If not for cap hell rosters over the years; How would this Knicks team have competed?

Just to help take our mind off these hard times of losing; just thought I'd think outside the box & come up with a different type of thread.

Just say we never landed two Stars in Amare & Carmelo & actually had the ability to keep all of these players up until now... How do you feel a team like this would compete in todays Easten Conf?

Coach: Jeff Van Gundy

Assistants: Mark Jackson, Patrick Ewing & Charles Oakley

C- Channing Frye / Anthony Randolph / Jared Jeffries

PF-Zack Randolph / David Lee / Anthony Randolph

SF- Wilson Chandler / Gallo

SG- Crawford / Landry Fields / Toney Douglas

PG- Raymond Felton / Toney Douglas / Nate Robinson

Bench; Gallo, Lee, Fields, TD, Nate, AR, JJ.

I know I started Chandler over Gallo (because of defense) & yeah, I was a little confused on who to start @ C' between Frye & Randolph. I also went with AR & JJ over Turiaf to form a 12 man team.

-Would that team be over the salary cap?

-How would you all have formed the rotations/depth?

Could that team win a championship?

Over the cap. Between Crawford,Randolph,Lee, and Robinson we'd be screwed. Also Felton would've never signed w/o Amar'e

Same rotation.

They'd get a win or two in the playoffs.

Be prepared for people wishing this was our team.

lol thnx la2ny.

I mostly like the depth of that team with proven talents such as Gallo, Fields, Douglas & Nate. Thats why I could picture that team fighting for the East.

I'd take our starters of now over those starts in a split second; Center or no Center. Give us a top FA C this offseason & we crush that team.

Once we land our C'... It's all about adding solid depth to the bench. I'm more than confident that Walsh will have us 8-10 deep in no time. I'm not talking the Walker, Mason, Carter & Rautins of the world either.

Just look @ A) The real talents Walsh has drafted & B) the real talents he's added through either FA or trades in less than 3 years... It's unreal. He's just as good as Tanny of the Jets.

Gallo
Douglas
Fields
Mozgov

Thats impressive drafting. You know whats even more impressive?

Amare
Melo
Billups
Chandler
Felton

He's done that in less than 3 years after 7+ years of serious cap hell caused by mostly Thomas.

Walsh has a plan & his body of work goes to prove it.

Wilson Chandler shouldve been our starting SF in his rookie season 2007-8.
The Knicks did not have to shuffle the deck for cap space to become
a postseason team. In 2007-8 season the Knicks shouldve hired
Patrick Ewing to the staff and let Herb Williams be the interim headcoach
with Mark Aquire the assistant headcoach.
Our starting lineup in 2007-8 was suppose to be:
C-Curry
PF-Lee
SF-Chandler
SG-Marbury
PG-Nate
Bench-players
6th-Zach
7th-Crawful
8th-Balkman
9th-Collins
10th-Rose
11th-Jones
12th-Q.Brick
The 2007-8 roster only needed a decent coaching-staff with a hardnose
offense/defense headcoach to run a 9+ man rotation to have the longest
depth-chart in the Eastern Conference.
Those who believe Donnie Walsh inhereted a bum roster from Isiah
are clueless to playing players to their best talents, especially when
used as depth players off the bench.
:smokin: :gony: :smokin:

Sorry but this is very hypothetical.

We might as well go back to 2003 and start with the Sprewell trade.

You mixed up some players from 2006 (Frye) with some from 2010 (Ant Randolph) so this doesn't make sense to me.

On a sidenote I think that Isiah beeing a horrible drafter is an urban myth!

His success quota is actually 75% in NY.

In his first draft in 2004 he selected Trevor Ariza who became a very solid swingman in the league and won a ring as a starter with the Lakers.

In 2005 he selected Channing Frye who became a solid forward/center in the league who can shoot the 3 ball, in addition to that he drafted David Lee who became pretty much our best player for 2 or 3 years and ended up at the All Star game. The third one was Nate Robinson one of the better sixth men in the league and a true energizer.

2006 was actually the only draft he cocked up. Selecting Balkman and Collins over Rondo was pretty dumb, but I guess he wanted an energizer on the wing to inject some life into our lethargic team at that time (Curry, Francis, Jeffries, James etc.)

In 2007 he found a diamond in the rough, picking Wilson Chandler at 23 was a steal! Isiah's best draft move. Will the thrill developed into one of the best swingman in the league.

So Imo Isiah had 3 good drafts for us in 4 years. Not that bad. Donnie Walsh had 1 good draft in 3 years...make of that what you want.

I understand where your coming from, I was only thinking about the talent we've had during the Thomas cap hell years but I never stated that Thomas couldn't draft but he sure as hell couldn't run a franchise & actually ended up running this proud franchise into the ground. Thomas was a great basketball player, he understands talent because he was one; but that doesn't change the fact that he put us into cap hell with horrible contracts.

I would like to think Walsh had more than just one good draft year though. Toney Douglas is an up & coming talent who he landed last year, & once he becomes our starting PG he could become an all NBA type of defensive player while averaging 15+ pts & 6+ assists per game. Fields was also this years steal of the draft.

KnicksFanFromQueens1985 said:

I understand where your coming from, I was only thinking about the talent we've had during the Thomas cap hell years but I never stated that Thomas couldn't draft but he sure as hell couldn't run a franchise & actually ended up running this proud franchise into the ground. Thomas was a great basketball player, he understands talent because he was one; but that doesn't change the fact that he put us into cap hell with horrible contracts.

I would like to think Walsh had more than just one good draft year though. Toney Douglas is an up & coming talent who he landed last year, & once he becomes our starting PG he could become an all NBA type of defensive player while averaging 15+ pts & 6+ assists per game. Fields was also this years steal of the draft.

Click to expand...

Nah no problem, just wanted to mention my oppinion on Isiah's drafting talents during his NY era. It's undeniable that he was a horrible GM and head coach :barf:

I was thinking of Fields when I wrote that Walsh had 1 good draft for us so far. I think Gallo was the wrong selection, Eric Gordon would have been the guy to draft. In 2009 Jennings should have been selected over Hill. Forgot about Douglas. Did we get the pick first and then drafted him or did the Lakers draft him and then wanted to get rid of him? Don't remember exactly.

To answer your original question:

I think our roster could look like this right now:

Rajon Rondo
Eric Gordon
Wilson Chandler
David Lee
Channing Frye

Nate Robinson
Leon Powe
Jared Jeffries
Jordan Hill
Landry Fields
Toney Douglas
Jerome Jordan
Lance Stephenson
Demetris Nichols
Pat Ewing Jr.


Just by drafting the right people. No free agency signings included, no trades. This could have been our roster, just by drafting right. Incredible isn't it?

Just looking at the list of names reminds me way too much of Isaiah to ever want that roster :lol:

And Sprewell, although that roster looks good in terms of what we could have potentially had, the only star on that team is Rondo and he can't even score. The 4 and 5 still suck at defense too haha..

I prefer what we have now

Now... If we had Sprewell's roster + 30 million cap space, that's a different story

This isn't exactly thinking outside the box since there a ton of threads that were created on the basis of a hypothetical question involving past teams, especially those under Isiah.

Let's try and accept that the team has been terrible, and not try and fool ourselves into thinking that things might have been different if only a few bits and pieces fell our way. Move on, already.

Umm... What the hell are you talking about guy. When did I say anything about "not moving on". Too funny.

I'm actually loving the team we have because I see the overall talents & potential in this team once we add a C & bench depth. Contenders.

"We need the move on"? Who were you just talking to lol? I really hope your not trying to pin that remark my way; because it seems as if I'm one of the few Knick fans around here, thats actually been thankful & excited about making the playoffs for the first time since 2004, led by two of the NBA's top 10 stars in Melo & Amare, a great veteran leader @ the PG position, in Billups with two solid home grown talents in Douglas & Fields. Enough to win a ring? Maybe not. Enough to enjoy the season for what it's worth? You bet.

But hey... Good post & remarks ;=)

KnicksFanFromQueens1985 said:

Umm... What the hell are you talking about guy. When did I say anything about "not moving on". Too funny.

I'm actually loving the team we have because I see the overall talents & potential in this team once we add a C & bench depth. Contenders.

"We need the move on"? Who were you just talking to lol? I really hope your not trying to pin that remark my way; because it seems as if I'm one of the few Knick fans around here, thats actually been thankful & excited about making the playoffs for the first time since 2004, led by two of the NBA's top 10 stars in Melo & Amare, a great veteran leader @ the PG position, in Billups with two solid home grown talents in Douglas & Fields. Enough to win a ring? Maybe not. Enough to enjoy the season for what it's worth? You bet.

But hey... Good post & remarks ;=)

Click to expand...

Yes, yes, you've already made it very clear to all of us that you are the only true Knicks fan in existence because of your blind homerism and childishly sunshining attitude.