Bargnani May Come Off Bench For Knicks

Pugz

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show me a team thats in the playoffs picture on paper that didnt improve.

raptors, cavs, pistons, bobcats, and the wizards all got better. celtics, magic, and hawks got worse. more teams out of the playoffs last season got better, a lot better.

its going to be a lot harder for them to complete.

world peace isnt an upgrade, udrih isnt an upgrade, aldrich is but only because he'll play and camby didnt, bargs could be help off the bench.

they didnt decline but they didnt improve. and jr will feel the need to shoot and shoot a lot, melo will be scoring a lot of empty points too.
 

Giantmetfan07

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i dont even like world peace and I think he's an upgrade. 
 
And if the Knicks are in the playoff picture then that first sentence is incorrect anyway. 
 

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he brings such up and down offense and you cant say he brings great defense anymore, it's hardly average. hes tough, that's it, not even mentally tough lol.

they arent any worse, but their season wont be the same.
 

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GMF1991 said:
i dont even like world peace and I think he's an upgrade. 
 
And if the Knicks are in the playoff picture then that first sentence is incorrect anyway. 
not if they didnt improve, and they didnt.
 

Giantmetfan07

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show me a team thats in the playoffs picture on paper that didnt improve. 
 
 
not if they didnt improve, and they didnt. 
 
So, if the knicks didn't improve, then what you're telling me is they're not even in the playoff picture? That's quite possibly the craziest thing I've heard this year. 
 

Pugz

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no, they are, but theyre not improved and their seeding wont be as high.
 

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the craziest thing you heard was nola saying 36 wins and no playoffs, anyways, chump :p
 

Giantmetfan07

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and im fine with that. i have no expectation of them being a 2 or 3 seed. All im saying is you said every playoff team on paper improved, yet the knicks are a playoff team and ur saying they didn't improve. It's just a statement that's incorrect. 
 
Honestly though, im tired. i give up. i'll just let the Knicks do their thing, arguing about it won't do me any good. 
 

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now youre just nitpicking a statement i worded wrong, the teams i listed wouldve shown i meant teams on the outs last season.

four teams got better while three in the playoffs last season got worse.
 

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Papa Pugz said:
now youre just nitpicking a statement i worded wrong, the teams i listed wouldve shown i meant teams on the outs last season.

four teams got better while three in the playoffs last season got worse.
 
well that's what I do when I'm playing a superior opponent. 
 

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The Knicks played to about the best of their abilities last season. They moved on from Stoudemire, they surrounded Melo with a load of shooters who gave him a lot more room to operate than he has had in years, they surrounded him with a couple different ball movers that could get him the ball in these spots, plus find these open shooters when they were open. And most importantly, it gave Melo the chance to slide over and play the majority of his minutes (76%) at the four instead of the three, which helped him offensively and is probably a more natural fit for him defensively.

What came of these things? The Knicks best season in a decade and a half, a scoring title for Melo (28.7 ppg, second highest total of his career), and the best season of his career.

Problem is, the Knicks may already be pulling the plug on Melo at the 4 because of Bargnani and and Stoudemire. Those two guys are injury prone, but so is Tyson Chandler who the Knicks will need this season if they hope to even replicate the success they had last season for a stretch of games. It's also worth noting that the Knicks were only 16-13 in the games Amare played last season. After saying all this, like I and Rob said, nearly every team that the Knicks will match up against in the East got better. The Nets added KG, Pierce, and AK47. Bulls got Rose back (who looks awesome), hopefully Deng is healthy, and they addressed possibly their biggest weakness with bringing in Mike Dunleavy who shot 43% from deep last season. Detroit obviously got better, Washington got better, Toronto should be better, the Pacers should get better with the addition of Scola plus their young players improving.

The Knicks resigned JR Smith, who is suspended the first five games, and it needs to be asked. What kind of player will he come back as after major knee surgery? Then they go out and make the move for Bargnani, which made no sense at the time and I think even less of now. I read a great quote, "Bargnani offers nothing of what the Knicks need and everything they should avoid." Bargnani is yet another injury prone big who doesn't pretend to play defense or rebound, and takes terrible shots. He also doesn't get to the ft line, and I guess you could assume he's supposed to kind of supposed to replace Novak as a stretch big, but he is far from that shooting just 30.6% from three last season which was actually an improvement from 29.6% the year before. The Knicks gave up a first round pick, two second rounders, and Novak for this guy. A guy Toronto couldn't trade before Ujiri got there and was thought of as an amnesty candidate. This addition alone makes the Knicks worse.

World Peace is kind of a "meh" pickup because he's not the elite defender he once was and he's another guy who won't space the floor and make life easier for Melo, Smith, etc. Udrih is a solid pickup, but I'm not entirely sure where he fits. And he's the same offensively as World Peace.

Last season the Knicks were 17th in points per possession defensively, and they really didn't do much to improve that. The addition of Bargnani alone will make them worse. They couldn't defend the pick and roll, so they bring in World Peace who can't guard the pick and roll (47% shooting, 43% from three, bottom 45% of the league in defending it), and Udrih who is better, but still not above average.

The Knicks main objective offensively was simple and effective. Take Melo away from the perimeter and put him more in the midrange elbow area, surround him with shooters and a someone like Tyson Chandler manning the paint. The shooters had space to operate, the ball handler and big played the pick and roll up top, and Melo did what he did, benefiting from the players surrounding him. During the offseason, the Knicks lost Kidd, Novak, and Copeland (Kidd made 114 threes last season, Novak shot 43% from three, and Copeland shot 42%) and replaced them with Udrih (34 threes), Bargnani (31%), and World Peace (34%). The Knicks offense will be much more crowded this year, will struggle to welcome Amare and Bargnani too it, and will turn the ball over much more than they did last season. The Knicks offense will look more like the 2011-2012 Knicks offense, which was 19th in the league. So take a below average offense, below average defense, and a number of Eastern Conference teams that got better?


the craziest thing you heard was nola saying 36 wins and no playoffs, anyways, chump
They'll make the playoffs, just not convincibly. Like I said, 37-39 wins would be my projection, but the highest as the team currently is? Probably low 40's.
 

Giantmetfan07

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Okay, I'll admit when I'm wrong. But I will ask one thing:
 
would the change of coaches have any affect on World Peace? Going from a team coached by D'Antoni whose last thought is Defense to a team coached by Woodson whose first priority is defense?
 
Other than that I agree with most of what you say. And i don't doubt how many 3s Kidd hit last year, my problem was his inconsistency late in the year and in the playoffs coupled with injuries. 
 

jonathanlambert33

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Okay, I'll admit when I'm wrong. But I will ask one thing:
 
would the change of coaches have any affect on World Peace? Going from a team coached by D'Antoni whose last thought is Defense to a team coached by Woodson whose first priority is defense?
 
Other than that I agree with most of what you say. And i don't doubt how many 3s Kidd hit last year, my problem was his inconsistency late in the year and in the playoffs coupled with injuries.
Personally I don't really think it would, I want to say he's going into his 15th or 16th year in the league, he's just up there in age and his effectiveness has been on this path for a while now. But there are also things non basketball related that he could bring to the team, his experience, demeanor, etc.

But hey, maybe I'm wrong. I've been wrong a hundred times before, and this definitely wouldn't be the last time either.
 

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I like Bargnani off the bench, just not sure I'm down with MWP starting.
 

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