Isaiah Thomas vs Brandon Knight

[silverstyne]

Looking at these two guys stats this season, they are very, very similar. What i dont understand is why the FO have to ship out isaiah in the first place if all they want was to get another blackhole scoring combo guard to replace him with??At the very least, Isaiah was in a super bargain contract and didnt have to cost the LA pick.

In any case, if you guys were to decide which player you want to have on this team, which would you have? Lets just focus the discussion purely on skills and team fit.

Pick one and defend your choice. Please disregard the draft picks that we traded them for, we are purely having this poll for direct player to player comparison... thanks...

[DRK]

Looking at stats is misleading, which pretty much is the sole reason why McD was rapt to sign the 5'9 Kyrie Irving in the first place.

Even still though, I agree with your point. There is nothing that Knight does better than IT that justifies his contract being triple IT's.

[Qwigglez]

I actually liked IT. I think he's a great player who works his butt off every game. He pretty much has to because of height disadvantage. He didn't play so well in the playoffs last year, and that's the scary part about him. I think under the right conditions, given him being the third or fourth scoring option on a team, I think he could really succeed and be a threat in the post-season.
Anyway, I like IT. I also like Brandon Knight. I'll take Brandon Knight over IT though mostly because of the height difference, and because Brandon Knight is currently on the Suns roster.

[Frank Lee]

I think Mc? had the deal in place for IT... and the plan all along was to swap out chuckers and keep baby (GD) in the corner.



I also think that MC? was anticipating difficulty in signing Dragic. IT was insurance not only for Bled to walk, but for GD as well. If Bled balked at the FA offer, is there any doubt he'd get traded? Same with Dragic... So... sign another offensive PG to hedge to risk. IT was still available, and bargain hunter pocket stuffer Mc? could not resist. They even created a Marketing campaign to justify it... like it was the plan all along. Trouble was, IT and the 3 PG experiment caused too much internal friction. Then the Dragon lowered the BOOM. Would not surprise me if Mc?'s plan all along was to get the best deal for either GD or EB in the off season anyway. We will never know... but the whole equation is puzzling from the standpoint of 'need'.

Front Office hubris strikes again.

[RunDogGun]

Well at least we can all agree that Goran was a baby.

[TASTIC]

Well at least we can all agree that Goran was a baby.

$18 Million Dollar Baby

[bwgood77]

Looking at these two guys stats this season, they are very, very similar. What i dont understand is why the FO have to ship out isaiah in the first place if all they want was to get another blackhole scoring combo guard to replace him with??At the very least, Isaiah was in a super bargain contract and didnt have to cost the LA pick.

In any case, if you guys were to decide which player you want to have on this team, which would you have? Lets just focus the discussion purely on skills and team fit.

Can I say neither? I don't like black hole guards at all. I like Knight a little better for some reason, but IT did seem to be a better ball handler and less careless with the ball. This is my biggest pet pieve with Knight. I wouldn't totally mind IT and that contract if he was strictly going to be energy off the bench, but I am not a fan of his because he strictly only seemed to care about getting his own.

I am hoping Knight can improve and grow and will end up being the better player. I would have rather probably just traded IT for the Cleveland pick and then keep Ennis and the Lakers pick though.

Hopefully Knight improves his game down the stretch though and finds chemistry with Booker, Warren and Len.

[pidi]

Brandon seems to be a better fit to me. If the Suns going to keep him on the roster we will have alot of fun with him. Still young, if he gets going he easily score 40 points on everyone. And he seems to be a better fit in the locker

[pidi]

But that is a point i hate about us being Suns fans. We are always tanking about what would, could should have been done.

Every other player seems to fit better than the guys we have, til they come here and Start sucking

[KLEON]

I.T is the clear winner here. This is a guy who easily gives you over 20 pts, 7 assist and 3 rebounds per game and he's only 5'9''. Knight is inconsistent, has a low basketball I.Q and still hasn't figured out his position.

[GMATCallahan]

Looking at stats is misleading, which pretty much is the sole reason why McD was rapt to sign the 5'9 Kyrie Irving in the first place.

Even still though, I agree with your point. There is nothing that Knight does better than IT that justifies his contract being triple IT's.

The stats are not that "misleading" in this case (and examining empirical evidence extensively and properly is more worthwhile than relying on baseless opinions, although advanced metrics need to be scrutinized rather than accepted blindly), for there is a pretty big difference between Thomas and Knight this season. Namely, Thomas' assists-to-turnover ratio is 2.54:1.00, whereas Knight's assists-to-turnover ratio is 1.62:1.00. In other words, Thomas gives you nearly one more assist per turnover, which is a huge difference given the modest assists volumes of these two players. Thomas' assists-to-turnover ratio this season is acceptable for a point guard; Knight's figure is not acceptable, certainly not with his mediocre-at-best scoring efficiency (a .525 True Shooting Percentage).

Of course, Knight was not supposed to be the Suns' point guard per se this season, but given that Eric Bledsoe's assists-to-turnover ratio is almost as bad, Phoenix did need another guard with more efficient playmaking skills. That guard is Isaiah Thomas, and it is not Brandon Knight. I have been feeling for awhile now that McDonough dumped Thomas unnecessarily, or at least prematurely. I understood and accepted the rationales at the time, last winter, but that move increasingly looks like a mistake. Additionally, consider another major statistical difference: Thomas is averaging 6.1 free throw attempts per game, over two-thirds more per contest than Knight's figure of 3.6 FTA. Both players are very good free throw shooters, but Thomas' vastly superior rate of attempts allows him to compensate for his deficient field goal percentage and three-point field goal percentage this season in a way that Knight is not compensating for his deficient field goal percentage and three-point field goal percentage. Mainly because of his free throw shooting and free throw volume, Thomas has actually been a rather efficient scorer this season with a .550 True Shooting Percentage. Thomas thus gives you more efficient scoring and more efficient playmaking compared to Knight, meaning that he would elevate your team's Offensive Rating (points scored per possession) more than Knight.

Part of the difference is that Thomas penetrates and weaves or zig-zags off the pick-and-roll, and in transition, much better than Knight. The latter is not very effective at going to his off hand or changing directions, and he penetrates too shallowly. Thomas, conversely, can really cross over and possesses some of the best in-and-out/out-and-in/hesitation dribbles in the league and is able to reach the rim or get into the middle of the lane much more often. Thus he reaches the free throw line far more often than Knight, creates better opportunities for teammates, and is less likely to pass prematurely or force passes, resulting in turnovers.

Intangibly, meanwhile, Thomas is a more energetic player than Knight and more of an emotional spark plug.

Both players are defensive liabilities to one extent or another, they both shoot way too many threes given their percentages, and they both shoot too much from the field for a point guard, at least given their field goal percentages. All that said, Thomas has still offered a much more efficient level of performance this season than Knight.

And given that Thomas' statistics have not been very different, historically, from those of Kyrie Irving, and that Thomas' price tag is much lower, McDonough's signing actually made quite a bit of sense. If anything, it represented a "Moneyball" signing—you scoop up an undervalued asset at a below-market rate (given how his offensive efficiency compares to many other players around the league). The question is whether McDonough then failed to leverage that asset correct, selling too soon and too low rather than benefiting from the player's services for a longer period of time and waiting for him to build greater trade value by pitting prospective buyers against each other over time.

Then again, if Thomas' absence helps the Suns score a top-three draft pick next June, and possibly the first or second selection, and Phoenix picks someone who turns out to be a franchise player or a cornerstone, then matters may ironically turn out for the best. We shall see.

[Damkac]

Stats comparison from this year:
http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/pcm_finder.cgi?request=1&sum=0&y1=2016&p1=knighbr03&y2=2016&p2=thomais02&p3=&p4=&p5=&p6=
IT is definitely a better passer, score more points and is not much worse at rebounding despite his size. What's interesting they 2PA and 3PA are nearly identical (per 36) but IT is making much more free throws.

But on the other hand Knight is almost 3 years younger and still have potential left while IT probably won't get much better than he is now. Knight also MAY be a good defender some day while IT is limited by his size. Lastly Knight may start along Bledsoe and IT is too small for this. (Although many people here would prefer Knight as a 6th men anyway)

In conclusion: you choose IT for already developed player and Knight for potential. In Suns situation the latter makes more sense.

However if I could choose between IT and LAL's pick or Knight and that late pick we got for It I prefer keeping IT and LAL's pick. But past can't be undone so we need to move on.

[RaisingArizona]

The Heat pick may end up being better than the Lakers pick plus we got an additional 2 draft picks in the swap. Guys, let it go. Everyone hated IT when he was here because of hero ball and IQ and size disadvantage. Now he's amazing because he's not a Sun? Drop the selective memories.

[Damkac]

And Knight is now hated for mostly the same reasons as IT. If Knight is traded (as half of this board wants) I'm sure soon people will be missing him

[jcsunsfan]

The Heat pick may end up being better than the Lakers pick plus we got an additional 2 draft picks in the swap. Guys, let it go. Everyone hated IT when he was here because of hero ball and IQ and size disadvantage. Now he's amazing because he's not a Sun? Drop the selective memories.

This is true. People wanted to be rid of IT in the worst way.

[Kerrsed]

No Suns fan is ever happy.


Suns re-sign Dragic: "Yea! We got our dragon back!!!" 1 YEAR LATER: "Trade this whiney b***h!"
Suns trade for Bledsoe: "YES! He is a future all-star! We got a great deal!" 1 YEAR LATER: "Trade him. I dont know why i dont like him, but trade him!"
Suns sign Thomas: "Sweet! We got a steal on a great player!" 1 YEAR LATER: "Trade him! I hate Hero Ball and he is a chuckster! His defense is HORRIBLE! We need a pure PASSING PG!!"
Suns trade for Knight: "Yeah we gave up the Lakers pick, but i like the deal!" 1 YEAR LATER: "Why did we trade for another IT?? We need a pass 1st PG! Trade him!"

Random rumor about the Suns going after Rondo is posted. 5 SECONDS LATER: "YUK! Not Rondo! Rondo is horrible! He cant shoot the ball! Sure his is a pass 1st PG that can defend and rebound, but ewwww.....no! Have you seen his 3 point shot? No thanks, i pass."


:Fade to black:

This has been a short scene from The RealGM Suns Board: A PG Lovestory. Tune in next week for the conclusion of our story!

[GMATCallahan]

Of course, the Suns could have featured both Knight and Thomas—Thomas would have continued serving as a Sixth Man, and he could have moved into the starting lineup once Bledsoe needed another knee surgery. Phoenix would not have needed to choose between Knight and Thomas, which is what renders the trade questionable.

Now, again, if Bledsoe's injury and Thomas' departure all translate into the kind of high draft pick that the Suns need, and if Phoenix uses that draft pick intelligently, then matters could work out. If not, featuring that three-guard rotation of Bledsoe, Knight, and Thomas—with the possibility of always trading one of them later or always being able to protect against injury—may have been more worthwhile than where Phoenix will now end up.

Again, we shall see. I still sense, though, that McDonough could have eventually received a better exchange for Thomas.

[GMATCallahan]

The Heat pick may end up being better than the Lakers pick plus we got an additional 2 draft picks in the swap. Guys, let it go. Everyone hated IT when he was here because of hero ball and IQ and size disadvantage. Now he's amazing because he's not a Sun? Drop the selective memories.

This is true. People wanted to be rid of IT in the worst way.

... a lot of that, I sense, is because Phoenix fans had developed a sort of cult-following toward Dragic and did not like seeing his role reduced at all (never mind that part of that reduction possessed nothing to do with Thomas and had more to do with Bledsoe being available for most every game and Hornacek opting to put the ball in Bledsoe's hands more, upsetting the nearly perfect balance that had existed the previous season even before accounting for Thomas).

Personally, I thought that Thomas constituted the Suns' best pick-and-roll guard, their best player at reaching the free throw line, their best free throw shooter (an unquestionable fact), and—although he was very easy to shoot over—their best guard at getting over the top of ball-screens defensively. He was also Phoenix's best three-point shooter a year ago. Sure, he was not a terrific distributor of the basketball or a terribly accurate passer, but nor were Dragic and Bledsoe. They were all liable to throw the ball out of bounds with any given pass (Bledsoe especially).

So I was never eager to see Thomas traded. I did understand where McDonough was coming from, but looking back, he may have jumped the gun.

... thing is, Thomas has a real half-court game. Bledsoe and Knight do not have a natural half-court game. They are trying to figure it out, and the process is mechanical with them.

[AtheJ415]

Isaiah is not a 2 guard though. He's a scoring PG. He's not tall enough to play the 2 or defend 2s. I like IT as a player. His contract is great, but he's not really comparable to Knight who is a 6'3" SG at heart, as compared to a 5'9" SG.

Really the comparison here ought to be Isaiah v. Bledsoe, and Knight v. other 2 guards.

Also, people should remember the timing of it all. We got Knight before Booker was ever a Sun, and Booker was projected to go about 8th, so he wasn't supposed to be there for us.

Now that Booker is a proven competent starting 2, you could argue for moving Knight. Either is fine, but he's not some unvaluable player even if you hate his playing style, so you trade him for something good. As a rebuilding team, you can't give away 24 year old talent.

[MrMiyagi]

I think this thread is only establishing that players have strengths and weaknesses, and people place different values on different skills. But of course, everyone is wrong because they aren't even close to being Steph Curry, so all talk is moot, they both suck.

"But I'd settle for Mike Conley or Kyle Lowry!" - (Someone on this board likely)

Shut the **** up no you wouldn't.