Briefing: April 22
Remembering the '99 Knicks, Kadeem Allen’s value, and more!
Good Morning,
Let’s catch up on what you might have missed over the weekend…
Greg Monroe is a fan of Mitchell Robinson. The Sixers center grew up in New Orleans 15 minutes from where Mitchell Robinson played in high school and even had a chance to see Mitch play there. He credits the Knicks for snatching up the big man in the second round: “Such a value he gave them at that pick. And he’s only getting better. That’s a good person to have as part of your young core. He’s the perfect kind of center for the NBA.’’ [Marc Berman]
Lance Thomas is impressed with Damyean Dotson’s leadership potential. Steve Mills shared this story with Steve Popper of Newsday, “How do we develop these guys into young basketball players and young men and leaders? We have a guy like Damyean Dotson. Lance Thomas said in his exit, ‘Hey, he’s going to be a leader on your team. When he talks the guys on the team all listen to him.’ Those are things we’re trying to develop because we want to find guys as we move into the next phase who can be leaders within the team and what they’re trying to do.”
The Pistons played their first playoff game in the city limits of Detroit since their decisive Game 5 showdown with the Knicks in 1984 at Joe Louis Arena. The game was an instant classic with Isiah Thomas nearly single-handedly beating the Knicks, scoring 16 points in the 94 seconds to force overtime. However, Bernard King was too much to handle. Despite battling multiple injuries and the flu, the Brooklyn native scored 44 points for his 4th straight 40-point game and led the Knicks to victory.
David Stern offered some rare quotes on James Dolan. Stern was commissioner of the NBA when Dolan became owner of the Knicks. In a recent New York Times article, he offered his insight into whether he thinks Dolan’s relationship with the fans hurts the franchise in attracting star players:
“I wish he had a longer fuse when it comes to the fans,” said David Stern, the commissioner of the N.B.A. from 1984 to 2014. “There are some overreactions, but it will have nothing to do with free agency or how the team is run. That all falls on Steve Mills and Scott Perry. Him having a short fuse at times will have zero bearing on player signings.”
…
“Jim has been on a crusade to get the best basketball people around him,” Stern said. “That’s what he thought he had with Phil and Isiah and Donnie, and what he thinks he has now with Steve and Scott.”
Zion Watch
Could the Knicks land Zion even if they pick behind the Suns? Sam Vecenie of The Athletic reports “sources around the NBA are buzzing that Morant is actually the player the Suns prefer to end up with.”
Don’t get too excited: Vecenie adds caution to the report, “But color me skeptical that the team would actually take him at No. 1.”
What are the Suns odds? With the new lottery rules in place, the Suns have the same odds as the Knicks to land the top pick (14%), as well as the same odds to land within the Top-4 (52.1%).
Watch out for Phoenix and Cleveland: Since both the Suns and Cavs have the same lottery odds as the Knicks in terms of landing a top pick (remember, the Knicks clinching the worst record in the NBA only prevents them from falling back relative to the other bottom-feeding teams). Which young player either Phoenix or Cleveland has their eyes on leading up to the lottery is obviously relevant to Knicks fans. Just don’t get too excited about either team passing on Zion.
Fun Graphic
Who would you take right now, Mitchell Robinson or Jarrett Allen?
via @BLACKMESSIAH
Some thoughts on Kadeem Allen
by Jonathan Macri
Now that the offseason is here and we've had some time to reflect, periodically in this space I'll spend some time looking back at the players that not only came to define this past Knicks' season, but more importantly, will likely help define what they do going forward.
With that as the backdrop, it might seem odd that the first name I'm choosing to look at is a two-way player who played more than twice as many games for the Westchester Knicks (39) than he did for the New York Knicks (19). That would be Kadeem Allen, the Fiz-proclaimed runt who seemed to have a positive impact on the court whenever he came onto it.
Allen was a numbers casualty in Boston after being drafted with the 53rd overall pick as a 24-year-old in the 2017 Draft. He only played 107 minutes for the Celtics as a rookie, and because Danny Ainge is too good at his job, was cut after the season.
Like many fans, I'd never heard of Allen when the Knicks picked him up, but with some quick help from the Google, I learned he had a rep as a strong defender. Over the course of this season, the eye test more than backed that up. The real surprise though was his offense.
As I was doing some research for a piece over the weekend, I came across this stat: according to Cleaning the Glass (which notably filters out garbage time), with Allen on the floor, the Knicks scored 8.5 more points per 100 possessions than usual. That improvement was in the 95th percentile of all NBA players last season, and was easily the best on the team.
Digging a little deeper, the improvement seemed in large part because the Knicks hit 6.5% more of their threes and a monumental 12.2% more of their long midrangers when Allen was on the court. On one hand, this seems like an unsustainable outlier (as does his own 3-pt conversion rate of 47.2%). On the other, it could speak to the fact that the ball moved around more frequently and effectively when he was in the game. New York had a 58.4 assist percentage during Allen's 416 minutes...not great, but in a different universe than their sludgy 52.5 figure on the year. Individually, his 27.6 assist percentage was in the 77th percentile among combo guards.
As I'll have in a piece coming out over the next few days, I think these positive numbers speak less about Allen as the second coming and more to the fact that the Knicks' offense is indeed capable of competency when run with someone who even remotely knows what they're doing. That doesn't mean he shouldn't figure in New York's future plans.
As many have pointed out, if their ploy for two max guys comes to fruition, the Knicks will need bodies for cheap. Allen is precisely that, as they have him locked up on a two-way deal through next season. It would be shocking if he weren't back. Based on what we saw this year, that's not a bad thing at all.
1999 Knicks: 20th Anniversary
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the 1999 Knicks, I thought it would be fun to look back on some key moments. As historical dates come up from their magical playoff run, we will remember them here.
We start, at the bottom. Everyone remembers Allan Houston’s running jumper and Larry Johnson’s 4-point play, but what is often overlooked is just how mediocre that ‘99 Knicks team was during the regular season.
For the first 42 games of their lockout-shortened campaign, nobody, and I mean, even if the most optimistic Jonathan Macri was writing about the Knicks back then, nobody, would have guessed they were on the cusp of making one of the most historic playoff runs in basketball history.
Let’s sum up where things stood over a crazy few days between April 21-April 22, 1999:
New York was 21-21, 10th in the Eastern Conference, the organization’s streak of 11 consecutive playoff appearances in peril.
Latrell Sprewell’s agent told the New York Post that Sprewell would demand a trade if he wasn’t made the starter and the team’s management issues weren’t resolved by the next season.
A story by New York magazine claimed Larry Johnson tried to expose himself in front of Knicks’ director of public relations, Lori Hamamoto, in the locker room.
Patrick Ewing looked old.
Allan Houston and Latrell Sprewell hadn’t developed any chemistry with each other, and they were running out of time to make things work.
All of this leading to Dave Checketts demoting General Manager Ernie Grunfeld, who was in a power struggle with Jeff Van Gundy over personnel decisions. The coach and GM often using the press to communicate their distrust of each other.
So when Patrick Ewing told reporters in the locker room after the Knicks fourth straight loss that dropped them to .500 with eight games remaining in the season, ''Once we make the playoffs, we'll be a team to be reckoned with,'' you can imagine the collective eye rolls.
Then everything changed.
In their first game following Grunfeld’s demotion, the Knicks nearly blew an 18-point lead at home, before Patrick Ewing (who had missed several key shots earlier in the season) saved the day with a running jumper in the waning seconds of the game.
Two days later, with Ewing out of the lineup due to lingering tendinitis in his Achilles' tendon, the Knicks stared down a 20-point, second half deficit in Miami and saved their season. A ferocious 17-4 run catapulted the Knicks to victory in one of the most important stretches of basketball leading to their ‘99 playoff run. The win gave the team a much-needed, mini two-game winning streak and built the momentum for them to win four of their final six games and enter the playoffs armed with the belief that they could beat Miami.
Remember when…
April 22, 2013: JR Smith named NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year after leading all NBA reserves in scoring with 18.1 points in 80 games off the bench.
April 22, 2011: Playoff basketball returns to the Garden after a seven-year layoff, but New York, without the services of injured Chauncey Billups (knee) and Amar’e Stoudemire (back spasms), falls to Boston 113-96 in Game 3 of the First Round, falling in a 3-0 hole.
April 22, 1994: Pat Riley records his 700th career victory in 125-85 win at Milwaukee. Riley becomes the 10th coach in NBA history to reach the milestone.
April 22, 1984: Bernard King scores 46 points for the second consecutive playoff game, leading the Knicks to a 120-113 victory over the Pistons at MSG and a 2-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference First Round.
April 22, 1973: In an MSG defining moment, Knicks roar back from a 17-point second-half deficit to defeat the Boston Celtics 117-110 (2OT) and take a 3-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference Finals. Walt Frazier leads the way with 37 points.
Thanks for reading, talk to you tomorrow!