Randle's Future

[spree8]

"For his career, Randle has appeared in 15 postseason contests. In those games, he has averaged 17.1 points, 9.4 rebounds, 0.5 steals and 0.2 blocks while shooting a putrid 34.4% from the field and 28.3% from downtown. He also has more turnovers (58) than assists (56)." - Tommy Beer

I don't think either is the answer, but I'm more open to KAT now than previous years.

Context matters. How you gunna ignore him being injured and needing surgery in 2023 or him having zero help and being doubled every possession in 2021?

Context does matter. As far as the 2021 season Randle was credited for improving his game after the bubble season but this narrative has been adjusted over time as far as his failures. Even with Randle's improvement the team was around 4 games below .500 before the trade for Rose which had a huge impact on the success of the team as things began to click.

Heading into the playoffs almost everyone including myself expected the Knicks to win especially after seeing how dominant Randle was against the Hawks in the regular season. He put up some monstrous stat lines while just physically dominating Collins. The Hawks came out with Hunter on Randle to start the series and Collins on Elfrid. Thibs adjust by removing Elfrid from the rotation completely after minimizing his role throughout the season.

Removing Elfrid didn't help and possibly hurt the bench while Randle still struggled with the Hawks walling off the paint and giving him extra attention but that should be expected for an opposing team's #1 option. The Hawks won easily in 5 games. At the end of the day the biggest difference between the Hawks and the Knicks was that their #1 option and their gameplan was more difficult to stop than the Knicks #1 option and their gameplan.

It wasn't because Randle had no help when Rose still provided the offensive punch that he did all season and actually led the team in scoring for the playoffs. It wasn't because Elfrid was so negative in his total of 13 minutes in the entire 5 game series. It wasn't because the Hawks didn't have a similar level of over-acheivement during the regular where they made a similar jump after a coaching change. It wasn't because the Hawks had a superior level of talent. There was no huge skill difference between prime Bullocks and Burks and young Hunter and Huerter. Rose wasn't some inferior second option in comparison to whoever the Hawks second option was.

Randle simply struggled with his shooting and decision making under pressure. Thibs predictable gameplan didn't help and Randle is clearly not a #1 option on a successful playoff team which is ok. If the Hawks threw the same defense at Jokic he would have picked them apart. Honestly I think if the Knicks had the ability to swap Randle and maybe Thibs for Young and possibly another forward to balance the roster they easily win that series imo.

Julius simply struggled in his role and I don't blame him since he obviously wasn't qualified for the role that was given to him but you can't give him all the credit for the regular season success and then absolve him from blame of the postseason failures. He played a role in both.

I remember most people knowing we were pretenders in 21’ rather than contenders. We didn’t have Mitch going in either and it was obvious we weren’t going to win.

Yes Randle isn’t a #1 option, and I don’t know who’s giving him all the credit for the RS and absolving him of the PO? The RS is a completely different game than the PO. There aren’t many players who can take on a whole defense schemed towards shutting them down and still come out on top with no help outside of a broken down 33 year old Derrick Rose on his last legs.

Comparing Randle to Joker is, well, meaningless. I’m not sure why you’re comparing a 3 time MVP, Finals MVP, ATG player already to Randle in his MIP season?

Swapping Randle and Thibs for Trae and a forward means what? I don’t follow..

Point is, you’re forgetting way too much here. You’re making a massive false equivalency too. The Hawks were better prepared. We couldn’t do to them what they did to us because they had far better weapons and strategy. Burks and Bullock? They were shooting below average 3pt%… What about Bog? What about Gallo? Capella and his 67% FG% or 3 ORB and 13.5RPG + 2.2 BPG? The guy was the back line helper behind Hunter/Collins when they were on Randle, because he didn’t have to worry about Noel… And comparing DRose to Collins (their 2nd option) who was an 18 ppg player is criminal. Lou Will? Hunter shooting his ass off from 3 @38% and Huerter? They had far better offensive weapons than we did, and all they had to do was gang up on Julius and let Nerlens no hands Noel, rookie IQ or 1.5 year RJ and his 28% 3pt shooting, try to beat them.

[3toheadmelo]

Randle’s going to come out beasting this season and none of you have been dumping on him all offseason will admit you were wrong. But Melo has been keeping files on all of you.

Who cares? Dude‘s wrong all the time too

I def don't care about your opinion. You stan Frank, KAT and Jerami Grant

This is you when it comes to basketball takes

[HarthorneWingo]

Randle’s going to come out beasting this season and none of you have been dumping on him all offseason will admit you were wrong. But Melo has been keeping files on all of you.

Who cares? Dude‘s wrong all the time too

I def don't care about your opinion. You stan Frank, KAT and Jerami Grant

This is you when it comes to basketball takes

See? Melo’s got the dossiers on everyone.

[Iron Mantis]

Context matters. How you gunna ignore him being injured and needing surgery in 2023 or him having zero help and being doubled every possession in 2021?

Excuses matter.

If a person is injured, and thus, can't hit a shot...they shouldn't force the issue, leading to those abysmal numbers.

He had a capable roster playing alongside him. It was his responsibility to refocus his energy into defense, rebounding, and being a decoy/ball-mover on offense.

Seems like a pretty superficial response…

1: If he made 1.2 FG’s and 0.5 3P’s more per game in the 23’ PO’s, he would’ve matched his RS %… I don’t think that constitutes as abysmal. He also took more than 4 FGA’s per game less in the PO’s than he did in the RS. So he wasn’t forcing it. He averaged the same amount of APG per 36 mins (he played 2mpg less on average). So he was deferring more to those capable teammates and shooting a lot less. Also had a lower USG%.

2: It’s not excuses, it’s what actually happened. There’s obviously a reason for the difference in performance between the RS and PO. That reason is an injury requiring surgery after the PO. Keep in mind, he injured it twice… once before the PO and then during the PO. Let’s also not forget the other major blows he took during the PO from Jarrett Allen and Bam… cheap shot causing him to fall from a dunk and land on his back, and receive a concussion level elbow to the head/eye by one of the dirtiest and strongest players in the game.

3: He turned the ball over 0.7 times more per game than the RS, and shot 4% less on his FT’s but took 1.5 FTA’s less per game. With the smaller sample sizes of RS-PO, the differences (especially TS%) look a lot worse than they really were because you’re only looking at a few games of data. Having a busted ankle twice over, really affects your shooting ability and your overall mobility, so defense/hustle/etc aren’t going to be easy… look at Hart this year getting that abdominal injury, his hustle fell off a cliff as a result, but he kept trying to play thru it yet nobody trashes him or claims he’s making excuses.

Again, it looks a lot worse than it was, but could he have sat out altogether? Sure, but the dude wanted to try for his team and the city. I can’t blame him for that. Could Thibs have come up with something different to have him be more effective? Possibly, or maybe he could’ve just sat him like he did with OG this year to save him from himself….

Randle is not the first player to play through an injury in the playoffs. And definitely not the first star to do so.

Going from All-NBA, All-Star to historically bad is not going to talked away by paragraphs of fluff and "ifs".

[KnicksGadfly]

Context matters. How you gunna ignore him being injured and needing surgery in 2023 or him having zero help and being doubled every possession in 2021?

Context does matter. As far as the 2021 season Randle was credited for improving his game after the bubble season but this narrative has been adjusted over time as far as his failures. Even with Randle's improvement the team was around 4 games below .500 before the trade for Rose which had a huge impact on the success of the team as things began to click.

Heading into the playoffs almost everyone including myself expected the Knicks to win especially after seeing how dominant Randle was against the Hawks in the regular season. He put up some monstrous stat lines while just physically dominating Collins. The Hawks came out with Hunter on Randle to start the series and Collins on Elfrid. Thibs adjust by removing Elfrid from the rotation completely after minimizing his role throughout the season.

Removing Elfrid didn't help and possibly hurt the bench while Randle still struggled with the Hawks walling off the paint and giving him extra attention but that should be expected for an opposing team's #1 option. The Hawks won easily in 5 games. At the end of the day the biggest difference between the Hawks and the Knicks was that their #1 option and their gameplan was more difficult to stop than the Knicks #1 option and their gameplan.

It wasn't because Randle had no help when Rose still provided the offensive punch that he did all season and actually led the team in scoring for the playoffs. It wasn't because Elfrid was so negative in his total of 13 minutes in the entire 5 game series. It wasn't because the Hawks didn't have a similar level of over-acheivement during the regular where they made a similar jump after a coaching change. It wasn't because the Hawks had a superior level of talent. There was no huge skill difference between prime Bullocks and Burks and young Hunter and Huerter. Rose wasn't some inferior second option in comparison to whoever the Hawks second option was.

Randle simply struggled with his shooting and decision making under pressure. Thibs predictable gameplan didn't help and Randle is clearly not a #1 option on a successful playoff team which is ok. If the Hawks threw the same defense at Jokic he would have picked them apart. Honestly I think if the Knicks had the ability to swap Randle and maybe Thibs for Young and possibly another forward to balance the roster they easily win that series imo.

Julius simply struggled in his role and I don't blame him since he obviously wasn't qualified for the role that was given to him but you can't give him all the credit for the regular season success and then absolve him from blame of the postseason failures. He played a role in both.

I remember most people knowing we were pretenders in 21’ rather than contenders. We didn’t have Mitch going in either and it was obvious we weren’t going to win.

Yes Randle isn’t a #1 option, and I don’t know who’s giving him all the credit for the RS and absolving him of the PO? The RS is a completely different game than the PO. There aren’t many players who can take on a whole defense schemed towards shutting them down and still come out on top with no help outside of a broken down 33 year old Derrick Rose on his last legs.

Comparing Randle to Joker is, well, meaningless. I’m not sure why you’re comparing a 3 time MVP, Finals MVP, ATG player already to Randle in his MIP season?

Swapping Randle and Thibs for Trae and a forward means what? I don’t follow..

Point is, you’re forgetting way too much here. You’re making a massive false equivalency too. The Hawks were better prepared. We couldn’t do to them what they did to us because they had far better weapons and strategy. Burks and Bullock? They were shooting below average 3pt%… What about Bog? What about Gallo? Capella and his 67% FG% or 3 ORB and 13.5RPG + 2.2 BPG? The guy was the back line helper behind Hunter/Collins when they were on Randle, because he didn’t have to worry about Noel… And comparing DRose to Collins (their 2nd option) who was an 18 ppg player is criminal. Lou Will? Hunter shooting his ass off from 3 @38% and Huerter? They had far better offensive weapons than we did, and all they had to do was gang up on Julius and let Nerlens no hands Noel, rookie IQ or 1.5 year RJ and his 28% 3pt shooting, try to beat them.

I think there's 2 things to really consider here with Randle. Number 1, if we're going to use the injury excuse for Randle, we should start considering him as injury prone. That's two straight seasons where he couldn't play or even worse, was a negative player who could not do anything against an old ass Kevin Love. I mean, we call Mitch injury prone and blame the 15 million dollar player for not outplaying Bam in the playoffs, but he outplayed Mobley and Allen in one series and flustered Embiid in another.

The other thing is that Knicks-Hawks was definitely not seen as any sort of mismatch until after the fact. Knicks were pretty favored. Julius Randle was seen as the best player in the series...I remember because I was very pumped about Randle at this time. Coming into the series, we didn't expect the Knicks to go that far into the playoffs, but we had a right to expect competitiveness.
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/31463086/nba-playoffs-2021-experts-predictions-round-1

It's a lot easier to break it down game by game too.
Game 1: Hawks 107 Knicks 105
Julius Randle (6-23). In this case, they didn't need to "gang up" on Julius...he shot us out of this game. 6-23 is not just on a defense. If he makes 2 more shots...not sure if 8-23 or 10-23 is too much to ask for. That's still below his standards, but that gets us the win.

Game 2: Knicks 101 Hawks 92
Julius Randle (5-16). I'll give him a pass because both teams shot under 40%. This was one of the classic defensive battles. Shout out to DRose.

Game 3: Hawks 105 Knicks 94
Randle (2-15). Shout out to on his last legs Derrick Rose shooting 61% from the field for 30 points.

Game 4: Hawks 113 Knicks 96
Randle (7-19).

Game 5: Hawks 103 Knicks 89
Randle (8-21). To be fair, he almost had a triple double. 23 points, 13 boards, 8 turnovers

People do take hits in the playoffs, but Randle, for the series, was historically bad. 29.8 FG%, 33% from three, more turnovers than assists. Like we're talking about how Randle couldn't take down a scheme that was geared toward him, but I don't know how many "All-NBA" or how many "All Stars" can get knocked down all the way to less than 30% shooting with a scheme from the Hawks...it's not a long list.

Derrick Rose "on his last legs" is laughable...that's just a phrase used to downplay his performance to make Randle look better. The man shot 47% from the field, 47% from three, played as many minutes as Randle, had 8 turnovers to Randle's 23, and was our leading scorer. DRose was the reason we won game 2. He was the reason this series was as close as it was...which it wasn't. It was Randle who let down 33 year old DRose, and that's just sad. He elevated his performance.

We can point fingers at Alec Burks, Reggie Bullock, rookie IQ (lol blame the rookie getting 15 mpg), but all of them shot better than Randle, even IQ. Look at it this way. Alec Burks played 25 mpg, took 56 field goals and made 24 of them. Randle played 36 a game, took 94 shots, and made only 4 more shots than Alec Burks.

Yea, Randle deserved lots of blame for that series.

[3toheadmelo]

Who cares? Dude‘s wrong all the time too

I def don't care about your opinion. You stan Frank, KAT and Jerami Grant

This is you when it comes to basketball takes

See? Melo’s got the dossiers on everyone.

People with the worst takes on this board act like they’re Jerry West of realgm

[spree8]

Excuses matter.

If a person is injured, and thus, can't hit a shot...they shouldn't force the issue, leading to those abysmal numbers.

He had a capable roster playing alongside him. It was his responsibility to refocus his energy into defense, rebounding, and being a decoy/ball-mover on offense.

Seems like a pretty superficial response…

1: If he made 1.2 FG’s and 0.5 3P’s more per game in the 23’ PO’s, he would’ve matched his RS %… I don’t think that constitutes as abysmal. He also took more than 4 FGA’s per game less in the PO’s than he did in the RS. So he wasn’t forcing it. He averaged the same amount of APG per 36 mins (he played 2mpg less on average). So he was deferring more to those capable teammates and shooting a lot less. Also had a lower USG%.

2: It’s not excuses, it’s what actually happened. There’s obviously a reason for the difference in performance between the RS and PO. That reason is an injury requiring surgery after the PO. Keep in mind, he injured it twice… once before the PO and then during the PO. Let’s also not forget the other major blows he took during the PO from Jarrett Allen and Bam… cheap shot causing him to fall from a dunk and land on his back, and receive a concussion level elbow to the head/eye by one of the dirtiest and strongest players in the game.

3: He turned the ball over 0.7 times more per game than the RS, and shot 4% less on his FT’s but took 1.5 FTA’s less per game. With the smaller sample sizes of RS-PO, the differences (especially TS%) look a lot worse than they really were because you’re only looking at a few games of data. Having a busted ankle twice over, really affects your shooting ability and your overall mobility, so defense/hustle/etc aren’t going to be easy… look at Hart this year getting that abdominal injury, his hustle fell off a cliff as a result, but he kept trying to play thru it yet nobody trashes him or claims he’s making excuses.

Again, it looks a lot worse than it was, but could he have sat out altogether? Sure, but the dude wanted to try for his team and the city. I can’t blame him for that. Could Thibs have come up with something different to have him be more effective? Possibly, or maybe he could’ve just sat him like he did with OG this year to save him from himself….

Randle is not the first player to play through an injury in the playoffs. And definitely not the first star to do so.

Going from All-NBA, All-Star to historically bad is not going to talked away by paragraphs of fluff and "ifs".

That’s the best you got?

[Iron Mantis]

Seems like a pretty superficial response…

1: If he made 1.2 FG’s and 0.5 3P’s more per game in the 23’ PO’s, he would’ve matched his RS %… I don’t think that constitutes as abysmal. He also took more than 4 FGA’s per game less in the PO’s than he did in the RS. So he wasn’t forcing it. He averaged the same amount of APG per 36 mins (he played 2mpg less on average). So he was deferring more to those capable teammates and shooting a lot less. Also had a lower USG%.

2: It’s not excuses, it’s what actually happened. There’s obviously a reason for the difference in performance between the RS and PO. That reason is an injury requiring surgery after the PO. Keep in mind, he injured it twice… once before the PO and then during the PO. Let’s also not forget the other major blows he took during the PO from Jarrett Allen and Bam… cheap shot causing him to fall from a dunk and land on his back, and receive a concussion level elbow to the head/eye by one of the dirtiest and strongest players in the game.

3: He turned the ball over 0.7 times more per game than the RS, and shot 4% less on his FT’s but took 1.5 FTA’s less per game. With the smaller sample sizes of RS-PO, the differences (especially TS%) look a lot worse than they really were because you’re only looking at a few games of data. Having a busted ankle twice over, really affects your shooting ability and your overall mobility, so defense/hustle/etc aren’t going to be easy… look at Hart this year getting that abdominal injury, his hustle fell off a cliff as a result, but he kept trying to play thru it yet nobody trashes him or claims he’s making excuses.

Again, it looks a lot worse than it was, but could he have sat out altogether? Sure, but the dude wanted to try for his team and the city. I can’t blame him for that. Could Thibs have come up with something different to have him be more effective? Possibly, or maybe he could’ve just sat him like he did with OG this year to save him from himself….

Randle is not the first player to play through an injury in the playoffs. And definitely not the first star to do so.

Going from All-NBA, All-Star to historically bad is not going to talked away by paragraphs of fluff and "ifs".

That’s the best you got?

Those are the fundamental facts that raise question marks around Randle's ability to not unravel in the playoffs.

Why muck up something so basic by dissecting all the fluff and excuses you wrote. If someone else is interested, they can do so.

[Iron Mantis]

Context does matter. As far as the 2021 season Randle was credited for improving his game after the bubble season but this narrative has been adjusted over time as far as his failures. Even with Randle's improvement the team was around 4 games below .500 before the trade for Rose which had a huge impact on the success of the team as things began to click.

Heading into the playoffs almost everyone including myself expected the Knicks to win especially after seeing how dominant Randle was against the Hawks in the regular season. He put up some monstrous stat lines while just physically dominating Collins. The Hawks came out with Hunter on Randle to start the series and Collins on Elfrid. Thibs adjust by removing Elfrid from the rotation completely after minimizing his role throughout the season.

Removing Elfrid didn't help and possibly hurt the bench while Randle still struggled with the Hawks walling off the paint and giving him extra attention but that should be expected for an opposing team's #1 option. The Hawks won easily in 5 games. At the end of the day the biggest difference between the Hawks and the Knicks was that their #1 option and their gameplan was more difficult to stop than the Knicks #1 option and their gameplan.

It wasn't because Randle had no help when Rose still provided the offensive punch that he did all season and actually led the team in scoring for the playoffs. It wasn't because Elfrid was so negative in his total of 13 minutes in the entire 5 game series. It wasn't because the Hawks didn't have a similar level of over-acheivement during the regular where they made a similar jump after a coaching change. It wasn't because the Hawks had a superior level of talent. There was no huge skill difference between prime Bullocks and Burks and young Hunter and Huerter. Rose wasn't some inferior second option in comparison to whoever the Hawks second option was.

Randle simply struggled with his shooting and decision making under pressure. Thibs predictable gameplan didn't help and Randle is clearly not a #1 option on a successful playoff team which is ok. If the Hawks threw the same defense at Jokic he would have picked them apart. Honestly I think if the Knicks had the ability to swap Randle and maybe Thibs for Young and possibly another forward to balance the roster they easily win that series imo.

Julius simply struggled in his role and I don't blame him since he obviously wasn't qualified for the role that was given to him but you can't give him all the credit for the regular season success and then absolve him from blame of the postseason failures. He played a role in both.

I remember most people knowing we were pretenders in 21’ rather than contenders. We didn’t have Mitch going in either and it was obvious we weren’t going to win.

Yes Randle isn’t a #1 option, and I don’t know who’s giving him all the credit for the RS and absolving him of the PO? The RS is a completely different game than the PO. There aren’t many players who can take on a whole defense schemed towards shutting them down and still come out on top with no help outside of a broken down 33 year old Derrick Rose on his last legs.

Comparing Randle to Joker is, well, meaningless. I’m not sure why you’re comparing a 3 time MVP, Finals MVP, ATG player already to Randle in his MIP season?

Swapping Randle and Thibs for Trae and a forward means what? I don’t follow..

Point is, you’re forgetting way too much here. You’re making a massive false equivalency too. The Hawks were better prepared. We couldn’t do to them what they did to us because they had far better weapons and strategy. Burks and Bullock? They were shooting below average 3pt%… What about Bog? What about Gallo? Capella and his 67% FG% or 3 ORB and 13.5RPG + 2.2 BPG? The guy was the back line helper behind Hunter/Collins when they were on Randle, because he didn’t have to worry about Noel… And comparing DRose to Collins (their 2nd option) who was an 18 ppg player is criminal. Lou Will? Hunter shooting his ass off from 3 @38% and Huerter? They had far better offensive weapons than we did, and all they had to do was gang up on Julius and let Nerlens no hands Noel, rookie IQ or 1.5 year RJ and his 28% 3pt shooting, try to beat them.

I think there's 2 things to really consider here with Randle. Number 1, if we're going to use the injury excuse for Randle, we should start considering him as injury prone. That's two straight seasons where he couldn't play or even worse, was a negative player who could not do anything against an old ass Kevin Love. I mean, we call Mitch injury prone and blame the 15 million dollar player for not outplaying Bam in the playoffs, but he outplayed Mobley and Allen in one series and flustered Embiid in another.

The other thing is that Knicks-Hawks was definitely not seen as any sort of mismatch until after the fact. Knicks were pretty favored. Julius Randle was seen as the best player in the series...I remember because I was very pumped about Randle at this time. Coming into the series, we didn't expect the Knicks to go that far into the playoffs, but we had a right to expect competitiveness.
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/31463086/nba-playoffs-2021-experts-predictions-round-1

It's a lot easier to break it down game by game too.
Game 1: Hawks 107 Knicks 105
Julius Randle (6-23). In this case, they didn't need to "gang up" on Julius...he shot us out of this game. 6-23 is not just on a defense. If he makes 2 more shots...not sure if 8-23 or 10-23 is too much to ask for. That's still below his standards, but that gets us the win.

Game 2: Knicks 101 Hawks 92
Julius Randle (5-16). I'll give him a pass because both teams shot under 40%. This was one of the classic defensive battles. Shout out to DRose.

Game 3: Hawks 105 Knicks 94
Randle (2-15). Shout out to on his last legs Derrick Rose shooting 61% from the field for 30 points.

Game 4: Hawks 113 Knicks 96
Randle (7-19).

Game 5: Hawks 103 Knicks 89
Randle (8-21). To be fair, he almost had a triple double. 23 points, 13 boards, 8 turnovers

People do take hits in the playoffs, but Randle, for the series, was historically bad. 29.8 FG%, 33% from three, more turnovers than assists. Like we're talking about how Randle couldn't take down a scheme that was geared toward him, but I don't know how many "All-NBA" or how many "All Stars" can get knocked down all the way to less than 30% shooting with a scheme from the Hawks...it's not a long list.

Derrick Rose "on his last legs" is laughable...that's just a phrase used to downplay his performance to make Randle look better. The man shot 47% from the field, 47% from three, played as many minutes as Randle, had 8 turnovers to Randle's 23, and was our leading scorer. DRose was the reason we won game 2. He was the reason this series was as close as it was...which it wasn't. It was Randle who let down 33 year old DRose, and that's just sad. He elevated his performance.

We can point fingers at Alec Burks, Reggie Bullock, rookie IQ (lol blame the rookie getting 15 mpg), but all of them shot better than Randle, even IQ. Look at it this way. Alec Burks played 25 mpg, took 56 field goals and made 24 of them. Randle played 36 a game, took 94 shots, and made only 4 more shots than Alec Burks.

Yea, Randle deserved lots of blame for that series.

Another excellent post.

[R-DAWG]

There's smoke with the KAT stuff, if they could get him and Richards or Kessler as well, and play him at the 4, we'd probably be better simply because we'd be able to go small when the time comes with a floor spacing 5 and all 3 of the perimeter guys out there with him. Saying KAT is soft is soft is one thing, at the end of the day his worst playoff run is better than Randle's best so far.

Randle's creation has been terrible in the playoffs, and there's also the prospect that Mikal Bridges is going to get touches, as well as OG to a lesser extent. If they're bringing Mikal here to just play the Donte role it's a waste, if they're trying to find the guy he was for those 31 games in 2023 (Playoffs included) with the Nets that's going to require him having the ball or the ball moving more than it normally does.

Dolan can love Randle, the front office is making the decisions, and extending him now could be a massive mistake. I don't see the point in doing it now, if he has a flame out in the playoffs we're screwed if he's extended, if he plays well you just sign him, and if you want to bring him back after a flame out do it at a lowered rate, it's not like there's going to be some robust market for him. The rest of the league is not as high on him as people are here.

I agree entirely that this FO is evaluating Randle's place in the team's future. They may not have come to a conclusion yet, but I doubt they are all-in on him at this point. If they offer to extend him before the season I would be surprised.

As far as folks who say we need a second scorer, I'm like hello? We now have Bridges who can give you similar production, OG is a legit three point scorer who can give you 15 to 25 depending on the game, we gave guys coming off the bench who can score.

It's a false narrative that Randle's production as 2nd option is the conclusive factor. Does he give us a scorer in the middle? Yes. But Brunson is basically a midget who is top 5 in paint scoring already so he is already technically a bully baller supreme.

While having a big who scores mostly by rumbling into the paint has value, this team is going to score in bunches with solid on and off the ball movement. If everyone is sharing the rock we have points coming from everywhere on the floor other than the C position. And Randle is not a C.

Getting to the rack and scoring is not solely based on size. We'll get more paint scoring from two basic sources:

a league leading defense that produces fast break opportunities
and
having a starting unit that can't be double-teamed without leaving a legit shooter open which will equal more drop passes to cutters besides open jumpers

As this team is constructed, Randle may fit well, but not necessarily be essential to the offense. If he was at all motivated on defense then I'd be more supportive of him remaining a Knick, but frankly his attitude on defense is unprofessional garbage.

And you're correct about the market for Randle being sketchy. No one is beating down the doors to obtain his services, because of his bi-polar seasons and playoff history. The FO would be foolish to over commit at this point.

Lots of good points there. But I think Randle's value as a #2 scorer comes from his ability to get his own shot. Mikal has a bit of that but mostly he needs to play off others, as does OG. The trick is can Randle mostly fit in a ball movement offense and just pick his spots to go iso like at the end of shot clocks.

Expanding on this - Mikal is an ideal #3 as lockdown defender and knock down shooter who provides secondary shot creation. You’re at your best when a team isn’t focused on Bridges defensively and he can use that to his advantage. As a #2 with teams putting better defenders and scheming to stop him, Bridges is a little underwhelming. But Bridges as your #3 and OG as your #4 is excellent.

So the Knicks need Randle. They need his shot creation. They need his high volume scoring. They need him to take the regular season load of Brunson so he’s fresh for the playoffs. They need him to show up in the playoffs if they want to go on a deep run.

[spree8]

Randle is not the first player to play through an injury in the playoffs. And definitely not the first star to do so.

Going from All-NBA, All-Star to historically bad is not going to talked away by paragraphs of fluff and "ifs".

That’s the best you got?

Those are the fundamental facts that raise question marks around Randle's ability to not unravel in the playoffs.

Why muck up something so basic by dissecting all the fluff and excuses you wrote. If someone else is interested, they can do so.

lol it’s not fluff, it’s logic and actual numbers. I literally addressed every particular thing you knocked him for, with sensible reasoning and now you’re trying to dismiss it because you realize you’re clearly being overly emotional about it still and only looking at it superficially… you don’t care to be objective… you got your talking points for your agenda and you’re calling it a day. It’s all good.

[JayTWill]

Context matters. How you gunna ignore him being injured and needing surgery in 2023 or him having zero help and being doubled every possession in 2021?

Context does matter. As far as the 2021 season Randle was credited for improving his game after the bubble season but this narrative has been adjusted over time as far as his failures. Even with Randle's improvement the team was around 4 games below .500 before the trade for Rose which had a huge impact on the success of the team as things began to click.

Heading into the playoffs almost everyone including myself expected the Knicks to win especially after seeing how dominant Randle was against the Hawks in the regular season. He put up some monstrous stat lines while just physically dominating Collins. The Hawks came out with Hunter on Randle to start the series and Collins on Elfrid. Thibs adjust by removing Elfrid from the rotation completely after minimizing his role throughout the season.

Removing Elfrid didn't help and possibly hurt the bench while Randle still struggled with the Hawks walling off the paint and giving him extra attention but that should be expected for an opposing team's #1 option. The Hawks won easily in 5 games. At the end of the day the biggest difference between the Hawks and the Knicks was that their #1 option and their gameplan was more difficult to stop than the Knicks #1 option and their gameplan.

It wasn't because Randle had no help when Rose still provided the offensive punch that he did all season and actually led the team in scoring for the playoffs. It wasn't because Elfrid was so negative in his total of 13 minutes in the entire 5 game series. It wasn't because the Hawks didn't have a similar level of over-acheivement during the regular where they made a similar jump after a coaching change. It wasn't because the Hawks had a superior level of talent. There was no huge skill difference between prime Bullocks and Burks and young Hunter and Huerter. Rose wasn't some inferior second option in comparison to whoever the Hawks second option was.

Randle simply struggled with his shooting and decision making under pressure. Thibs predictable gameplan didn't help and Randle is clearly not a #1 option on a successful playoff team which is ok. If the Hawks threw the same defense at Jokic he would have picked them apart. Honestly I think if the Knicks had the ability to swap Randle and maybe Thibs for Young and possibly another forward to balance the roster they easily win that series imo.

Julius simply struggled in his role and I don't blame him since he obviously wasn't qualified for the role that was given to him but you can't give him all the credit for the regular season success and then absolve him from blame of the postseason failures. He played a role in both.

I remember most people knowing we were pretenders in 21’ rather than contenders. We didn’t have Mitch going in either and it was obvious we weren’t going to win.

Yes Randle isn’t a #1 option, and I don’t know who’s giving him all the credit for the RS and absolving him of the PO? The RS is a completely different game than the PO. There aren’t many players who can take on a whole defense schemed towards shutting them down and still come out on top with no help outside of a broken down 33 year old Derrick Rose on his last legs.

Comparing Randle to Joker is, well, meaningless. I’m not sure why you’re comparing a 3 time MVP, Finals MVP, ATG player already to Randle in his MIP season?

Swapping Randle and Thibs for Trae and a forward means what? I don’t follow..

Point is, you’re forgetting way too much here. You’re making a massive false equivalency too. The Hawks were better prepared. We couldn’t do to them what they did to us because they had far better weapons and strategy. Burks and Bullock? They were shooting below average 3pt%… What about Bog? What about Gallo? Capella and his 67% FG% or 3 ORB and 13.5RPG + 2.2 BPG? The guy was the back line helper behind Hunter/Collins when they were on Randle, because he didn’t have to worry about Noel… And comparing DRose to Collins (their 2nd option) who was an 18 ppg player is criminal. Lou Will? Hunter shooting his ass off from 3 @38% and Huerter? They had far better offensive weapons than we did, and all they had to do was gang up on Julius and let Nerlens no hands Noel, rookie IQ or 1.5 year RJ and his 28% 3pt shooting, try to beat them.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=2081927
Where are the people that thought the Knicks were obvious pretenders reflected in that poll prior to game 1 of the series? Most people knew the Knicks were not contenders but almost everyone expected the to beat the Hawks. 86% of the people had the Knicks winning the series and only 2% had them losing in 5 and I doubt they were Knicks fans. We have re-written the narrative on that series so much since then.

People constantly point to his all-NBA and all-star appearances which include that season but if you are unwilling to place any blame on him for the post-season struggles he shouldn't be given credit for the regular season successes. What the Hawks did to him in the post-season could have easily been re-created in the regular season.

The Hawks didn't have some unique roster that allowed them to defend Randle in a different way than he experienced during the season. Most teams could have played Randle in a similar way and possibly had similar results during the regular season too but that is not most teams objective as far as team building. We saw in his first season here Randle's inconsistent shooting, sloppy ball-handling and poor decisions under pressure. Till this day he still has some of the same issues but they are just hidden better with Brunson and a better supporting cast.

I mentioned Jokic because he would have been a far better decision maker in those situations and he would have made his teammates better but unfortunately decision making especially under pressure is one of Julius' weaknesses. They didn't just send extra attention his way because of the lack of talent around him. They sent extra attention his way because he struggles with it.

We praise him for his playmaking which is good for a power forward but unfortunately if you put the ball in his hands you also have to deal with his decision making under pressure. It doesn't matter who his teammates are or how much you try to make them seem inferior to their opponents.

The Knicks were the higher seed. The Knicks swept them in the regular season. Randle dominated. A team game-planning to stop your best player in the playoffs is not some strange foreign concept. The Knicks regular season supporting cast performed just as well as their regular season supporting cast in the regular season but when your playmaking power forward that needs the ball in his hand and is supposed to generate quality offense for himself and others completely collapses so will the complementary pieces.

The second option Rose that was less dependent on Randle continued to perform at a similar level in a bigger role no matter how much you focus on his age. Almost 20 points per game, 5 assists and only 1.6 turnovers is far better than what Randle did. Rose did his part offensively. Defensively is another story but that doesn't explain Randle's offensive struggles.

Yes, the Knicks had young inexperienced players in the rotation but so did the Hawks including their #1 option Young who was a far better decision maker while also being the focus of the opposing teams defense. They also had multiple other 1st, 2nd and 3rd year players in their rotation. And if Rose was on his last leg what was Lou Will? He retired after the next season and basically finished the last few seasons taking 1 shot per point on atrocious efficiency and playing absolutely no defense.

I'm not blaming Randlr for all the failures in that post-season but to pretend that when your best player fails in his role it solely because of the people around him is a narrative that I want to end. He just wasn't good enough in his role which is ok.

[Iron Mantis]

That’s the best you got?

Those are the fundamental facts that raise question marks around Randle's ability to not unravel in the playoffs.

Why muck up something so basic by dissecting all the fluff and excuses you wrote. If someone else is interested, they can do so.

lol it’s not fluff, it’s logic and actual numbers. I literally addressed every particular thing you knocked him for, with sensible reasoning and now you’re trying to dismiss it because you realize you’re clearly being overly emotional about it still and only looking at it superficially… you don’t care to be objective… you got your talking points for your agenda and you’re calling it a day. It’s all good.

It's excuses, old sport.

Excuses.

You can use tactics to attack me personally, but it doesn't change the truth....

This is the cold, hard truth:

Historically bad


Until Randle shows he can perform in the playoffs, he will have that skepticism among objective observers.

[3toheadmelo]

Another day grateful that Randle is a Knick and the Anti Randle keyboard warriors can't do anything about it

[spree8]

Those are the fundamental facts that raise question marks around Randle's ability to not unravel in the playoffs.

Why muck up something so basic by dissecting all the fluff and excuses you wrote. If someone else is interested, they can do so.

lol it’s not fluff, it’s logic and actual numbers. I literally addressed every particular thing you knocked him for, with sensible reasoning and now you’re trying to dismiss it because you realize you’re clearly being overly emotional about it still and only looking at it superficially… you don’t care to be objective… you got your talking points for your agenda and you’re calling it a day. It’s all good.

It's excuses, old sport.

Excuses.

You can use tactics to attack me personally, but it doesn't change the truth....

This is the cold, hard truth:

Historically bad


Until Randle shows he can perform in the playoffs, he will have that skepticism among objective observes.

I’m not attacking you personally? I’m just saying you’re being emotional about it which is clear… when someone brings facts and numbers to the table and you run from them and revert back to talking points like “historically bad” and call those same facts “fluff” you’re showing you have an agenda… one that is rooted in emotion for whatever reason..

[spree8]

Context does matter. As far as the 2021 season Randle was credited for improving his game after the bubble season but this narrative has been adjusted over time as far as his failures. Even with Randle's improvement the team was around 4 games below .500 before the trade for Rose which had a huge impact on the success of the team as things began to click.

Heading into the playoffs almost everyone including myself expected the Knicks to win especially after seeing how dominant Randle was against the Hawks in the regular season. He put up some monstrous stat lines while just physically dominating Collins. The Hawks came out with Hunter on Randle to start the series and Collins on Elfrid. Thibs adjust by removing Elfrid from the rotation completely after minimizing his role throughout the season.

Removing Elfrid didn't help and possibly hurt the bench while Randle still struggled with the Hawks walling off the paint and giving him extra attention but that should be expected for an opposing team's #1 option. The Hawks won easily in 5 games. At the end of the day the biggest difference between the Hawks and the Knicks was that their #1 option and their gameplan was more difficult to stop than the Knicks #1 option and their gameplan.

It wasn't because Randle had no help when Rose still provided the offensive punch that he did all season and actually led the team in scoring for the playoffs. It wasn't because Elfrid was so negative in his total of 13 minutes in the entire 5 game series. It wasn't because the Hawks didn't have a similar level of over-acheivement during the regular where they made a similar jump after a coaching change. It wasn't because the Hawks had a superior level of talent. There was no huge skill difference between prime Bullocks and Burks and young Hunter and Huerter. Rose wasn't some inferior second option in comparison to whoever the Hawks second option was.

Randle simply struggled with his shooting and decision making under pressure. Thibs predictable gameplan didn't help and Randle is clearly not a #1 option on a successful playoff team which is ok. If the Hawks threw the same defense at Jokic he would have picked them apart. Honestly I think if the Knicks had the ability to swap Randle and maybe Thibs for Young and possibly another forward to balance the roster they easily win that series imo.

Julius simply struggled in his role and I don't blame him since he obviously wasn't qualified for the role that was given to him but you can't give him all the credit for the regular season success and then absolve him from blame of the postseason failures. He played a role in both.

I remember most people knowing we were pretenders in 21’ rather than contenders. We didn’t have Mitch going in either and it was obvious we weren’t going to win.

Yes Randle isn’t a #1 option, and I don’t know who’s giving him all the credit for the RS and absolving him of the PO? The RS is a completely different game than the PO. There aren’t many players who can take on a whole defense schemed towards shutting them down and still come out on top with no help outside of a broken down 33 year old Derrick Rose on his last legs.

Comparing Randle to Joker is, well, meaningless. I’m not sure why you’re comparing a 3 time MVP, Finals MVP, ATG player already to Randle in his MIP season?

Swapping Randle and Thibs for Trae and a forward means what? I don’t follow..

Point is, you’re forgetting way too much here. You’re making a massive false equivalency too. The Hawks were better prepared. We couldn’t do to them what they did to us because they had far better weapons and strategy. Burks and Bullock? They were shooting below average 3pt%… What about Bog? What about Gallo? Capella and his 67% FG% or 3 ORB and 13.5RPG + 2.2 BPG? The guy was the back line helper behind Hunter/Collins when they were on Randle, because he didn’t have to worry about Noel… And comparing DRose to Collins (their 2nd option) who was an 18 ppg player is criminal. Lou Will? Hunter shooting his ass off from 3 @38% and Huerter? They had far better offensive weapons than we did, and all they had to do was gang up on Julius and let Nerlens no hands Noel, rookie IQ or 1.5 year RJ and his 28% 3pt shooting, try to beat them.

I think there's 2 things to really consider here with Randle. Number 1, if we're going to use the injury excuse for Randle, we should start considering him as injury prone. That's two straight seasons where he couldn't play or even worse, was a negative player who could not do anything against an old ass Kevin Love. I mean, we call Mitch injury prone and blame the 15 million dollar player for not outplaying Bam in the playoffs, but he outplayed Mobley and Allen in one series and flustered Embiid in another.

The other thing is that Knicks-Hawks was definitely not seen as any sort of mismatch until after the fact. Knicks were pretty favored. Julius Randle was seen as the best player in the series...I remember because I was very pumped about Randle at this time. Coming into the series, we didn't expect the Knicks to go that far into the playoffs, but we had a right to expect competitiveness.
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/31463086/nba-playoffs-2021-experts-predictions-round-1

It's a lot easier to break it down game by game too.
Game 1: Hawks 107 Knicks 105
Julius Randle (6-23). In this case, they didn't need to "gang up" on Julius...he shot us out of this game. 6-23 is not just on a defense. If he makes 2 more shots...not sure if 8-23 or 10-23 is too much to ask for. That's still below his standards, but that gets us the win.

Game 2: Knicks 101 Hawks 92
Julius Randle (5-16). I'll give him a pass because both teams shot under 40%. This was one of the classic defensive battles. Shout out to DRose.

Game 3: Hawks 105 Knicks 94
Randle (2-15). Shout out to on his last legs Derrick Rose shooting 61% from the field for 30 points.

Game 4: Hawks 113 Knicks 96
Randle (7-19).

Game 5: Hawks 103 Knicks 89
Randle (8-21). To be fair, he almost had a triple double. 23 points, 13 boards, 8 turnovers

People do take hits in the playoffs, but Randle, for the series, was historically bad. 29.8 FG%, 33% from three, more turnovers than assists. Like we're talking about how Randle couldn't take down a scheme that was geared toward him, but I don't know how many "All-NBA" or how many "All Stars" can get knocked down all the way to less than 30% shooting with a scheme from the Hawks...it's not a long list.

Derrick Rose "on his last legs" is laughable...that's just a phrase used to downplay his performance to make Randle look better. The man shot 47% from the field, 47% from three, played as many minutes as Randle, had 8 turnovers to Randle's 23, and was our leading scorer. DRose was the reason we won game 2. He was the reason this series was as close as it was...which it wasn't. It was Randle who let down 33 year old DRose, and that's just sad. He elevated his performance.

We can point fingers at Alec Burks, Reggie Bullock, rookie IQ (lol blame the rookie getting 15 mpg), but all of them shot better than Randle, even IQ. Look at it this way. Alec Burks played 25 mpg, took 56 field goals and made 24 of them. Randle played 36 a game, took 94 shots, and made only 4 more shots than Alec Burks.

Yea, Randle deserved lots of blame for that series.

Wait, answer me this, was this Derrick Rose’s last relevant season of his career yes or no? I mean, you don’t have to answer because it was, he never played more than 27 games in a season after 2021, so please cut the bullshyt. If that doesn’t constitute as “last legs” then idk wtf does lol.

Don’t you think there’s a reason why Rose was so efficient offensively that series? I’ll let you figure that out with the help of my last post.

Who the hell blamed IQ for this btw? You’re making shyt up lol. I never said that. I said the Hawks threw multiple defenders at Randle from the jump and decided to let everyone else try to beat them including Burks, Bullock, RJ, Rose, IQ, Noel… why you’re singling out IQ and putting words in my mouth blaming only him is beyond me.

Regarding the team being pretenders, idc what ESPN people picked us to win that series, I was talking about us in the PO in general, not just vs the Hawks. I mean really, the team was average before 33 year old Derrick Rose came in, cmon now. If people thought we’d beat the Hawks because we did during the season, that’s on them. But the RS is not the PO. The game changes. It gets slowed down, pressure is higher, there’s more emphasis on game planning and coaching. It’s just not the same.

The fact you’re comparing the shooting percentages of everyone else on the team who weren’t doubled and tripled every possession (and at times actually left open) to Randle who was doubled and tripled every possession just goes to show you how you have no idea wtf you’re talking about and need to go sit down and raise your hand. Thanks, bye

[HarthorneWingo]

I def don't care about your opinion. You stan Frank, KAT and Jerami Grant

This is you when it comes to basketball takes

See? Melo’s got the dossiers on everyone.

People with the worst takes on this board act like they’re Jerry West of realgm

I love when you show them the receipts

[Iron Mantis]

lol it’s not fluff, it’s logic and actual numbers. I literally addressed every particular thing you knocked him for, with sensible reasoning and now you’re trying to dismiss it because you realize you’re clearly being overly emotional about it still and only looking at it superficially… you don’t care to be objective… you got your talking points for your agenda and you’re calling it a day. It’s all good.

Spoiler:

It's excuses, old sport.

Excuses.

You can use tactics to attack me personally, but it doesn't change the truth....

This is the cold, hard truth:

Historically bad


Until Randle shows he can perform in the playoffs, he will have that skepticism among objective observes.

I’m not attacking you personally? I’m just saying you’re being emotional about it which is clear… when someone brings facts and numbers to the table and you run from them and revert back to talking points like “historically bad” and call those same facts “fluff” you’re showing you have an agenda… one that is rooted in emotion for whatever reason..

You said some variation of "you" 9 times in your last post I responded to. Yes, that's coming at me. So, clearly, I'm NOT the one being emotional here, old sport. Superfans of a player can get defensive....no prob.

Nevertheless, these are the facts: HISTORICALLY BAD.

We can make excuses and juggle numbers and "ifs" to fit any narrative we choose. Your points were simply not WORTH addressing. They're the same years' worth of recycled excuses being repackaged.

Randle will have the chance to step it up this year and erase the playoff stink. We need him to. Of course if he does poorly, even on this loaded team, there will be yet more excuses.

[DaGawd]

knew this thread would go nuclear today. did not disappoint

[aggo]

the great thing about randle not signing his extension

is that we don't have to shop him.



teams will call us and we dont have to deal with the drama of "knicks are looking to move randle"