Spending the weekend babysitting my goddaughter so we’re goin’ abridged recap version, five quick takeaways from the knicks vs wiz game 2 of the preseason:
1. Randle and Portis together was a disaster. Portis May have had rust but he was really bad at positioning himself to defend any player on the perimeter and Randle’s defensive y’all hasn’t translated on the court yet regardless of the kind words from Fiz this week.
2. Still not seeing much of an offensive system when we get slowed to half court offense. When the knicks get stops and push the pace, they look great. When Mitch and frank both pick up piss poor fouls simultaneously, it’s damn near guaranteed that the stops won’t be there because there aren’t many plus defenders on the team. It’s early, there’s low chemistry and Fiz spent the first quarter of last season adding some wrinkles...so this isn’t a reason to panic but it’s kinda glaring. The offense can come off like an isolation free for all at times and I think Payton is really hurt by the lack of off ball action since he’s not a scoring threat.
3. Trier is still a bucket and we’re gonna need that at times. With Knox and DSJ out, he was absolutely needed and even while I felt like we got a lot of glaringly bad aspects to his game (5 TO’s in 17 mins, lazy defensive moments in spite of 3 steals, choosing tough takes inside when a baseline cutter would have the dunk)...his scoring ability trumped it all. Dude is built like a sixth man scorer but needs a rotation that puts the ball in his hands which depends on who’s in and out of that rotation.
4. Youth development is a PROJECT! Mitch still feels like he’s not working at the speed he did last year but still picking up bad fouls like when he gets overzealous. Frank is more aggressive but it hasn’t translated to consistent finishing yet. Knox and DSJ didn’t play. Iggy was part of the worst spacing units on a night when spacing was pretty bad most of the way. RJ looks great but the efficiency is still a work in progress. All this to say though, young guys’ seasons tend to have more peaks and valleys. Prepare for the frustration and hope for the best.
5. The big line ups provide a ton of size to look for mismatches, but that gets broken if those units can’t knock down the three ball. The wizards pinched in and the Knicks really struggled. What changed when they went on some brief runs late in the third and throughout the fourth quarter was that Fiz went smaller. Randle or Portis as the only big worked out better last night than pairing two bigs. Fiz will probably need a combination or two that addresses teams closing the space or at minimum he should use more Taj in those instances. Taj just has to knock off the dumb offensive foul TO’s and he’s arguably be our most effective big whether the stat sheet reflects it or not imo.
I'm pretty sure I agreed with you though.
