shtolky wrote:Clyde Frazier wrote:shtolky wrote:
My point about Riley was not that he did a 180 just for the hell of it, he did a 180 because the players he was handed (good players) played that style, so he only needed to add similar players. With Phil, what did he need to adapt to? He inherited a garbage, mediocre team. I was specifically responding to the fact that people are saying that Fox isn't a "Phil guard." I find this too general. Was KP a Phil forward? I don't think so. Yes, you can criticize Phil for sticking too close to the triangle, but he has definitely not simply stuck with triangle oriented players only. If he feels Fox is the BPA, he will take Fox. I don't think he is that much of a slave to the triangle where he will willingly pass up talent for lesser talent.
I'm not saying I know exactly what phil will do. No one does. However, he hasn't adapted to the way the game is played today, and a constant theme has been ignoring guard depth as he's re-done the roster several times over. Even with bringing in rose, it was a poor decision as rose doesn't create nearly enough for others when he gets in the paint. Riley did infact adapt to small ball in the lebron era, which was the 3rd time he changed his game plan since coaching / GMing. Maybe phil proves us wrong and drafts a PG to develop, but his track record in that department is poor.
If he hasn't adapted to the way the game is played today, wouldn't he have picked Mudiay over KP? KP is THE prototypical stretch 5 that teams are desiring. He brought in Rose specifically because it was low risk, because he didn't want to pay a Mike Conley 135 million dollars. To be, this is the definition of adaptation. Riley didn't adapt at all with Miami, he landed Lebron and Bosh and said, hooray for me, now we have a super team. Also, you can't say Phil's track record is poor with PGs when he has had very few options. What point guards did we have or should have had that would show you he wants to develop PGs over what he has done? Do you remember the PGs on the roster the year Phil arrived? It's like a crime scene. And he didn't have cap space or a first rounder after his first year, so he was sort of hamstrung. In fact, he traded for Grant, a low risk gamble that unfortunately didn't work out, so he has shown an ability to take younger PGs. The PGs in this draft destroy Grant in terms of talent.
The exact opposite. Mudiay was a dynamic PG prospect who could run the P&R and get in the paint at will to penetrate and dish. We've barely had that on the roster since phil took over, and in general the guard depth (as in PG/SG) has been outright terrible. There's no scenario where vujacic should be getting rotation minutes, yet he was STARTING LAST SEASON when afflalo was hurt.
Grant was never given a chance, period. Rambis was literally playing calderon 35+ MPG toward the end of last season, where quiet calderon had to publicly go to the press to plead with him to stop.
He hasn’t given opportunities to many fringe NBA guards to see if they work out. I’m not a jimmer supporter, but that crap last year when he killed it in the d league for months, and then barely even played when they finally gave him a 10 day was a joke. He at least deserved a chance on an NBA court to prove himself. Randle should’ve ‘been on the roster all year, but again vujacic took up a valuable roster spot. And when rose missed some games here and there, we had no backup PG, because baker hadn’t really come into the fold yet.
Not to mention a talented guard like dinwiddie was readily available, and phil just sat there. And we can’t even hate on the nets at this point, so over the last 36 games, he’s put up some serviceable numbers: 7.6 PPG, 3.1 RPG, 3.6 APG, .6 SPG on 42/42/82 splits. And it didn’t have to be dinwiddie specifically, but just giving more chances to guys to see if we can find diamonds in the rough. It hasn’t happened nearly enough.
And yes, KP is a prototypical stretch 5, but he barely plays in the P&R which is one of his strengths. And i’m going to nail this into the ground: the reason the knicks continue to suck is because we don’t have a starting PG who gets melo and KP good shots. There’s no reason those 2 guys should be scoring below league average efficiency, which they now are. Knicks management overall has failed us in that regard since melo came aboard. 12-13 season was a blueprint for success, and it’s largely been ignored.
. Assuming Hennigan isn't fired. 
