entire game, you deserve some kind of recognition. This was just a bad game that included two bad teams with nothing to really play for. If you think that the Knicks have anything to play for, you’re just wrong. The Knicks began the game shooting well from the perimeter, with Melo, KP, and the rest of the Knick shooters starting out hot. The shooting allowed the Knicks to get a nice double digit lead to get some space in-between them and the Magic. As we’ve seen all year, the Knicks love to let their leads go once they get them, and that was the case tonight as well.

The difference tonight was that New York was playing Orlando, who are in full blown tank mode for this season, so the Knicks were able to hang on and pull away for the victory.

There’s really not much to say about this one, other than the fact that the Knicks won. Nobody played all that well, and nobody really stunk up the joint either. This was just one team who was clearly better beating another team who was clearly worse. The fact that the Magic can’t even compete with the Knicks shows just how badly it has gotten in Orlando. That city is where basketball goes to die.

Also, Marshall Plumlee scored, and that’s just fun for the entire family.

The Knicks road trip takes them to Philadelphia for another date with the 76ers, Friday night at 7 pm. The Joel Embiid-less Sixers are another squad currently attending tankapolooza, so we should be in for more bad basketball on Friday. Can you feel the excitement. 25-36.

New York Knicks at Minnesota Timberwolves – 11/30/16 – Game Recap

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New York Knicks at Minnesota Timberwolves
Game 18: November 30, 2016
Knicks 106, Wolves 104

Written by Eric Weinstein – @ericcweinsteinn

Why do you do this to me Carmelo? Why?

After I had been talking and tweeting about how Carmelo Anthony needed to stop shooting and Porzingis should take the last shot, Anthony came out and hit the game winning jumper to defeat the Timberwolves in Minnesota. The Knicks held on after blowing a 17 point fourth quarter lead to win 106-104. Kristaps Porzingis led New York with 29 points on 11/20 shooting, but he wasn’t the story of tonight’s game. Karl-Anthony Towns, taken three picks ahead of KP in the 2015 draft, had a career high 47 points on 22 shots, along with 18 rebounds. Whoever the Knicks threw at him defensively, whether it was Kyle O’Quinn, KP, or Marshall Plumlee, it didn’t matter. Dude was in an unstoppable zone tonight, and man was that fun to watch.

Takeaways from this game:

Resiliency

The Knicks were without Joakim Noah, who sat out the game with an ankle sprain, and Courtney Lee had an early exit as well due to injury. New York had to turn to guys like Sasha Vujacic, Marshall Plumlee, Brandon Jennings, and Mindaugus Kuzminskas, who each stepped up in the minutes they played. Jennings had 12 points and 7 assists, Kuz scored a career high 14 points, Plumlee played 20 energized minutes, and Sasha hit a few key jumpers early in the 4th.

Excellent job by these guys to hold the lead for the Knicks as they overcame injuries and ineffective play by key starters. Nice to see the guys that don’t play much be ready to step in if their name gets called.

KAT on the attack: Continue reading →

Draft Preview # 2.1: Prospect Evaluation

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Written by Ian Ellis (iellis2018@yahoo.com)

‘Sup folks, today we look at the most important part of the draft, the players (duh). Let’s see who the heck these people are, their strengths & weaknesses and how they would fit in with our Knicks. In this 4 part series, there are four tiers I will place all the players in: the hopefuls, the most likely, the trade downs and the buy-a-picks.  

The Hopefuls

These are the players that will most likely be picked before the Knicks are up at four, but due to a draft day slide, they might be available. Also, no, I’m not gonna look at Karl Anthony Towns. There is no way he’s still available at four.

Jahlil Okafor:

DURHAM, NC - DECEMBER 15: Jahlil Okafor #15 of the Duke Blue Devils reacts after a basket against the Elon Phoenix during their game at Cameron Indoor Stadium on December 15, 2014 in Durham, North Carolina. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

NBA Player Comparison: Al Jefferson

Highlights: HERE

We start off with Jahlil Okafor, the post scoring dynamo from Duke. Jahlil came out Chicago’s Whitney Young High School as Illinois’s Mr. basketball and ESPN’s Top Recruit in there ESPN 100 for 2014, and along with buddy Tyus Jones, signed with Duke University. While at Duke, he did not disappoint. Starting off by winning the co – MVP in both the McDonald’s All American game and Jordan Brand Classic, Okafor averaged 17.3 points on 66% shooting, along with 8.5 rebounds and 1.4 blocks in his freshman year at Duke, that culminated in leading his team to a National Championship. In addition to that hardware, he was a Consensus first-team All-American, won the USBWA National Freshman of the year award, won the ACC player of the year award and won the Pete Newell Big Man of the year award (yeah, that’s a lot). When you think of his game, it all revolves around his post game. He has one of the most sophisticated post games that we’ve seen in awhile, enough to be compared to Tim Duncan’s. He will immediately be able score once he enters the league. In addition to that, he is also a very good passer out of the post, so finding open shooters wouldn’t be a problem with him (Amaré Stoudemire should take some notes…). Once we look past these strengths, there are some real weaknesses to his game. First, there is the defense. He is not a rim protector, which can be seen by his measly 4.6 block percentage, which is similar to Nikola Vucevic and Spencer Hawes. In addition, he is a terrible pick & roll defender, so especially with the fact this is the most run play in the NBA, teams could really attack him (trust me, you don’t wanna see a Calderon, Okafor pick & roll defense). But, there is also a disclaimer: Jahlil played on a very shallow Duke team, with his only backup being Marshall Plumlee. So, it was best for Okafor to not be aggressive on defense and get fouls, because they needed him to score to win. Am I saying Okafor is suddenly a good defender, no way, just merely that he’s probably not as bad as advertised. His other big weakness is his shooting. He shot an abysmal 51% from the line, and doesn’t really have a jump shot meaning he won’t be able to spread out defenses. You can see that I compared him to Al Jefferson, but really think that’s his floor: a consistent 20 & 10 guy who can score in the post, with below average defense. A better comparison might be Tim Duncan, but comparing Okafor’s defense to Duncan’s is insulting. Now how would he get to and fit with the Knicks? Well, assuming Towns goes first, maybe L.A decides that they prefer one of the guards in D’angelo Russell or Emmanuel Mudiay. Philly then picks the other guard, because they already have Joel Embiid and Nerlens Noel (or the guy Marc can’t pronounce). Then there he is and Knicks get him at four. While this may seem crazy, some NBA executives think that this will happen. With the Knicks, he would be the primary focus of the offense in the paint, and be a consistent 16 and 7 starting his rookie season. This would allow Carmelo to play more outside. This would also mean that Phil would have to bring in one more defensive minded frontcourt player, because Carmelo + Okafor could = atrocious defense. All in all, Jahlil Okafor has the potential to become a franchise big man for the next decade or so. Continue reading →