RealGM

All the talk about lack of motivation goes out the window with game 1 of the IN-SEASON TOURNAMENT. Ugly new court, ugly new jerseys, same ugly team. Don't miss it.

Go Bucks.

Most important game of the season by far. If the team can't get up for game one of the in season tournament on the new court rocking the new Bucks' swimming trunks how are they supposed to get up for the playoffs?

I'm depressed. Everything ugly about this season about to be on full display.

Griff has been playing chess & pulls out the real schematic vs. Master Thibs.

Seriously though, he talked up the tourney as a chance to ramp up for the playoffs. Do the Knicks feel the same way? Do they turn this thing around?

When does Scariolo sign on the dotted line?

I think we lose. Cause Thibs is coaching the Knicks and he'll keep making things frustrating for us. And then, at some point, we won't react well and then we'll collapse. Early on or in the second half, I don't know. But this is a loss.

Will be interesting if the in-season tournament does anything. I feel they went too cheap on the payout. There should be an all tournament team where it's a $1m bonus and $5m for tourney MVP and another $1-4m for winning team (Come up with a weighted average on advance stats - Top 5 get $4m, Next 5 get $2m and then $500k for 11-15). Like Giannis dominating would get him $10m. Yeah, they make a lot of money but I think that is a needle mover for these guys. Just take it out of the BRI next CBA for player incentives (include higher All-NBA bonus based on higher games played floor). Ultimately, you are trying to make the regular season more watchable so PA and NBA should have an incentive to drive up those ratings.


ETA: After chewing on it, I feel more strongly about this. Players portion of BRI is $4.5b and you can't make it 1 PERCENT of that be for driving a mid-season tournament to drive higher BRI in the future? Come on.....

Shameless plug: Got 2 lowers in 102 Row 7 that I'm trying to sell. $95/ticket would save both sides on fees.

loss

Put some perimeter defense in the rotation, dick head.

Let’s see how much worse our historically bad DRTG can be! I will call this the AG special. Lets pump these rookie numbers in honor of our rookie coach.

Another putrid offense (26th) to test our new confounding defensive scheme.

I don't find the Knicks particularly good but they definitely play hard. Maybe act like we care to play an NBA game.

You guys might be right about AG. I wasn't a fan of the hire either.

But I just can't bring myself to jumping on the panic train after 4 games. I've been following the NBA for a long time and I've seen it so many times where a team with a new coach or new player (We have both) struggles and looks bad out of the gates and then 20-30 games into the season starts clicking and they go on a great run.

A recent example was the 2022 Celtics. New coach, looked terrible and they were struggling to stay above .500 into late January. Then things clicked and they went on a run that lasted all the way to game 6 of the NBA Finals. The 2001 Bucks started 3-9 and were a Big Dog jumper from playing in the NBA Finals.

The optics look really bad at the moment, but I am going to give it a bit more time.

Ron Swanson wrote:Another putrid offense (26th) to test our new confounding defensive scheme.

Note they are #2 league wide in RPG. And the Bucks last. If nothing changes, Knicks will be getting a lot of second chances to boost that 26th O rating.

AussieBuck wrote:Put some perimeter defense in the rotation, dick head.

Adrian Griffin would not play Adrian Griffin.

rilamann wrote:You guys might be right about AG. I wasn't a fan of the hire either.

But I just can't bring myself to jumping on the panic train after 4 games. I've been following the NBA for a long time and I've seen it so many times where a team with a new coach or new player (We have both) struggles and looks bad out of the gates and then 20-30 games into the season starts clicking and they go on a great run.

A recent example was the 2022 Celtics. New coach, looked terrible and they were struggling to stay above .500 into late January. Then things clicked and they went on a run that lasted all the way to game 6 of the NBA Finals. The 2001 Bucks started 3-9 and were a Big Dog jumper from playing in the NBA Finals.

The optics look really bad at the moment, but I am going to give it a bit more time.

I don't think we *really* have a choice but I agree with you. We forget how much and how quickly things can change.

Figure it out

The issue is that no one is seeing a single glimmer of hope in the product on the floor right now. There's no obvious scheme. It's complete randomness on O, and we literally can't protect the paint or the perimeter on D, and giving up a lot of boards.

If we could see what the team was trying to do then we could maybe get on board. The fact is that there is no clue right now as to what the identity of this team is going to be. None. We don't even know if we want to be known as an offensive team or a defensive team, because we are so random and bad on both ends.

blazza18 wrote:Figure it out

This is what worries me. Quotes from Giannis, Dame, and AG seem to all say that they just need to figure out how to play with each other, but when no one seems to have a high BBIQ, this is never going to end well. The head coach should be telling these guys exactly how they need to play with each other. He clearly isn't. Dame himself said that he's not sure what he should be doing, and neither are the other guys, and no one wants to step on each other's toes. What a load of ****. This just means that no one understands their assignment.

Best case: the Knicks put up 170+ and the fire AG train gains major steam.

Worst case: Bucks win a close one because they have a big three and the Knicks have a MID three.

Keep playing Beasily 30+, Brook 25 feet from the rim, and Dame off ball, dick head.