How will Fizdale shake-out the young backcourt rotation

I think the focus has now shifted to DSJ as to whether they want to keep him instead of Nits. If the kid went undrafted and played like he has the last 2 the worst team in the NBA would cut him before the regular season.

Not sure how Fiz is going to handle this, start him as an audition to see if he snaps out of it when the games count or bring him off the bench for spot minutes. One thing I know about the kid is he won?t accept a backup role, he?s got a little bit of an ego that he hasn?t earned.

Hey Tiger,
That is why I keep asking the question 'When did DSJ win the starting PG job'?? It was given to him because they didn't like Frank and for some reason Mudiay. They should have never trade for DSJ but Dallas saw a fool in Mills and Perry.

I agree with you about the ego. Certainly that is what Dallas saw and decided to let him go quickly.

DSJ and Payton looked HORRIBLE last night.

We also got out rebounded again which is a big concern for me.

Mills/Perry/Fizdale all need to be replace ASAP !!!
The only best part of watching the Knicks preseason games were the phenomenal performance of rookie RJ Barrett .. Wsup? No playing-time for rookie Iggy during the preseason games?

In the preseason games we Knick fans would've rather seen a guard rotation of a set tandem guards on the court for 8 straight minutes to get on the same-page each quarter to run several scoring plays for forwards/center teammates.
The Knicks need two guards to run their offense to keep ball-movement active so teammates get touches.
It would have been nice to see Fizdale pair off the guards to give Payton & Ellington the first 8 minute of playing-time in the first-quarter, than replace them with Frank & Dotson to receive 10 straight minute of playing-time into the 2nd quarter. And let Payton & Ellington finish the 2nd quarter.
The combination guard tandem of DSJ & Trier need to work together on ball-movement and PicknRoll with the bigs to get switches for their first-step ISO scoring. DSJ & Trier needed to be on the court together running the backcourt for 8 to 10 minutes of playing-time in the 3rd quarter of each preseason game.
Our rookie RJ Barrett has a nice high B.Ball IQ able to perform at multi position should have receive playing-time at the SF position to play a little Point-forwards at times alongside the guards throughout the preseason games.

After watching all 4 of the Knicks preseason games only 3 players performance are real candidate for the Starter & Finisher roles SMH ..
Frank, Morris, and MitchRob preseason performance were the best at their position. The SG and the PF preseason performance are up for grabs. Giving Randle 30+ plus minute of playing-time in all the preseason games did not help Randle's Hero-act (shoot-first pass-later) performance .. What it did were show us fans that Randle have twice as more weak areas in his game than strong areas within his performance.
The Mills/Perry huge contract has put Randle in the 30+ minute Starter lineup in the regular season games!!!
I'm still upset with the Mills/Perry show for not resigning DeAndre Jordan!!!
Who do Fiz put in the starter SG position? Ellington? Trier? Dotson? Or will Mills/Perry put the rookie in as a NBA starter?
I'm specially happy and proud for rookie RJ Barrett for having a nice consistency preseason, that I elect rookie RJ to be the Knicks 6th-Man throughout the season. Rookie RJ Barrett NBA growth need to watch all Knicks opponent starter-lineup from the bench in his rookie season as a 6th-Man !!!

Dark Raider said:

Hey Tiger,
That is why I keep asking the question 'When did DSJ win the starting PG job'?? It was given to him because they didn't like Frank and for some reason Mudiay. They should have never trade for DSJ but Dallas saw a fool in Mills and Perry.

I agree with you about the ego. Certainly that is what Dallas saw and decided to let him go quickly.

DSJ and Payton looked HORRIBLE last night.

We also got out rebounded again which is a big concern for me.

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They are definitely not helping matters AT ALL. At the same time they looked no more offensively in ept than Knits but what both did is play some defense...which fans will never acknowledge from our back court unless it's from FRANK STANK! DSJ also had 9reb and 6ast yesterday. We need offensively fluidity from our back court in the worst way

At least Mudiay could find ways to manufacture some offense and had the ability to go on runs by himself

Just read that DSJ, Ntilikina, and Payton were a combined 14 for 58 from the field (24%) while going 3 for 20 (15%) from 3-point range in the preseason. Brutal.

htr10 said:

Just read that DSJ, Ntilikina, and Payton were a combined 14 for 58 from the field (24%) while going 3 for 20 (15%) from 3-point range in the preseason. Brutal.

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Pretty sure that this is the worst set of PG?s as far as shooting percentage in the NBA. Payton and DSJ can?t even make freebies.

Imagine we end up in the lottery again in the 2020 draft and have to go after a PG again after using a lottery pick on Ntilikina and trading KP for DSJ. I could see it happening.

Greg Anthony?s kid at UNC will be high on the prospect list, with Ball kid.

If you believe internet rumors, decision on Ntilikina?s 4th year player option is coming before Wednesday?s season opener.

htr10 said:

If you believe internet rumors, decision on Ntilikina’s 4th year player option is coming before Wednesday’s season opener.

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I read that in the Post also, reasoning is they don't want the uncertainty hanging over the team. Interesting that there was no mention of doing the same for DSJ, I think they should do it for both on the same day. Makes more sense to wait until 10/31.

Reports also surfacing that said Knicks told Payton he would be the starter.

Perry drafted him and they used his performance last season to justify the move....

But it?s odd they would screw with DSJ like this.... but, I think this group got ****y and felt they had KD in the bag. I bet DSJ simply a throw-in, to save face, bc the main motivation was to clear cap space.

This front office wasn?t tied to Knits and they could care less about defensive effort, so I imagine they have no use for Franky. I bet some contending team will
Find a role for Frank.

Meanwhile, DSJ and Payton mean NY has arguably worst PG depth in NbA

Fizdale is starting to put more set plays into the offense, but his bigger focus is ball movement. He felt there was too much isolation and one-on-one play during the preseason.

?That?s where they got to fight the urge to stop the ball,? Fizdale said. ?That?s what we did in practice today. We just hammered home, ?Move it, move it, move it.? You got a 1 ?/₂-second hold, then you got to move it.

?There?s certain guys against certain matchups, they should hold it and take advantage of it, but overall I want that thing moving as much as possible.?

RJ Barrett said, ?We definitely thought about playing together in college, but me playing in New York for my whole career, it sounds great to be honest. That?s an honor.??

What?s done is done. For a moment, I thought that taking a Hunter or Collie along with a Garland or White.... a wing plus a PG... that might have been the 1 alternative to drafting RJ. But, as the draft played out, that scenario was impossible with the 2 ATL picks. Maybe we do trade back if this was an option...

We got a blue chip guy, who is a versatile player with a winning pedigree. Let?s move on and afford him the space to grow.

Imagine sitting here right now with Zion and his knee injury!

mafra said:

Fizdale is starting to put more set plays into the offense, but his bigger focus is ball movement. He felt there was too much isolation and one-on-one play during the preseason.

?That?s where they got to fight the urge to stop the ball,? Fizdale said. ?That?s what we did in practice today. We just hammered home, ?Move it, move it, move it.? You got a 1 ?/₂-second hold, then you got to move it.

?There?s certain guys against certain matchups, they should hold it and take advantage of it, but overall I want that thing moving as much as possible.?

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About time Fizdale started acting like a coach instead of a cheer leader. I'm surprised the ball movement hasn't been better because Spo's Heat move the ball very well. Next is to unleash the pit bull and toughness and get them to defend.

He has some talent on this squad, he needs to exceed expectations with them. Usually teams go down to the wire competing for that final playoff spot, I'd like the Knicks to be one of them.

Just read online that the Knicks are expected to announce that they are picking up the rookie options on Ntilikina, Smith, and Knox.

htr10 said:

Just read online that the Knicks are expected to announce that they are picking up the rookie options on Ntilikina, Smith, and Knox.

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The Knicks' front office has decided to pick up the option on Frank Ntilikina's contract for the 2020-21 season, the team announced.

Dennis Smith Jr. and Kevin Knox, New York's 2019 first-round pick, also had their options exercised. Ntilikina will make around $6.2 million next season, while Smith gets $5.6 million and Knox receives $4.58 million.

Would?ve been hard to trust these kids could grow this year if we didn?t show faith in them.... it pissed off KP... glad we didn?t make the same mistake.

mafra said:

Reports also surfacing that said Knicks told Payton he would be the starter.

Perry drafted him and they used his performance last season to justify the move....

But it?s odd they would screw with DSJ like this.... but, I think this group got ****y and felt they had KD in the bag. I bet DSJ simply a throw-in, to save face, bc the main motivation was to clear cap space.

This front office wasn?t tied to Knits and they could care less about defensive effort, so I imagine they have no use for Franky. I bet some contending team will
Find a role for Frank.

Meanwhile, DSJ and Payton mean NY has arguably worst PG depth in NbA

Click to expand...

When Mills/Perry/and Fizdale did not notice or care bout the impact of consistency in Knox & MitchRob performance after veteran DeAndre Jordan arrive as a Knicks, by not given the experience DJ mentoring the young-core players an extension to his contract, showed me the front-office not only dont care bout the Knicks team defense DJ could provide, but the front-office also didn't care much bout the NBA growth of the Knicks rookies Knox & MitchRob.
Out of the 7 FA players the Knicks signed in the offseason, not one of them come close to the experience & depth we could have receive from a full season of DeAndre Jordan performance in the locker-room and on the court.

The Knicks has three 3rd season players, plus three 2nd season players, plus two rookies, and the only thing it seems like the Knick poor Program are guaranteed to offer them are INJURIES, and becoming a injury-prone player.

I'd say a factor in picking up all 3 players options esp Nits and DSJ is that the Knicks brass don't anticipate they will be active in FA this off-season. If this was last Oct. they may have not been picked up trying to preserve cap space for those 2 max players they wanted.

Nits was asked about it and seemed happy getting the early news but I would have waited until Oct. 31 to make the decision.

mafra said:

Would’ve been hard to trust these kids could grow this year if we didn’t show faith in them.... it pissed off KP... glad we didn’t make the same mistake.

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All we did was pick up the options. We did the same for #kporzee and Mudiay btw. This was done primarily to not kill value in our assets cuhz had we not and wanted to trade them their BR were in jeopardy essentially becoming expiring assets and our offers for them would plummet. Not that they're that high to begin with but having RFA rights can have value to a team of interest(Pistons/Magic)

We likely want to control their cost for one more yr should any of them break out of their ambiguous identities. Don't read more into this than necessary.