Down 3, Melo misses a fastbreak layup. Down 4, JR misses a fast break layup. There are nights when you don't have it, the Knicks don't have it. The Raptors don't have it either except they have two keys, John Lucas III and Alan Anderson.
The Knicks have open shots 3s and drives, they are just not falling. That's the way it goes sometimes. They need this break.
Down 6, Felton drives, gets fouled and has a good layup. The ball just didn't trickle in. Nothing happening, and the Raptros had the better bench.
worst performance of the year for the Knicks...They looked awful shooting..so many missed layups and Melo Stat were ineffective
Some weird things on twitter: Woodson said MElo hurt his shooting arm and at times Melo couldn't feel it. Weird. Woodson said he might think about changing the starting lineup. Twitter speculates that it will probably be Brewer for Kidd since Kidd's shooting has fallen off
How about you assign stat to making towel runs to the dressing room during each game. Should be good for an extra dozen wins this season
Sometimes you have off nights. Melo was just off. Most of the team was off. But, what I cannot understand is why Woodson would play Kidd 30+ minutes to do nothing. He is a leader and a great locker room personality to have, given his age. Shump is not 100%, I understand that, but at least space out his minutes for god sake. First of all, don't start him if hes not ready. And most importantly, space his minutes so he can play in crunch time. We got spoiled early on when Kidd was shooting really well. This break couldn't come at a more perfect time.
Yeah time to regroup, perfect time for the AS break. Everyone gets some rest, and hopefully Sheed/Camby can start practicing. The game was ugly for everyone and we missed that spark off the bench. Oh well. I actually liked our defense and thought it played the pick and roll better and liked most of our offensive ball movement, we just couldn't finish at the rim. I can rememer 3 fast breaks off the top of my head where we ended with 0 points not including trips with missed free throws. And to Yisman, I figure this was why he was off: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/nba/news/20130214/knicks-anthony-bruises-arm-in-loss.ap/
LOL. Those missed layups just proved how off the team was. Melo couldn't hit free throws at 1 point. I don't know if anyone caught it, but sometime in the 4th quarter, a foul was called away from the ball which stopped play. Melo, like every other player, just ran up to the hoop to toss the ball in and he missed that lay up too. Its ok, you can't do anything about it. Some games you are just OFF. Here is my concern though. When melo is off, out of sync, or just not playing well, this team is completely lost. The guy has carried us and this team (literally), but how long can we play like this. I love my Knicks, always will. The last thing I want is to waste another great talent. The front office really needs to ask themselves a serious question: "Can this team as is win a championship?". Not jumping the gun, but, IMO we cannot. I do not want to get into health and injury. That is something that you will always face. The team as is, IMO would fall to 3 teams in the East if they had to face off against them in the playoffs. Miami, Chicago, and Boston. I just do not think we can win with 1 single player. Every championship caliber team has at least 2 offensive threats. Quickly off the top of my head I can recall the following players not able to win it all on their own (no fault of their own, it is too difficult for 1 man to beat 5). Miller, Iverson, Kobe, LeBron, Dwight Howard. I am sure there are more, this is just what comes to mind instantly. Kobe was able to win again once they added some extra pieces, Gasol. LeBron added himself 2 stars. Dwight is trying to put himself in a better position to win (i think?). Lets just quickly look over some of Melo's good performances that went to waste. At times he shoots much more, and that is because he actually has to. I am not going to post his minutes or game situations. Just from points, rebounds, and assists. At the end of the day, he is here to score. vs Clippers: 42 Points, 8 Rebounds, 1 Assist vs Wizards: 31 Points, 8 Rebounds, 3 Assists vs Brooklyn: 29 Points, 3 Rebounds, 7 Assists vs Chicago: 39 Points, 8 Rebounds, 5 Assists vs Portland: 45 Points, 7 Rebounds, 4 Assists vs Lakers: 34 Points, 7 Rebounds, 3 Assists vs Chicago: 31 Points, 3 Rebounds, 1 Assist vs Brooklyn: 35 Points, 13 Rebounds, 1 Assist vs Houston: 37 Points, 4 Rebounds, 2 Assist You aren't going to win every single game. The Houston game we were getting bashed the whole time. But some of these games you need a second option to help. Even in games we have won, Melo has to work much harder than anyone else to get his. There have been some games we have barely won, all thanks to Melo. Contending teams with more than 1 threat: Miami: 3 - LeBron, Wade, Bosh Chicago 3: Rose, Deng, and ill give them Boozer who is a solid player. Thunder 3: Durant, Westbrook, and Martin is also good. Clippers 3: Paul, Griffin, Crawford, and ill even add in Bledsoe. We were all expecting the second option to be Stat. But that clearly isn't working and hasn't worked. JR smith is NOT a legitimate 2nd threat. You second threat cannot be a guy who comes off the bench. IMO, you have to build to beat the contending teams in the East. I know people will look at the games vs the Heat and Spurs. Personally, I think the Spurs will fall in the playoffs. And Miami, we will get a true understanding of how we will fair against them in our later match ups, when teams start making their playoff push. We have a good team, we are just missing 1 more piece. Id hate to waste away the talent we have in Melo. LeBron is only getting bigger, faster, stronger, and better. We don't need another Jordan Miller episode.
Team mailed it in last night, too busy thinking about looking up women in their black books and their itineraries on their vacation for the all-star break
Good research here. I don't think we are missing a piece. I think we are a good team that definitely overachieved to get to this 32-18 record. We are also taking advantage of a weak East to get to the 2nd spot. The way we win the championship is if we get hot from 3. I know it sounds bad, but we have the ability to do it and when we get hot from 3, nobody can beat us. Your second threat can be a guy who comes off the bench. It doesn't matter who starts, it matters who finishes games. I think Amare/JR can provide a punch off the bench, I just think Woodson is trying to figure out a rotation. Like Novak last night was one and getting shots, something everyone struggled to do, as the Raptros kept on going to Anderson, Woodson couldn't find a way to get Novak more involved or give him more minutes. Our model is the Mavs 2 years ago. Dirk and company, we need Melo and company. That means sound defense, knocking down open shots, and Melo being efficient. The chances aren't high for us to win, but it can be done with this unit. (Remember Terry played a ton of minutes that year, and closed games, as the 6th man). We obviously need to get healthy, and I think Shump when healthy is a decent scoring threat. If you get off of him, his 3 point shooting has improved, and he can blow by you. He needs to work at finishing at the rim. (tries to hard to just throw it down) Amare can come off the bench and provide a great punch. He is making quick decisions. I agree we definitely aren't favorites, but I disagree that we can't win it all. All it takes is an 10 game hot streak (one for the Heat, one for the WC). I think we can beat the remaining the teams if we stay healthy without dropping 23/31 from 3 point land performances. It's not far fetched we put it together, we just need to figure out the rotation. I think it should Starters: Felton, Kidd/Brewer (both are struggling shooting. Kidd has better passing, Brewer better defensively, so depending on matchup.) Shumpert, Melo, Chandler. Bench: We can roll out Prig, Kidd, Smith, Amare, Novak, Sheed. Hopefully the Sheed, Novak, Amare, Smith, Prig lineup will hold up defensively with Sheed talking. I also like, Shump, Smith, Novak, Melo/Amare, Chandler. It's risky because Smith is your PG, but at the same time, Smith/Shump can create turnovers and love to push, and Melo/Novak in transition are deadly. Game of runs and Novak always seems to start one or cap one off. I was going to buy this except JR dropped 26 on 17 shots. If anyone was going to be looking forward you thought it would be JR.
So much for catching Miami with a very easy schedule stretch. Knicks need this all star break badly. Everybody's banged up right now. Melo, Kidd, Camby, Wallace, Felton... Shump & Amare aren't 100% yet. After last game I'd consider pulling Melo out of the AS game. He seemed injured. I can't believe how many fast breaks we blew last game. Novak was on fire for a while and then he just disappeared from the game. I don't get Melo. He's having a terrible game, so why force so many shots? Pass the ball and let others thrive instead. It worked when he did it, but he barely dished at all. Kidd is going to fall apart if we keep playing him so many minutes. He's great on defense but his shot hasn't been there lately, which is a shame considering how he started the season and that he's usually wide open when he does shoot. It was interesting finally playing against Fields.
Good post. Only thing I would add is that Melo did pass it quite a bit and the open shots weren't falling. We had multiple guys, including Melo, miss open 3s. One of those days
