The Knicks Fix

As much as I hate Mardy, I think it makes sense for tonight matchup wise..if u start Nate...then he guards Andre Miller who is a good post-up guard which is a recipe for foul trouble, and let's face it, with Craw and Randolph/Curry (of course only one of them will have a good offensive game), we rely on Nate heavily to be our 3rd/4th scorer, and our main scorer off the bench

The Knicks don't stand a chance with Mardy & Q-Rich playing substantial minutes. Teams won't respect Mardy's outside shot. I don't understand as a NBA player if you know your weakness is your jumpshot why don't you work on it. I'd spend night and day in the gym until I developed one. Some of the players today just don't have the work ethic as players of the past

I am sick and tired of eddy curry watching rebounds go to opposing players. I'm sick of him not contesting shots. I'm sick of him missing free throws. How do we get rid of him?

Maybe Curry will Choke inhaleing a Hoggie???
I agree, he's got to go!

First of all - nice to see another win. Especially one where the Kicks led at the end of the first, rather than having to play catch-up. This team does seem to be playing better. Last night they were scrappy and competitive - much better defensive effort than the Sixer games earlier in the season. A lot of that attitude comes from Nate, Lee, Balkman - the guys everyone here wants to see more of.

With a tough road trip up next, I have some concerns that the win last night didn't put to rest. WAY too much Q for one thing. And the weird Isiah substitution patterns, like the end of the third, where the guys who are playing pell are pulled for ineffective starters like Curry and the other team immediately goes in a run. That, and Jamal dribbling down the clock and hoisting ill-advised shots when he is stone cold (that's not the leadership roll needed from him). The overall improved play of the Knicks, and the hustle and aggressiveness of their more effective players can overcome poor coaching and game management against a crappy team like the Sixers. Less Curry, Q, Jeffries at all times would be a big boost out west.

One plus - at least we won't have to see Bynum destroying Muffins in Staples, then hearing how the Knicks could have drafted him instead of Frye over and over.

I was at the Garden last night, seemed like a normal evening between two teams that are trying to figure out what the hell they are in the NBA. So, all in all, quite pleasant. While I was thrilled to see Mardy finally, the club didn't seem to know what to do with a real point guard in there. Jamal was at times passive and at times unbridled (hat tip Clyde) - the hoisting that Pete mentions. While I like Jamal working on leadership, complete game, etc... he still has a jones for the ball that is palpable. Not being able to massage it as the PG/SG, orchestrator, finisher (isn't that what we didn't want from Starbury?) put him off a little bit. But to his credit, he found his stride enough at times for the Knicks to win.

What I don't understand is why he is not given the Shooter's role that he is best for. Nate can handle the point and Crawford is a stone-cold scorer; let him do it. And more important, make him responsible for it - meaning, instead off free lancing, run the through the screens, play real pick and roll basketball, space the floor right - become a known quantity, night in and night out so the role players, of which we have many, know where they need to be to be effective.

We can't win in the long run, with Crawford running the point. He doesn't have the handle or the proclivity. He's fine off the bounce when he goes where he wants to go and can improvise, but he's not good against pressure, he doesn't protect the ball well, often chooses poor angles for his passes and can be bothered out of running the offense. Make him elusive, make him move without the ball and get him opportunities a la Rip Hamilton. He can shoot that curl off of baseline screens as well as anybody in the League right now. Less thinking, more swishing -- he's at his best when he's unconscious. That way, he's a headache for opposing defenses. As it is now, any team with decent defensive work can stop him and the Knicks offense simultaneously. Its a disservice to him and the club that Zeke has never had the PG position correct his whole tenure. A good point and a defined role would make him into a great player.

I like Mardy Collins alot. Watch him on the floor, you can see he has a feel for the game. The ball never sticks in his hand and he plays the rhythm of the game nicely, feeds the post better than anybody on the team and does it in a variety of ways. He gets the bigs the ball in rhythm, when they have an advantage and can execute - how many times have we had to watch Marbury or Crawford standing with the ball over their head faking pass after pass while Zach or Eddy tries to hold the defender off, then giving up and switching the ball. He rebounds: two offensive boards and a volley ball tap out to Eddy off a miss that was fluffed, all in the first 3 minutes of the game last night alone. He defends and has size. He is not a great shooter at this point but he can score a variety of ways and I do believe he does work on his shot. Many PGs are late to the game in developing jumpers: took Mark Jackson years, and Kidd still doesn't have one. I don't think its as great a liability as Skycap thinks. With proper ball movement in half court sets, he needn't be the one holding the ball with 3 seconds on the shot clock. I think if the guy got burn, as he did last year, we wouldn't be worrying about what he can't do. He is a true PG that makes the game easier for the rest of the guys so all they have to do is score - very important on a team with alot of effort guys, intangible guys, that can never get their own shot, but need to be on the floor to defend and rebound.

mardy collins plays too much in slooow motion. we all prefer nate's pace & energy but he is i think suited for coming off the bench. he is a sparkplug when the starters wear down like at the end of the first qtr. steff would be that best of both worlds PG but his time here hopefully is done.

p.s - draft JARVIS VANARDO from miss st. !!!!!!!!!!!

Willis,

Your post was insightful and your blueprint is logical. However, this team is winning right now because crawford is making plays. Point blank. This team is not a team that executes a game plan; when they win it is a result of raw talent, energy and aggressiveness. I do like your idea for pick and roll basketball, I really don't understand some of our offensive sets that take 14 seconds to develop and end in ZBO catching it 20 feet from the rim, forced to isolate as the shot clock runs out. Isiah wanted to make himself look good by force-feeding the bigs, but this team is better served by its guard play. Despite the knocks on marbury, he is one of the best in the pick and roll game and he was underutilized while he was somewhat healthy.

And also, the notion of a true pass first point guard is overrated anyway. At the end of the day, assist to turnover ratio is the stat that matters and the knicks have greatly improved in that department. Look at the winning teams; spurs, mavs, pistons, the champion heat of just a couple years ago (hard to believe). They didn't have pure, pass-first point guards. Parker, Terry, and Billups are scorers, even if analysts try to tell you different. The heat only have a point guard to speak of if you consider jason williams, and he's plain garbage.

Last note is that I'm sick of "fans" rooting for the tank and the draft. I'm not short-sighted. I know we'd be better off in the long run, but I just can't consider you a fan if you can watch a game of your home team and root for the other. And those are the same fans "ashamed" that the knicks are a "laughingstock". That label doesn't change without winning. If this team survives the upcoming road trip, it has a great chance to see the playoffs. Yeah we'll be the 7th or 8th seed and probably get bounced quickly, but nobody thought the warriors would make noise and we know from 99' that nothing is impossible

@Jeremy
I thinking tanking to get a pick a la David Robinsons back problems (Tim Duncan) is different when you have young players to evaluate and develop. I would not "sit" players to lose games. Actually the Knicks don't have to sit anyone on most nights to lose. But I think you need to see what kind of players you have in Randoplh Morris, Chandler, even Collins. Players get better by playing. Even Telflair has improved by getting more time with the wolves. So I am willing to have players develop and learn from mistakes now so they know what to improve on in the off season. Not benching Crawford of ZBo. But maybe less minutes to Q and Curry to get the younger guys together on the floor. It paid off for Atlanta and I think this is by far the most important off season in a while as to where this organization is going.

Pete - I'm with you, the most important stat to view the recent success is assist to turnover ratio. And I agree that the Knicks are way deficient on game plan and are winning on, as Zeke says, "honest effort", as you say, aggressiveness, energy, talent.

But I think they got there by everybody finally buckling down and attempting to to execute a game plan. We're not there yet, but I think recent success is a result of trying to do it. And a big part of that is somebody, anybody, taking care of the ball, bringing it up court smartly, and getting the team into a half court set with time to execute: the pass-first point guard function. Right now, Crawford is doing that for the Knicks because Zeke trusts him I guess, and because he has taken responsibility for the role and has changed his game to make it happen for his team. This is a good thing, I just think his greatest contribution would be as a shooting guard, free to concentrate on torturing his man. Basically, all players look to score these days, PGs too. Pass-first probably meant "can't shoot" at one time, but those days are gone. Players have supreme talent these days, and there are enough to choose from, why would you grab a guy who can't shoot, when there's plenty who can.

I'm not sure what a pure point guard is, but I think the point guard functions need to happen, no matter who plays it. Billups could never stay on a team until he learned to pass it first, and save his scoring as the default option. When he did that, he started using all of the players on the floor, and the Pistons prospered. Moreso, he became Mr. Bigshot, because he was able to read the offense, and with his ability, able to make the shot they needed when things broke down. You can get that distributive function from a point forward (Oscar Robertson) or in the triangle offense (Pippen), or in a guy like Kidd, who is so creative, he is able to distort the defense enough by himself to be the assist man. Not many off those guys around. Like you say, the assist to turnover ratio is in our favor, not because we have a Kidd making every pass, but because the whole team is sharing the ball. I think a post oriented offense is always going to have that - throw it in to the big, draw the double, throw it out, pass it along to the WIDE open man, not the kinda open man. We never had that with Marbury, because that process always got short circuited. The bigs never felt the ball would come back to them, so they forced it up, ditto for everybody else.

As far as guard play leading the knicks, all bad teams are alike in that their guards take the majority of shots. Look at Chicago, all they want for christmas is somebody to throw it to in the post. Guards can always get there own shot, its an easier shot to get, not a better shot, and it also means you have to have really good guards. But, if they go cold from the perimeter, they are dead. A guard first offense is fools gold and will always get shut down in the playoffs, because jump shots are harder to hit than layups and dunks, and they don't draw fouls. Our guards were leading the way the past few years because we haven't been able to use the bigs right, so we lose more than we win. Bruce Bowen, whose only offensive skill is the standing three pointer, is able to contribute because he gets wide open looks as the third or fourth pass out of a Duncan double team. That's the beauty of a sound offense, you can use a guy with only one exemplary skill - Bowen, Rodman, Wallace on Detroit - instead of having to have superior players at every position. If we had our s#!t together, we'd have been able to keep a guy like D-Nichols around until he got a clue - "go stand over there, we'll find you with the ball later".
Until we have that system in place, and a QB to manage it, we'll be running in place.

@Willis, Pete and BAZ (and others), thanks for carrying the conversation. I'm having trouble logging into the blog to put up a new post. Bear with me. Hopefully the problem is solved before tonight's game.

Look forward to hearing from you Alan - any intelligence on this?

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695247499,00.html

THAT Ron Artest showed up in Utah the other night.

I found this back-and-forth very illuminating. The only thing I would add is that when the offense works well ( from the guards in and then, maybe , back out ), the Knicks seem in better positon to defend. Better offense seems to allow fewer fast breaks for the other team ( even after a miss ) . Does anyone else note this ? If so, can he/she explain why this is the case ?

Jan. 26

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - New York Knicks coach Isiah Thomas' 19-year-old son has been arrested for underage drinking.

Joshua Isiah Thomas was charged with illegal consumption of alcohol and being a minor in a tavern, both Class C misdemeanors; and disorderly conduct, a Class B misdemeanor, early Tuesday morning, according to Bloomington police.

The younger Thomas is a student at Indiana University, where his father won a national championship in 1981. Joshua Thomas doesn't play basketball at the school.

Thomas and two friends were at the bar Kilroy's on Kirkwood when Thomas attempted to order a drink and started talking with another man, according to the police report. Thomas told police the man punched him, causing a laceration above the right eye.

Other witnesses said Thomas was hit with a beer bottle.

Thomas was taken to a hospital, and police were called around 1:20 a.m. Tuesday. Officers said Thomas appeared intoxicated, with slurred speech and bloodshot eyes. He became irate and started shouting obscenities at officers at the hospital, after his friends got into an argument with police.

Thomas told officers he wanted to pursue criminal charges if they found the man who hit him.

The Knicks have said Isiah Thomas won't comment on the case.

Last poster,

Have you ever drank underage? I would believe that most people in America have! ! So what's your last post about???? On second thought .....who cares???

Peaceman

i agree with you on the last post...what does isiah's son's underage drinking have to do with the team...so what?if you have been to college you have seen 100s of kids do this...it is no big deal...

please post things that are relevant to the team.not idle gossip.

WHAT IS THIS PAGE SIX?

also what is up with the Anonymous posts?
be a man and put your name on it!

I agree on the guard-oriented offences as being the best hope for poor teams, and good guard play can make up for a lot. Think of good mid-majors in the college game – usually they have the kind of backcourt that can make shots and disrupt the opposition. With the current Knicks, Nate and Jamal, with their ability to freelance, can keep the team in a game.

Willis – I like your observation on the way the Knicks are sort of figuring out a “game plan” on their own – looking after the ball, trying harder on d, etc. It speaks to the character of at least some of the players that instead of basically giving up with the coaching vacuum, they seem to be adapting.

Tonight’s game will be interesting, because the Warriors are the kind of team some of the Knicks would like to be – controlled chaos with some really talented perimeter guys. But GS is also really well coached – people who compare them to streetball are way off. They have a system and it is hart to prepare for. This is actually a team where Muffins could be useful, since the Warriors struggle with post defense as much as the Knicks do. Biedrins is pretty good, but he is their only real inside presence, so a couple of fouls on him will go a long way. If the Knicks keep doing what they’ve been doing, they can beat this team, but getting sucked into a shootout is a bad idea. So is letting the crowd get to them. Getting frustrated (listen, Q), sending “messages” (that’s you Isiah) just fires the crowd up, and guys like Jackson, Barnes, etc. thrive on that

The annonymous posters only worry about things off the court.They are probably the same morons who make jokes about the team even though we've won 5 of our last 7 games.These are the same people who attend the church of ESPN instead of using their own eyes.In other words,SHEEPLE!!!!!!!! BAAAA BAAAAAA!!!!!!!