Is our bench better than we’ve been led to believe?

[nykballa2k4]

It's COACHING. The answer was always coaching, we have been GASLIT into thinking that Josh Hart is better as a starter, and that our bench is LESS than G League talent.

Who was gaslit? Never seen an objection on this board to the idea Hart should be on the bench not a starter.

Spoelstra had Wright on his bench in 2023-24 and let him go rather than sign him to a vet minimum contract.

Going into this season Wright was an unrestricted free agent.. All 30 NBA teams evaluated Wright as not being worth more than a vet minimum contract.

Wright has played for 10 different teams in the last 7 seasons. Each of those teams preferred to let him play elsewhere, rather than retain him.

No one should think that Thibs is alone in his assessment of Wright's value to a winning NBA roster.

Spo is an overrated coach. good coach, but aside from the weird covid bubble never has overachieved.
He, like every coach from the Riley tree (Van Gundys, Thibs, Steve Clifford, Mike Malone) does a great job developing centers.

None of those guys besides the Van Gundys are from the “Riley tree”…I’ve seen this said once before but I don’t get it. Every time people say “Popovic tree” they literally mean they worked under him. Using the 6 degrees of separation thing isn’t accurate. They’re from the “JVG tree” if anything

The Van Gundys got their chops under Riley in the NBA. Spo was developed from a video guy from Riley. Brendon Malone and I believe Steve Clifford were both assistants for us during the JVG era (maybe also in the Don Cheyney era).

It doesn't mean that everyone is equal with same pro's/con's. It does mean that they might have similar philosophies in terms of effort/scheme.

[DOT]

That's like, basically every bench in the league

You guys can't seriously tell me that Indiana's bench is that much more talented than ours.

It was... by a lot. Pacers bench was ranked #7 by PPG (40), The Knick were bottom 2 (21).

You can't score if you are not on the court.

https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/advanced?SeasonType=Regular%20Season&StarterBench=Bench&dir=A&sort=NET_RATING

During the regular season, our bench had a Net rating of +1.7, which was 9th best in the league

Meaning they outscored opponents by 1.7 points per 100 possessions during their time

Indiana's bench was 16th, at -0.2, meaning they were outscored by .2 points per 100 possessions

In the playoffs, our bench was +2.3 (behind Cleveland, LAC, and OKC) to Indy's -1.4

In the ECF, our bench was +3.2 (better than anyone else in the Conference Finals), Indy's was -1.3

So their bench was better than ours "... by a lot" yet consistently performed worse than ours. Fascinating what happens when you start with a conclusion, find the one piece of data that kind of proves your point, and ignore everything else.

[Barcs]

That's like, basically every bench in the league

You guys can't seriously tell me that Indiana's bench is that much more talented than ours.

It was... by a lot. Pacers bench was ranked #7 by PPG (40), The Knick were bottom 2 (21).

You can't score if you are not on the court.

And you can't get on the court if you suck. It's not even an argument, they had a better bench than us, by a lot.

[Barcs]

It was... by a lot. Pacers bench was ranked #7 by PPG (40), The Knick were bottom 2 (21).

You can't score if you are not on the court.

https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/advanced?SeasonType=Regular%20Season&StarterBench=Bench&dir=A&sort=NET_RATING

During the regular season, our bench had a Net rating of +1.7, which was 9th best in the league

Meaning they outscored opponents by 1.7 points per 100 possessions during their time

Indiana's bench was 16th, at -0.2, meaning they were outscored by .2 points per 100 possessions

In the playoffs, our bench was +2.3 (behind Cleveland, LAC, and OKC) to Indy's -1.4

In the ECF, our bench was +3.2 (better than anyone else in the Conference Finals), Indy's was -1.3

So their bench was better than ours "... by a lot" yet consistently performed worse than ours. Fascinating what happens when you start with a conclusion, find the one piece of data that kind of proves your point, and ignore everything else.

Most of the time it was our starters vs other people's benches. When our bench plays there are usually 3 starters out there.

Of course the numbers will skew because of that. Chances are if they gave the bench more minutes, the numbers are worse. Our bench isn't capable of playing 89.4 MPG (Pacers).

[NYKinMIA]

That's like, basically every bench in the league

You guys can't seriously tell me that Indiana's bench is that much more talented than ours.

It was... by a lot. Pacers bench was ranked #7 by PPG (40), The Knick were bottom 2 (21).

You can't score if you are not on the court.

[Red Vines]

Would anyone be surprised if the bench beat the starters in a scrimmage?

[Pr0nzingis]

It was... by a lot. Pacers bench was ranked #7 by PPG (40), The Knick were bottom 2 (21).

You can't score if you are not on the court.

And you can't get on the court if you suck. It's not even an argument, they had a better bench than us, by a lot.

McBride barely played against the Pistons, i guess he is trash, well he looked like trash, kinda hard not to when u enter the game and leave after 2 minutes. Knicks net rating lineups say otherwise but hey who cares about common sense and facts. Not Thibs.


Imagine a franchise that traded all it's picks for the near future not playing it's 4 energetic rookies.

[Barcs]

You can't score if you are not on the court.

And you can't get on the court if you suck. It's not even an argument, they had a better bench than us, by a lot.

McBride barely played against the Pistons, i guess he is trash, well he looked like trash, kinda hard not to when u enter the game and leave after 2 minutes. Knicks net rating lineups say otherwise but hey who cares about common sense and facts. Not Thibs.


Imagine a franchise that traded all it's picks for the near future not playing it's 4 energetic rookies.

McBride is mid, not trash. I like McBride, but that's 1 guy out of 4. If Josh Hart comes off the bench, that is good.

I think Thibs just plays the best lineups to win the most games and it would have worked if not for those Meddling Pacers.

Guess we'll see what happens, but whatever they do, they need to build a better bench. Too many situational 1 dimensional players. Many rookies take time to develop. Hope they can find that sparkplug guy soon.

[spree8]

Who was gaslit? Never seen an objection on this board to the idea Hart should be on the bench not a starter.



Spo is an overrated coach. good coach, but aside from the weird covid bubble never has overachieved.
He, like every coach from the Riley tree (Van Gundys, Thibs, Steve Clifford, Mike Malone) does a great job developing centers.

None of those guys besides the Van Gundys are from the “Riley tree”…I’ve seen this said once before but I don’t get it. Every time people say “Popovic tree” they literally mean they worked under him. Using the 6 degrees of separation thing isn’t accurate. They’re from the “JVG tree” if anything

The Van Gundys got their chops under Riley in the NBA. Spo was developed from a video guy from Riley. Brendon Malone and I believe Steve Clifford were both assistants for us during the JVG era (maybe also in the Don Cheyney era).

It doesn't mean that everyone is equal with same pro's/con's. It does mean that they might have similar philosophies in terms of effort/scheme.

Yea I mentioned the Van Gundys, but everyone else besides them didn’t work under Riley. Therefore it should be known as the JVG tree.

Not sure why you just now tossed Spo in tho?

[nykballa2k4]

None of those guys besides the Van Gundys are from the “Riley tree”…I’ve seen this said once before but I don’t get it. Every time people say “Popovic tree” they literally mean they worked under him. Using the 6 degrees of separation thing isn’t accurate. They’re from the “JVG tree” if anything

The Van Gundys got their chops under Riley in the NBA. Spo was developed from a video guy from Riley. Brendon Malone and I believe Steve Clifford were both assistants for us during the JVG era (maybe also in the Don Cheyney era).

It doesn't mean that everyone is equal with same pro's/con's. It does mean that they might have similar philosophies in terms of effort/scheme.

Yea I mentioned the Van Gundys, but everyone else besides them didn’t work under Riley. Therefore it should be known as the JVG tree.

Not sure why you just now tossed Spo in tho?

Riley is sort of his own thing. JVG, Spo, Stan Van all were immediately under Riley. Hence from the tree. Someone under JVG's tree is inherently part of that same tree (roots, branches, leaves etc)

But my point still remains that centers eat under those coaches.

[spree8]

The Van Gundys got their chops under Riley in the NBA. Spo was developed from a video guy from Riley. Brendon Malone and I believe Steve Clifford were both assistants for us during the JVG era (maybe also in the Don Cheyney era).

It doesn't mean that everyone is equal with same pro's/con's. It does mean that they might have similar philosophies in terms of effort/scheme.

Yea I mentioned the Van Gundys, but everyone else besides them didn’t work under Riley. Therefore it should be known as the JVG tree.

Not sure why you just now tossed Spo in tho?

Riley is sort of his own thing. JVG, Spo, Stan Van all were immediately under Riley. Hence from the tree. Someone under JVG's tree is inherently part of that same tree (roots, branches, leaves etc)

But my point still remains that centers eat under those coaches.

Na it’s misleading. Someone says “he’s from the Popovich tree” they don’t mean the coach learned everything from Budenholzer and never met Pop once their whole life. They mean the coach learned directly from Pop, and is one of the many assistant coaches he’s had.

[WaltFrazier]

Excluding the rookies. The veterans on the bench were all guards, Deuce, Shamet, Payne, even Wright at 6'5. Precious the only vet with size, and can't shoot or playmake. He could have been used more for his D. But in general we needed a 3/4 man who could score play D and rebound, someone 6'7 or taller

[E-Balla]

If the bench is good it's because of Thibs, the coach we got rid of. Just look at the contracts off our bench, Miles at $4 mil is the highest one. We get great production out of them because we have the coach that runs the best practices in the league.

[JayTWill]

I was never high on the talent of the bench and Thibs eventually trimming the rotation down to 7-7.5 players was pretty predictable knowing him but I never thought they were unplayable like some of Thibs defenders made it seem sometimes. Even if the bench wouldn't consistently win their minutes if given more time it would've provided the starters with some rest and it's not like the starters were playing incredibly well together. There were some injuries and some roster imbalance but his overall use of the bench especially in the regular season was very confusing to me.

[nykballa2k4]

Yea I mentioned the Van Gundys, but everyone else besides them didn’t work under Riley. Therefore it should be known as the JVG tree.

Not sure why you just now tossed Spo in tho?

Riley is sort of his own thing. JVG, Spo, Stan Van all were immediately under Riley. Hence from the tree. Someone under JVG's tree is inherently part of that same tree (roots, branches, leaves etc)

But my point still remains that centers eat under those coaches.

Na it’s misleading. Someone says “he’s from the Popovich tree” they don’t mean the coach learned everything from Budenholzer and never met Pop once their whole life. They mean the coach learned directly from Pop, and is one of the many assistant coaches he’s had.

Eh, I always follow vampire logic. Especially when you an see the similarities.

Someone like Kerr who is influenced by Phil Jackson and Popovic for example is hard to pigeonhole whereas Thibs, Van Gundys, Malone, Clifford all have clear similarities, especially when looking at the Riley iteration of the Knicks. Spo is also fairly similar, but since he has just been with the Heat, there isn't a track record of him being a certain way in a variety of settings.

[prophet_of_rage]

Would anyone be surprised if the bench beat the starters in a scrimmage?

Very.

Sent from my SM-S9080 using RealGM mobile app

[Clyde_Style]

Our rookie PG led the nation in assists right before he was drafted.

He was not glued to the bench for lack of ability, but because Thibs will defer to a lesser player simply because they are a veteran

All season long there were some who said Kolek couldn't hack it in the NBA. All that tells me is they don't know anything about him and they need to watch some tape

Watch on YouTube

[Ravenxvirall]

I voted the in between option, I think it’s pretty obvious thibs has always been short on the bench everywhere he’s been. Wright, shamet and at times precious deserved more minutes in the playoffs. Also Kolek needed more minutes to develop and probably hulk too. If your regular season rotation is 6 or 7 you are 95% likely to not develop a bench, doesn’t matter who’s ass is grabbing splinters if they never get to pull them out

[Ravenxvirall]

Oh damn didn’t realize y’all was arguing about what makes a coaching tree. By all means continue to put square pegs into round holes.

[god shammgod]

Read on Twitter

bye