The Come Down

After an exhilarating win on Jalen Brunson's shoulders in Phoenix, the Clippers painfully reminded the Knicks about their defensive issues.

Good morning all, and happy holidays. Hopefully you’re feeling the holiday spirit and aren’t too down after Saturday’s unpleasantness. Thankfully, the Knicks don’t have to wait long to get the unpleasant taste out of their mouths…

Game Night

TONIGHT: Knicks at Lakers, 10:30 pm

Injury Report: The big one for LA is Anthony Davis, who is being listed as questionable with hip and groin issues. Before missing the Lakers’ recent loss to San Antonio, AD had been on a tear, averaging 38.3 points over his previous three contests. LeBron James is also questionable with a calf injury, although he played in LA’s most recent game. My guess is that both go, but James seems like the safer bet.

Other than the big two, Christian Wood is questionable, Gabe Vincent remains out, and D’Angelo Russell and Jarred Vanderbilt are probable. Mitch remains sidelined for New York.

Halftime Zoom: Here’s the link for tonight.

What to watch for: LA’s half-court offense is a step below some of the powerhouses New York has been facing lately. Will it make a difference against a team that is reaching new defensive lows with each passing game?

Speak of the devil…

Game 24: Knicks 122, Clippers 144

Yikes.

In a New York minute…

Believe it or not, this was a game for about 21 minutes. Playing on the second night of a back to back after friday’s emotional roller coaster, the Knicks hung with LA despite the Clippers firing on all cylinders early. New York actually sniffed around playing real NBA defense for a stretch in the second quarter and took a 61-57 lead on a Brunson triple with 3:37 to go in the half, but that’s when the dam broke, and LA went on a 20-5 run before halftime. The defensive intensity only worsened in the third, and the Knicks were soon down 22. A 9-0 flurry cut the lead to 13 and forecasted signs of life, but Los Angeles continued to get whatever it wanted, pushed the lead past 25, and Thibs put in the scrubs midway through the fourth.

One Thing (yes, it’s the same thing)

During the second half of Saturday’s shellacking at the hands of the Clippers, Mike Breen spent a few minutes pontificating the unfortunate task that is defending modern NBA offenses.

Wiser words, I have never heard. The level of skill and shooting in the league today is not only unmatched compared to any other era, but it is to such a degree that the sport is almost unrecognizable from what we saw even a decade ago.

In the 2013-14 season, the Clippers had the top offense in the league, generating 111.3 points per 100 shot attempts. Today, that same rating would rank 25th. A decade ago, there were 14 players averaging at least six 3-point attempts per game. Today, there are over 50. 20 points per game used to be the hallmark of an All-Star level scorer. Now, it barely gets you on the first page of the leaderboard.

The result is that defenses no longer dictate the terms of engagement. It is offense vs offense, at least in the regular season, and whoever’s defense springs fewer leaks over the course of 48 minutes will be the victor.

On the bright side, the Knicks are no longer the team that brings a knife to a gun fight. Since their slow start in the opening two weeks, New York has the third ranked offense in the league over their last 18 games. Better yet, it’s no longer a smoke and mirrors show like last season, when they finished the year with that same ranking despite being 20th in efficiency. In these last 18 games, the Knicks have the fifth best effective field goal percentage league-wide. They are a genuine offensive powerhouse.

And yet, despite that fact, they now go into games feeling like they need to score 130 or more just to have a chance. A defense that ranked fifth as recently as the morning of December 1 has now plummeted to a tie for 15th, barely in the top half of NBA teams. The fall from grace has taken place over seven games this month, when the Knicks are giving up 128.3 points per 100 possessions, nearly 20 more points per 100 possessions than they were just two and a half weeks ago.

That number is not only dead last in the league over that time, but it is more than three points per 100 possessions worth than the 29th ranked Wizards, whose defense resembles something closer to bad performance art than competitive athletic engagement. It is staggering by any metric.

There are, of course, caveats. The competition has been fierce. Boston and Milwaukee both sport top-six offenses, while the Clippers have the league’s second best offense over their last nine games. The size of both Utah and Toronto presented a particularly poor matchup given New York’s guard glut.

Teams have also been nailing threes at prodigious rates. In the last six games, Knick opponents are hitting 44.1 percent of wide open triples and 40.5 percent of open threes. Both figures rank 8th highest of 30 teams in this stretch. While its true that New York is giving up the fifth highest frequency of open threes, they’ve also allowed the fifth lowest frequency of wide open ones during the same rough patch, so there’s reason to conclude they’ve been unlucky to a certain degree.

Still, using these caveats as an excuse for allowing nearly 900 points in their last seven games falls on the deafest of ears to anyone who has had the misfortune of watching. There is something fundamentally broken about New York’s defense.

Worse yet, there are no clear answers on the horizon.

Going back to my earlier analogy about NBA defenses needing to plug as many leaks as possible, Mitchell Robinson was an octopus, and his absence is causing the ship to sink. The Knicks were the best defensive rebounding team in the league through 18 games, but are second to last this month. They’re also second to last in December at forcing turnovers, which they ranked ninth in through the end of November.

Both are areas that Robinson made all the difference, both in his ability to grab boards at both ends and his immense growth as a pick and roll ball handler who could routinely guard two men at once. Jericho Sims, his replacement in the starting five, was so overmatched by the middle of Saturday night’s game that he might as well have pulled a white hankie out of his pocket and waived it around before mercifully being pulled:

Looking at the numbers for the Mitch-less starting five, it’s easy to place a lot of blame on Sims, who has looked overmatched in four starts. The numbers sort of back that up, as the Knicks are allowing a laughable 142.7 points per 100 in 114 possessions with the current starters.

Then again, it’s not like they’ve done better with Robinson or Hartenstein in the same spot, albeit on limited sample sizes:

The DiVincenzo + Brunson/Randle/Barrett groups have been gangbusters on offense, but they haven’t stopped a traffic cone on the other end.

So should we pin this breakdown on Donte? I don’t see how we can, not when he was part of a backup brigade (along with IQ, Hart, RJ and Hartenstein) that sported a stingy 107.5 defensive rating in 244 possessions. He functioned fine in that unit, when he was in a role that suited his talents. That’s not the case now, not since he replaced Quentin Grimes as the de facto top defensive guard in the first five.

Swapping him back to the bench for Grimes is one of any number of possible solutions. After all, Mitch was healthy when that swap was originally made, so there’s a built in excuse for reverting form so fast. But would the payoff be worth the trade off of diminished offense? DiVincenzo has fit like a glove on offense, and his four early threes were the biggest reason Saturday’s game didn’t reach blowout status until the second half.

Putting Josh Hart in the first unit is another possibility, especially since Hart has the best on/off defensive differential on the team at minus-9.4 points per 100 possessions. That’s a bigger discrepancy then the more ballyhooed Quickley, with whom the Knicks give up 6.4 fewer points per 100 when he plays. Both numbers are strong, and jive with the eye test.

The difference is that Quick is the far stronger individual offensive player and floor spacer. Hart, by contrast, brings more size for the most difficult one on one matchups. New York’s defense is at its best when both guys share the court - the pairing has a robust 108.9 defensive rating in over 900 non-garbage time possessions this season - but it’s tough to find ample minutes together when neither player starts.

Hart as a starter seems like a dead end given the spacing issues that exist when he plays alongside three other shooters who defenses don’t respect from long range.

That leaves Quickley, whose playing time has once again become a cause célèbre amongst many in the fan base. He has hardly played this season with the Brunson/Barrett/Randle trio. It’s a clear sign that Thibodeau wants to spread the wealth by always having at least two of those four on the floor at the same time, which is a virtual impossibility if you start all four together. For as obvious a solution as it is to find a few more minutes for Quick in each half, this seems unlikely to meaningfully move the needle given the fundamental issues plaguing New York’s defense.

Perhaps excising the struggling Sims from the starting unit in favor of Hartenstein or Taj is the answer, but this too seems like putting a band aide on a gaping wound.

The reality is that Thibodeau is left picking between various cosmetic and ultimately trivial alterations as long as the three tentpoles remain the same. As a trio, Jalen, Julius and RJ have been a disaster on defense from the first moment they first shared the court last fall. Those three had a 6th percentile defensive rating in nearly 3000 possessions together last season and are in the 25th percentile now with a defensive rating that would be in the bottom-five league wide - and that includes the 463 possessions with Robinson and Grimes, when the starting five defended at a top-five rate.

But pointing this out doesn’t do much good. We know Brunson and Randle aren’t leaving the first five, and Barrett’s defense, while not on the level of Quickley, Hart or Grimes, is easily the strongest of the three. RJ also gets a quick hook as it is, so it’s hard to envision staggering those three even more than Thibs already does.

Which brings us back to square one: Mitchell Robinson kept this thing afloat with what was turning into an All-Defense campaign - a case made even stronger by what has happened since he went down.

For as long as he is out, this will require triage at its finest. There are no obvious answers and no easy lineup changes to be made.

More than anything, it’s time for everyone to look in the mirror and decide how they want this season to go. Every NBA player possesses the ability to play at least passable defense when they’re fully engaged and give max effort.

That’s a lot to ask for offensive stars who already have to carry a large load, but given the current predicament, they may not have a choice.

Play of the Day

I did it guys…I found a strong defensive possession from the Clipper game:

Positioning, rotations, activity, awareness. It ain’t that complicated, boys.

💫 Stars of the Weekend 💫

I’ve vacillated between breaking down multi-game weekends into two different “Stars” sections or combining them as one. Today I’m splitting the baby, doling out one and two stars apiece for Suns and Clippers games but rewarding Jalen Brunson with the top prize for the weekend as a whole. It’s the least I can do after the single most impressive performance I’ve seen from a Knick in my adult life.

⭐️ (PHX) Quentin Grimes: Hit two of the three 3-pointers that flipped the momentum early on in the fourth quarter before Brunson ever checked back into the game. Also played exceptional defense on Devin Booker throughout much of the second half. My guess is that he finds his way back into the starting lineup before too long.

⭐️ (LAC) Immanuel Quickley: Could just as easily have gotten a star for the Suns game (he hit the third 3-pointer in the early fourth quarter run I mentioned above, and was strong enough overall that Thibs left him in until garbage time), but I’m giving him props for his performance in LA instead. It’s not easy to play 19 minutes in a game your team once trailed by 32 and wind up with a plus-3 in the +/- column, but IQ pulled it off. Good things almost always happen when he’s on the floor.

Thibodeau has many conflicting masters to serve as he continues to figure out the best rotation in Robinson’s absence, but it’s starting to feel like getting Quickley on the court more needs to move towards the top of the list.

⭐️ ⭐️ (LAC) Donte DiVincenzo: The best Knick on Saturday night simply by virtue of lighting it up when the game was still in question. DDV finished with 18 points on eight shots, and perhaps more importantly, repeatedly spoke afterwards of his team needing to put forth more effort if it wants to stay afloat defensively. He may not be what a Mitch-less starting five needs at the moment, but his energy level can never be questioned.

⭐️ ⭐️ (PHX) RJ Barrett: Maybe, just maybe, we’re exiting the wilderness.

After carrying a 39.0 effective field goal percentage in his first eight games after sitting for a week with migraines, RJ has now topped a 53.0 eFG% in four of his last five contests (we’ll conveniently forget about the disaster in Utah). Six of his 21 points on Friday night came during the pivotal early fourth quarter push. He finished with almost as many made free throws (eight, in eight tries) as he did field goal attempts (10), which is a great sign moving forward. He was less efficient on Saturday night but had several impressive finishes at and around the basket.

And how about the aggression going up and grabbing this offensive board in the fourth quarter against the Suns:

More of this, please.

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ Jalen Brunson: If you haven’t already watched it and need a pick-me-up on this Monday morning, check out DJ Zullo’s thread on Brunson’s performance. Better than anything you’ll get on Christmas.

While we didn’t realize until the second half that this was going to be one of those nights, we knew damn well early on that Brunson was hell-bent on doing whatever it took to win.

Three of his career high five steals came in the first nine minutes, almost like he was sick and tired of hearing how he was being picked on defensively, and needed to take matters into his own hands.

Watching him grab his own miss and then get a basket by weaving through the entire Suns’ front-court may have been my favorite of his 17 made shots:

As this team awaits at least eight more weeks without Mitchell Robinson, the focus will continue to be on how they can stay afloat defensively. As it should.

But the reality is that stretches like this, when perfection is a mirage and simple competence can seem like a lofty goal, are why you have stars. They can tilt the balance by themselves, and make the impossible seem possible.

The Knicks needed a miracle on Friday night. Jalen Brunson gave it to them.

Tip-Ins (Saturday)…

🏀 Josh Hart was ejected after just eight minutes on Saturday night, apparently after saying something he shouldn’t have to the ref. With no Hart for the second half, Deuce McBride got some run with the second unit before re-entering for garbage time.

🏀 Speaking of “fuck you’s” to the refs, it was hard to read this game any other way, at least where the Knicks were concerned. The Clippers took 30 free throws in the first half, which was a high for any NBA team in any half this season. After halftime, it seemed apparent that New York threw their hands up in silent protest, figuring that if any remotely aggressive defense was going to be called a foul, they might as well just stop defending altogether. As such, LA attempted just four free throws in the third and fourth quarters combined.

🏀 After committing two turnovers in the first 21 minutes, New York gave it away twice in 20 seconds, spurring the Clipper run that wound up turning the game before halftime.

Tip-Ins (Friday)…

🏀 After arguably losing the Jazz game at the line on Wednesday, New York converted 24-of-28 free throw attempts in Phoenix. They also made 23-of-26 from the line on Saturday night, so hopefully their free throw woes are behind them.

🏀 It didn’t end up mattering, but after a fantastic start to the game, Julius Randle had an extended brain fart to close the first half. He failed to close out on Kevin Freaking Durant behind the arc not once, not twice, but three times. KD sank triples on all three attempts as it looked like the game was turning in Phoenix’s favor. To his credit, Randle regained his composure down the stretch, and even came up with a key block midway through the fourth as New York was trying to put the game away.

🏀 It was not, however, the block of the game, which occurred on the very next possession courtesy of a man who has no regard for life and limb:

Final Thought

I wrote in the immediate aftermath of the Robinson injury that going .500 in his absence was a reasonable goal. So far, so good, even if it took an all-time performance to keep the ledger at even. The schedule doesn’t get any easier - just eight of the next 30 opponents are outside of the top 10 in their respective conference, and two of those eight are the Grizzlies, who will have Ja Morant back - but nobody ever said it was going to be easy.

Gut check time continues for the Knicks.

🏀

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”