Porzingis thread #4: The KP era is upon us

[KnickXxxx]

I mean it’s not like KP just slowed down, he became a different player over night after we got report of his injury.

You don’t just go from a track of top 3 mvp contender to below average over night for no reason. You don’t just lose the ability to toy with your opponents. This isn’t just a matter of getting hot with your shot, this is a matter of having the tools to consistently dominate your opponent which KP has and that doesn’t leave unless you’re injured or get older.

By all logic a healthy KP should be continuing his trajectory, getting even better. The only way I can figure something different is that the injury really is serious.

[EnigmatiC]

In my opinion it looks like he's rushing in to his shot. Earlier in the season everyone was commenting on how patient he was with his shot but since teams started doubling him he's been rushing it. Even when the double isn't there he's expecting it to come puts up a quick one. I think it's snowballing now where he's taking bad shots as well as holding the ball too long trying to force something.

[ChaosHamster]

Its just combination of fatigue setting in, as always after ~20 games, injury and teams defending him better.

He is doing the same thing he did early, just s step slower. + double teams, and guy defending him tighter after the hot start he had.

[3toheadmelo]

im expecting KP to be up and down all season. he should be fine

[KnickXxxx]

In my opinion it looks like he's rushing in to his shot. Earlier in the season everyone was commenting on how patient he was with his shot but since teams started doubling him he's been rushing it. Even when the double isn't there he's expecting it to come puts up a quick one. I think it's snowballing now where he's taking bad shots as well as holding the ball too long trying to force something.

Early season KP was able to get to the hoop at will too. He stopped doing that too.

[IAmTheBest]

Not sure how to respond to this by not getting warned or banned.

Cousins has meltdowns and gets in foul trouble. KD defends himself with alts on Twitter. Dirk stays in Dallas, and makes no excuses for his problems

I'm talking about actual games, this isn't 2011' anymore. KP should work out with Draymond/KD or Pelicans bigs

You have better options? Dirk is old and washed. You can't get better playing against worse players. Draymond will teach him toughness, kd will teach him everything else.

nah i actually think he should work out with dirk. a lot of players like kobe and amare learned a **** ton from an old and washed hakeem

KP's problem isnt toughness. KP is willing to get into it on the court. He doesnt shy away from contact.

The reason it looks like KP is soft is he simply does not have the build to get truly nasty down low. He is not as stable due to his extremely long, skinny frame. He does not cover a lot of area on the court. Even Markenson looks significantly stronger than him.

He will never have Draymond's combination of strength and lower center of gravity. He will never have Durant's ridiculous skill. Durant's shooting guard skill that even garnered the praise of michael jordan is not something that can simply be taught.

Davis is an athletic freak who started his organized basketball journey as a shooting guard. KP can't play like the significantly shorter but wider and stronger athletic specimen that davis is. And cousins is a behemoth, something KP will never have.

Then you look at Dirk - tall physically outmatched white guy with skills. there are some differences - KP is the better athlete but Dirk was more skilled and had better instincts. If KP wants to be truly dominant he will need to be able to exploit his height to become unguardable. This means either the Dirk fadeaway or the Kareem skyhook. He is much closer to developing dirk's fadeaway than the skyhook.

KP has the tools to develop more of an arsenal. He's already incorporating a lot of Melo's game as best as he can.

KP will be fine as long as he can maintain the same drive and hunger he's always had.

[Wolfgang630]

KP has got to learn the fadeaway from dirk. KP being so damn tall and skinny is hurting him. Also he needs to workout with Kareem

[3toheadmelo]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

[Wolfgang630]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

He needs to figure it out or someone needs to mentor him. Playmaking and passing out of the double team shouldn’t be so hard.

I know at times you get the ball and you only think “score”, but he needs to train his mind to read and react and make the right play. He has height to his advantage. Get players to cut when he gets a double so he can pass it to them.

[3toheadmelo]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

He needs to figure it out or someone needs to mentor him. Playmaking and passing out of the double team shouldn’t be so hard.

I know at times you get the ball and you only think “score”, but he needs to train his mind to read and react and make the right play. He has height to his advantage. Get players to cut when he gets a double so he can pass it to them.

the double teams are new to him since this is his first year where the focus is all on him. i do think that he will make better decisions out of it in time. this is a learning experience for him

i agree about the cutting part though. i was talking about that yesterday. everyone can't just be standing around when KP is getting double teamed. it's the same problem we had with melo. everyone just stood there. that's a result of poor coaching unfortunately

[IAmTheBest]

I'm not worried about KP's reactions to double teams. This is his first season as the main option. He's never played as the bonafide go-to guy in a professional setting.

It's easy to pass out of the double team on paper, but the actual practice of doing so isnt so simple.
It's not a simple matter of the defense either double teaming or not double teaming. Sometimes they fake double teams, sometimes, they actually commit to double teams, and sometimes they dont attempt double teams at all. Defenses always keep players guessing and even all time greats are kept on edge. You're not gonna get a feel for this in the NBA overnight

He's also not used to passing out of the low post or block.

He definitely needs to improve his decision making and passing but you cant expect a 22 year old porzingis to be immediately proficient at it when he's never done it before, and now all of a sudden he's attempting to do it in the strongest league in the world.

This is one of the reasons I was never a fan of melo "taking offensive pressure off" of KP. It probably suppressed his growth a bit.

Another area he can improve is setting screens. right now he's basically just setting slip screens and isnt even reading the defense well enough to optimize the angles for him and the ball handler.

[Zingod]

KP has got to learn the fadeaway from dirk. KP being so damn tall and skinny is hurting him. Also he needs to workout with Kareem

Kareem is like 100 years old, are you guys serious?

And Hakeem workouts are more overrated than coffee. He asks way too much money and guys like Amare and Dwight never got better. he's teaching one move basically. That's not what kp needs, he's got enough moves.

Kp needs to improve his toughness on the road. Guys like Draymond could teach him a thing or two on how to deal with tough crowds and adversity on the road.

[Knicksfan20]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

Not in bat. He just grabbed 16 rebounds

[Juris]

Fantastic. Everyone knows what KP needs... But guys i'll tell you this- you need a patience, every one of you. He's 22 and every night he's dealing with tough guys whose primary mission is to lock him, disturb and make him uncomfortable out there. What did you expect? Physically he's not a grown men, he's young. We, people from north countries, are growing much slower than afro-americans. He's ceiling is so high that he needs at least three to four off seasons to get he's mind and body to perform equally every night. Just relax and send your thoughts to space about other pieces of puzzle for champion team.

[IllmaticHandler]

So wait... Janis is not teaching KP enough? KP putting his offseason program in his brothers hands is not paying off??

[IllmaticHandler]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

Not in bat. He just grabbed 16 rebounds

dude had a stat line he never had in real life.

[3toheadmelo]

i think his biggest issues right now are making the right decisions out of double teams and rebounding

Not in bat. He just grabbed 16 rebounds

dude had a stat line he never had in real life.

i thought this sim was supposed to be realistic

[IllmaticHandler]

Not in bat. He just grabbed 16 rebounds

dude had a stat line he never had in real life.

i thought this sim was supposed to be realistic

yeah when I saw the stat line I was like....oooooookay...


its to be expected for a game...now if he avgs a double-double all year it's most def off.

[nedleeds]

Kobe for mentor of the week.

[thebuzzardman]

Hasn't this sort of been KP every year? You get "Cadillac KP" for like 20 games in the season, then nagging injuries hit, and you get high end Ford KP

I’ve never noticed what you are talking about where KP falls off.

In previous years I never saw him have anywhere close to the start he had this season where he was able to just toy with defenders at will.

He went from incredibly efficient to we hear about this injury and then he hasn’t had an efficient game since. Seems to be a simple cause and effect to me.

He did the same thing last year.

Huge part of the reason we had a good start.

Then he got hurt

Then he became average

All by December

Seems like a pattern to me. Basically, now I'm watching to see if a pattern that formed gets undone.