This guy is a horrible leader and commissioner.
{~}Official 2023/2024 NBA Thread - 2024 Summer League, USA Hoops
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This guy is a horrible leader and commissioner.
I actually dont think you get it all. If you did you probably wouldnt be so dismissive of something we've never seen done before in history.
And FYI- hes also probably the best 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15 year player as well. Not to mention best 18 year old and 19 year old player.
Bol Bol being listening to Shaq too much. He actually thinks hes good as Wemby.
And Utah
Tell dat fuckin dick sucker King Faggot and that team jumping pussy punk pussy Beeiii to keep my name out their fuckin mouths. You wanna talk about quiet? PUNK PUSSY BEEIII AIN'T BEEN IN THE NFL THREAD SINCE BRADY LEFT THE PATRIOTS. THE ULTIMATE FORUM OF BITCH MADE THIS BOARD HAS EVER SEEN. Now, let Punk Pussy Beeiii and faggot ass King Dickhead jerk each other off in peace. Two of the biggest pieces of shit in the history of pieces of shit!!!!Some of us in Philly still have hope that our 2nd Rounders might still make it at least that far this year
Bron has every "youngest to" record and every "oldest to" record. His haters say he's just accumulated numbers cuz he's played a long time. He still not even top 5 all time in games played.
Vogel is a hoe
If Bol Bol had work ethic, this would’ve been an elite fucking matchup for years to come but instead it will be “What is vs What Could’ve Been”
Poole is weird player. Sometimes he looks all world and sometimes he looks like the Monstars stole his powers.
Josh Hart Compares Mikal Bridges Being On The Nets To A SpongeBob Meme
Josh Hart has some thoughts on Mikal Bridges being in a different borough than himself, Jalen Brunson, and Donte DiVincenzo.
uproxx.com
Kristian Winfield: Knicks have all the culture the Nets ever wanted as divide grows between teams
Four summers ago, the Nets pulled off the clean sweep, signing superstars Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving in the 2019 offseason while the Knicks modestly signed Julius Randle to a three-year deal.
www.nydailynews.com
Fuck Vogel
Oh hell... Wizards win = $2.50 Big Mac today
You'd think I was 300 pounds from this recent exchange:
"I usually learn of a Wizards win when I get on the app,"
"The ESPN app? The NBA app?"
"No. The McDonald's app."
She's Up! Tristan Thompson Reportedly Ordered To Pay Back Child Support To Maralee Nichols
NBA player Tristan Thompson was ordered to pay back child support to Maralee Nichols for their two-year-old son Theo.
theshaderoom.com
Tristan Thompson 'ordered to pay $57k child support in back pay to Maralee'
TRISTAN Thompson is having to play catch up after not paying child support to Maralee Nichols for their young son, The U.S. Sun can exclusively reveal. The Cleveland Cavaliers player fathered littl…
www.the-sun.com
@largebillsonlyplease @4 Dimensional @ansatsusha_gouki @REDLINE
theathletic.com
Mar 22, 2024
119
A midseason mystery has developed this NBA season. Suddenly, scoring is down. Way down.
After spending the bulk of the season at historically high levels, scoring has declined since the beginning of February. Through Jan. 21, teams were averaging 115.6 points per game (just under 231.2 total points per game). That would be the sixth-highest ever, and highest since 1969-70 when the league was playing about 20 possessions per game faster than it is today.
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From Feb. 1 to March 17, that had dropped to 112.8 (225.5 points total). Even with the decrease, the league still has the highest points per possession on record (going back to 1972-73 per Basketball-Reference.com) by around 0.7 points/100 as compared to last season, and more than 3.2 points/100 higher than the third-most efficient season — 2020-21.
Still, the decline is doubly unusual because scoring almost always increases as a season progresses, with perhaps a slight dip around the trade deadline and All-Star break:
Data compiled by Seth Partnow from NBA.com
The main culprit? Free throws, or lack thereof. The average game through Jan. 31 saw the teams combine for 45.6 free-throw attempts/48 minutes. From Feb. 1 through March 17, that rate has declined to 40.1. Assuming those missing free throws would have been converted at league average rates, that directly accounts for close to 1.7 of the 5.7 points per game decline in overall scoring.
To slightly oversimplify, a possession ending in two FTA is worth around 1.6 points compared to a league-average possession being worth just over 1.1.
There has been reporting and rampant speculation about the degree to which league officials have or have not directed officials to alter the way they call games. I’m not able to adjudicate what forces are behind the change; rather, I want to illuminate the facts — which ultimately lead me to suspect that a small change in officiating has had wide-ranging effects on the game.
I should acknowledge up front that the stats are suggestive of a change in officiating but fall short of proof. While I believe there has been an observable difference, I’m reluctant to lean too heavily on that observation, especially considering the change itself has been somewhat small, on the order of one fewer shooting foul per team per game.
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Both sources have dropped. Through January, NBA games averaged just under 20.5 shooting fouls called/48 minutes. From Feb. 1 to March 17 , this had dropped to just under 18.6/48.
Interestingly, the decline in “bonus” free-throw attempts is even larger on a percentage basis, the league having dropped from around 2.75 bonus foul trips (and thus 5.5 FTA) per 48 to a little more than 2.0 since the start of February. We can start to see some of the knock on effects of a more permissive game flow here, as each team is spending around one minute and 40 seconds less game time with the opponent in the penalty.
One such suggestion is that with noted foul drawers such as Joel Embiid and Trae Young sidelined for extended periods, it is natural we should see fewer fouls being drawn. There is some truth here.
If individual free-throw attempt rates had stayed constant before and after Jan. 31, around 17 percent of the decrease in overall attempts can be attributed to this factor. To put it another way, the NBA as a whole has attempted around 1,600 fewer total free throws since Feb. 1 than if attempt rates had stayed at the through-January mark. Around 275 of those “missing” attempts are a result of the change in who is on the floor.
At least at first pass. I think the above number is probably an overcount to some degree. When high-usage/high-foul draw rate players are absent, their scoring attempts don’t simply vanish. Rather, they are taken up by teammates who might draw fouls at a lower rate than an injured star, but will still draw some fouls. Even the team most affected by player absences, the 76ers, have seen their FTA/G decrease by nearly 8.8 FTA/G. Embiid was averaging 11.9 FTA/G on his own, so clearly there is some degree of replacement level free-throw production happening. Still, even accounting for that, I’m comfortable positing that about 12-15 percent of the leaguewide decrease is simply certain players being out.
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Drops in either transition play opportunities or offensive rebounding could also explain some of the free-throw decline, as fast breaks and putbacks tend to result in free throws at a higher rate than do offensive chances overall.
According to Cleaning the Glass, there has been a modest decrease in transition play, with 15.1 percent of scoring attempts coming in transition through January, but only 14.8 percent since. Similarly, there has been a slight decrease in offensive rebounding league wide, 24.6 percent through Jan. 31 compared to 23.8 percent in the ensuing month-and-a-half. While these changes are in the right direction to cause a reduction in free-throw attempt rates, the size of them aren’t nearly sufficient to explain the bulk of the drop we’ve seen.
Fouls drawn by shot location
Across 2-point territory, the largest overall drop has come in “floater range” — the non-restricted area portion of the paint. Matched with the decline in foul rates on drives, this is again suggestive of, without directly proving, a reinterpretation of “defensive freedom of movement.”
Through Jan. 31, fouls had been whistled in favor of the offensive player on just under 7.5 percent of events classified as “drives” by NBA.com tracking data. Since Feb. 1, that rate has declined to just above 6.5 percent. As with overall free-throw attempts, who is doing the driving tells part of the story. Embiid and Young are both high-volume drivers who have drawn fouls at above average rates and have either barely played (Young) or not appeared at all (Embiid) from February on.
If foul rates on drives had stayed constant, there would have been about 250 more fouls called since Feb. 1. Around 30 of that 250, or 12 percent of the decrease, can be attributed to the identity of the average driver. This is probably a better estimate of how much of the decline in free-throw attempts is the result of injured and/or otherwise absent star players than the 17 percent I referenced earlier.
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The bulk of the rest results from a slightly slower pace of play. According to data collated by Mike Beuoy of Inpredictable.com, the average possession featuring free throws is around three seconds shorter than a possession where no free throws are attempted. On its own, this would only produce a small impact on overall pace, as we’re talking about maybe 10 seconds per game total.
However, Beuoy has also found that both free-throw and non-free-throw possessions are lasting slightly longer after Feb. 1 than they were through the end of January, making the average possession in each group around .15 seconds longer on average. That might not seem like much, but over a full game, the combination of a couple fewer free-throw possessions with the lengthening of possessions of all types equates to a pace of play of around two fewer possessions per 48 minutes for each team, which roughly accounts for the remaining four points per game of the offensive decline.
I’d suggest the longer possessions themselves illustrate how a slightly reduced foul rate can help defenses force offenses to go a little deeper into possessions, in effect slowing the entire pace of the game in a way that might not be perceptible to the naked eye, but shows up once we zoom out a little.
Milwaukee’s Damian Lillard has seen his free-throw attempts drop in the last few weeks. (Troy Taormina / USA Today)
Further, many of the individual changes in free-throw attempt rates have much more to do with changing circumstances than with any league-wide trends.
For example, Grant Williams has seen one of the largest increases in free-throw attempts, but he also has had the ball in his hands substantially more often in Charlotte (10.0 percent time of possession) than he did in Dallas (a paltry 6.1 percent) playing alongside the extremely ball dominant Luka Dončić. Williams’ offensive role has become commensurately larger as well (19.9 usage in Charlotte compared to 13.8 in Dallas).
On the other side of the ledger, Spencer Dinwiddie has unsurprisingly seen the ball far less after moving from Brooklyn to orbiting around LeBron James in the Lakers’ solar system, with time of possession percentage declining from 29.9 percent to 11.2 percent. He has seen a steep decrease in foul drawing as well.
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That said, the rainy day officiating we’re seeing now has impacted players differently.
Of the 149 players who played at least 800 minutes through Jan. 31 and 400 from Feb. 1 to March 17, 91 have seen a per-game decline in free-throw attempts, while 98 have seen a per-minute decline. There are a few players who have actually seen their FT rate tick upwards, which is to be expected. Most notably, DeMar DeRozan is taking nearly 3.1 more free-throw attempts per game since Feb. 1 than he did through January. Williams and Kelly Oubre, a recipient of a lot of Embiid’s scoring chances, have also seen large increases.
On the downside, the two most affected players have been Damian Lillard and Stephen Curry, each down about three free-throw attempts per game. They are followed by Dinwiddie, Bam Adebayo and De’Aaron Fox, all of whom have seen a decrease of more than two attempts per game. There doesn’t appear to be an obvious pattern in terms of which players have seen the largest declines. Among players with some degree of a rep for foul baiting, James Harden, Jalen Brunson and Immanuel Quickley have all seen slight increases in free-throw attempts, while Dončić and Austin Reaves have dropped off by 1.6 free-throw attempts per game and 1.0 free-throw attempts per game, respectively.
First, as mentioned previously, the data taken as a whole is quite suggestive of some modification in how certain situations have been officiated over the last several weeks. This has naturally affected certain players and teams more than others, perhaps in ways we will continue to see shake out over the remaining regular season into the playoffs.
The second bit is perhaps more interesting. The complexity of the overall system means that a relatively minor change — essentially a single shooting foul per team per game — has had an outsized impact, with the overall decline in scoring multiple times larger than simply the extra free throws at issue.
As a final note, we’ve seen “points of emphasis” have impacts over the short term before. Often these occur at the beginning of a season, where a certain violation or other call is made at elevated rates for a few weeks before settling back to historical trends. The foul dip and related scoring decline has already lasted longer than those situations have tended to, as the effect usually fades after around a month.
It remains to be seen if it does persist for the rest of the regular season and, if so
Why is scoring down recently in the NBA? A deep dive into the numbers behind the decline
After spending the bulk of the season at historic levels, scoring has declined since Feb. 1 and a lot of that starts at the free-throw line.
theathletic.com
Why is scoring down recently in the NBA? A deep dive into the numbers behind the decline
Seth PartnowMar 22, 2024
119
A midseason mystery has developed this NBA season. Suddenly, scoring is down. Way down.
After spending the bulk of the season at historically high levels, scoring has declined since the beginning of February. Through Jan. 21, teams were averaging 115.6 points per game (just under 231.2 total points per game). That would be the sixth-highest ever, and highest since 1969-70 when the league was playing about 20 possessions per game faster than it is today.
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From Feb. 1 to March 17, that had dropped to 112.8 (225.5 points total). Even with the decrease, the league still has the highest points per possession on record (going back to 1972-73 per Basketball-Reference.com) by around 0.7 points/100 as compared to last season, and more than 3.2 points/100 higher than the third-most efficient season — 2020-21.
Still, the decline is doubly unusual because scoring almost always increases as a season progresses, with perhaps a slight dip around the trade deadline and All-Star break:
Data compiled by Seth Partnow from NBA.com
The main culprit? Free throws, or lack thereof. The average game through Jan. 31 saw the teams combine for 45.6 free-throw attempts/48 minutes. From Feb. 1 through March 17, that rate has declined to 40.1. Assuming those missing free throws would have been converted at league average rates, that directly accounts for close to 1.7 of the 5.7 points per game decline in overall scoring.
To slightly oversimplify, a possession ending in two FTA is worth around 1.6 points compared to a league-average possession being worth just over 1.1.
There has been reporting and rampant speculation about the degree to which league officials have or have not directed officials to alter the way they call games. I’m not able to adjudicate what forces are behind the change; rather, I want to illuminate the facts — which ultimately lead me to suspect that a small change in officiating has had wide-ranging effects on the game.
I should acknowledge up front that the stats are suggestive of a change in officiating but fall short of proof. While I believe there has been an observable difference, I’m reluctant to lean too heavily on that observation, especially considering the change itself has been somewhat small, on the order of one fewer shooting foul per team per game.
Fewer free throws overall
So where has this decline in free-throw attempts occurred? Though there has been a drop in technical free throws of all types — both in the player and of the team/defensive 3-seconds varieties — the vast majority of NBA freebies come from either shooting fouls or team fouls committed while in the bonus.ADVERTISEMENT
Both sources have dropped. Through January, NBA games averaged just under 20.5 shooting fouls called/48 minutes. From Feb. 1 to March 17 , this had dropped to just under 18.6/48.
Interestingly, the decline in “bonus” free-throw attempts is even larger on a percentage basis, the league having dropped from around 2.75 bonus foul trips (and thus 5.5 FTA) per 48 to a little more than 2.0 since the start of February. We can start to see some of the knock on effects of a more permissive game flow here, as each team is spending around one minute and 40 seconds less game time with the opponent in the penalty.
But why? Alternative explanations
As noted, the decline in free throws is suggestive in its own right, but there are a number of possible factors that could cause a decline in foul rates, either in whole or at least in part that have little to do with officiating, per se.One such suggestion is that with noted foul drawers such as Joel Embiid and Trae Young sidelined for extended periods, it is natural we should see fewer fouls being drawn. There is some truth here.
If individual free-throw attempt rates had stayed constant before and after Jan. 31, around 17 percent of the decrease in overall attempts can be attributed to this factor. To put it another way, the NBA as a whole has attempted around 1,600 fewer total free throws since Feb. 1 than if attempt rates had stayed at the through-January mark. Around 275 of those “missing” attempts are a result of the change in who is on the floor.
At least at first pass. I think the above number is probably an overcount to some degree. When high-usage/high-foul draw rate players are absent, their scoring attempts don’t simply vanish. Rather, they are taken up by teammates who might draw fouls at a lower rate than an injured star, but will still draw some fouls. Even the team most affected by player absences, the 76ers, have seen their FTA/G decrease by nearly 8.8 FTA/G. Embiid was averaging 11.9 FTA/G on his own, so clearly there is some degree of replacement level free-throw production happening. Still, even accounting for that, I’m comfortable positing that about 12-15 percent of the leaguewide decrease is simply certain players being out.
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Drops in either transition play opportunities or offensive rebounding could also explain some of the free-throw decline, as fast breaks and putbacks tend to result in free throws at a higher rate than do offensive chances overall.
According to Cleaning the Glass, there has been a modest decrease in transition play, with 15.1 percent of scoring attempts coming in transition through January, but only 14.8 percent since. Similarly, there has been a slight decrease in offensive rebounding league wide, 24.6 percent through Jan. 31 compared to 23.8 percent in the ensuing month-and-a-half. While these changes are in the right direction to cause a reduction in free-throw attempt rates, the size of them aren’t nearly sufficient to explain the bulk of the drop we’ve seen.
Where are the missing free throws?
As noted above, around two-thirds of the decline in free-throw attempts are the result of a decrease in shooting fouls. This decrease is spread fairly evenly across shot zones, at least those inside the arc. Foul-draw rates on above the break 3s have only declined modestly, while the low base rate of fouls called on corner 3s makes the percentage change seem much more extreme than it is — the nearly 30 percent decline equates to around five fewer foul calls in total since the turn of February.Fouls drawn by shot location
| ZONE ▼ | BEFORE FEB 1 | POST FEB 1 | DECLINE |
|---|---|---|---|
| Restricted area | 16.10% | 14.91% | 7.40% |
| Midrange | 7.48% | 6.68% | 10.60% |
| In the paint (non-RA) | 20.48% | 18.68% | 8.80% |
| Above-the-break 3 | 1.05% | 1.01% | 3.60% |
| Corner 3 | 0.69% | 0.48% | 29.60% |
Through Jan. 31, fouls had been whistled in favor of the offensive player on just under 7.5 percent of events classified as “drives” by NBA.com tracking data. Since Feb. 1, that rate has declined to just above 6.5 percent. As with overall free-throw attempts, who is doing the driving tells part of the story. Embiid and Young are both high-volume drivers who have drawn fouls at above average rates and have either barely played (Young) or not appeared at all (Embiid) from February on.
If foul rates on drives had stayed constant, there would have been about 250 more fouls called since Feb. 1. Around 30 of that 250, or 12 percent of the decrease, can be attributed to the identity of the average driver. This is probably a better estimate of how much of the decline in free-throw attempts is the result of injured and/or otherwise absent star players than the 17 percent I referenced earlier.
Second-order effects
Around a third of the decline in per game scoring is directly attributable to fewer free throws being awarded.ADVERTISEMENT
The bulk of the rest results from a slightly slower pace of play. According to data collated by Mike Beuoy of Inpredictable.com, the average possession featuring free throws is around three seconds shorter than a possession where no free throws are attempted. On its own, this would only produce a small impact on overall pace, as we’re talking about maybe 10 seconds per game total.
However, Beuoy has also found that both free-throw and non-free-throw possessions are lasting slightly longer after Feb. 1 than they were through the end of January, making the average possession in each group around .15 seconds longer on average. That might not seem like much, but over a full game, the combination of a couple fewer free-throw possessions with the lengthening of possessions of all types equates to a pace of play of around two fewer possessions per 48 minutes for each team, which roughly accounts for the remaining four points per game of the offensive decline.
I’d suggest the longer possessions themselves illustrate how a slightly reduced foul rate can help defenses force offenses to go a little deeper into possessions, in effect slowing the entire pace of the game in a way that might not be perceptible to the naked eye, but shows up once we zoom out a little.
Milwaukee’s Damian Lillard has seen his free-throw attempts drop in the last few weeks. (Troy Taormina / USA Today)
Who benefits?
While some players appear to have been affected more than others — we’ll name names in a second — this is only natural. Changes in the playing environment are naturally going to advantage certain skill sets and players over others. Rather than assume anything conspiratorial, it is generally best to view officiating guidelines as being akin to the weather.Further, many of the individual changes in free-throw attempt rates have much more to do with changing circumstances than with any league-wide trends.
For example, Grant Williams has seen one of the largest increases in free-throw attempts, but he also has had the ball in his hands substantially more often in Charlotte (10.0 percent time of possession) than he did in Dallas (a paltry 6.1 percent) playing alongside the extremely ball dominant Luka Dončić. Williams’ offensive role has become commensurately larger as well (19.9 usage in Charlotte compared to 13.8 in Dallas).
On the other side of the ledger, Spencer Dinwiddie has unsurprisingly seen the ball far less after moving from Brooklyn to orbiting around LeBron James in the Lakers’ solar system, with time of possession percentage declining from 29.9 percent to 11.2 percent. He has seen a steep decrease in foul drawing as well.
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That said, the rainy day officiating we’re seeing now has impacted players differently.
Of the 149 players who played at least 800 minutes through Jan. 31 and 400 from Feb. 1 to March 17, 91 have seen a per-game decline in free-throw attempts, while 98 have seen a per-minute decline. There are a few players who have actually seen their FT rate tick upwards, which is to be expected. Most notably, DeMar DeRozan is taking nearly 3.1 more free-throw attempts per game since Feb. 1 than he did through January. Williams and Kelly Oubre, a recipient of a lot of Embiid’s scoring chances, have also seen large increases.
On the downside, the two most affected players have been Damian Lillard and Stephen Curry, each down about three free-throw attempts per game. They are followed by Dinwiddie, Bam Adebayo and De’Aaron Fox, all of whom have seen a decrease of more than two attempts per game. There doesn’t appear to be an obvious pattern in terms of which players have seen the largest declines. Among players with some degree of a rep for foul baiting, James Harden, Jalen Brunson and Immanuel Quickley have all seen slight increases in free-throw attempts, while Dončić and Austin Reaves have dropped off by 1.6 free-throw attempts per game and 1.0 free-throw attempts per game, respectively.
So what does it all mean?
For me, the salient aspects are two-fold.First, as mentioned previously, the data taken as a whole is quite suggestive of some modification in how certain situations have been officiated over the last several weeks. This has naturally affected certain players and teams more than others, perhaps in ways we will continue to see shake out over the remaining regular season into the playoffs.
The second bit is perhaps more interesting. The complexity of the overall system means that a relatively minor change — essentially a single shooting foul per team per game — has had an outsized impact, with the overall decline in scoring multiple times larger than simply the extra free throws at issue.
As a final note, we’ve seen “points of emphasis” have impacts over the short term before. Often these occur at the beginning of a season, where a certain violation or other call is made at elevated rates for a few weeks before settling back to historical trends. The foul dip and related scoring decline has already lasted longer than those situations have tended to, as the effect usually fades after around a month.
It remains to be seen if it does persist for the rest of the regular season and, if so
, how that might carry into the postseason.
Why NBA players couldn’t be more wrong about the Knicks’ Tom Thibodeau
By Sam Amick
Mar 22, 2024
173
Donte DiVincenzo had seen the poll.
Last April, as the playoffs approached and the New York Knicks were well on their way to the franchise’s best season in a decade, The Athletic published an anonymous player poll in which their coach, Tom Thibodeau, was the leading vote-getter in a most unflattering category: The coach whom players would least like to play for.
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It wasn’t even close, either, with Thibodeau receiving 43.6 percent of the votes and then-Houston Rockets coach Stephen Silas a distant second at 14.5 percent. Add in the fact Thibodeau had become a two-time winner of this unwelcome award, having also taken the (dis)honor when this poll was last published in 2019, and it’s safe to say his reputation as an old-school leader in these new-age times was alive and well.
But to see these Knicks (41-28) compete with that vintage Thibodeau style on their 3-1 West Coast trip that ended with a loss at Denver on Thursday night, and to marvel at their ability to remain among the Eastern Conference’s best (Boston notwithstanding) despite a brutal run of injuries to pivotal players, was to realize that today’s players are just flat-out wrong about the oft-criticized 66-year-old. Just ask DiVincenzo.
“That poll, for me — and excuse my language — but it doesn’t mean s—,” DiVincenzo, who played for Golden State last season and signed a four-year, $50 million deal with New York last summer, told The Athletic after the Knicks’ win over the Warriors on Monday night. “I’ve seen the poll, but I signed here.”
His ringing endorsement continued from there.
“I don’t care (about Thibodeau’s reputation),” DiVincenzo continued. “I don’t care. Guys in the NBA now (are different) than before. Everybody wants the game all offense. Nobody wants to come in and practice. But me, being my first year here, I think he’s done a great job of balancing things.
“From the outside world, there’s always (a different view). But in our house — in-house — we have a good dynamic and we enjoy it and everybody enjoys being around each other. To the outside world, you don’t really know. All you know is perception. All you know is the history from other teams (Thibodeau has coached) and his years with different organizations. But we’ve had plenty of rest days, plenty of off days.”
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And rumor has it, I shared with DiVincenzo, that Thibodeau practices aren’t nearly as hard as advertised these days.
“They’re not,” DiVincenzo confirmed. “I played for (the Warriors’ Steve) Kerr and played for Coach Bud (former Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer). It’s not like you come here and all of a sudden you’re just running track every day (in practice). I think what he does by far better than anybody I’ve been around is he’s the most prepared. So it doesn’t necessarily mean you have to go for two hours on your feet and running. But when you’re in there, you’re gonna lock in and you’re gonna get the stuff done and we’re gonna get out of there.”
In this “player participation policy” season where the NBA has finally pushed back on the load management movement, and where a public outcry for improved defensive play and increased physicality has come along with it, there’s something fitting about a Thibodeau team showing out in this kind of way. They’re tough, with a next-man-up mentality that has helped them survive serious setbacks for Julius Randle (out since suffering a dislocated right shoulder on Jan. 27), Mitchell Robinson (out since ankle surgery in mid-December) and OG Anunoby (missed 20 of the last 23 games after having a loose bone fragment removed from his right elbow). They play hard on both ends of the floor, with a seventh-ranked defense that has flourished despite the aforementioned absences (Robinson and Anunoby, in particular, are elite on that end).
After wins at Portland (105-93), Sacramento (98-91) and the Warriors (119-112), these (severely) undermanned Knicks used that formula to nearly upset the defending champion Nuggets in their West Coast finale (they trailed by five midway through the fourth and lost 113-100). It was another strong sign, among so many of late, that the Knicks will be a handful for any team that comes their way in the playoffs — no matter who’s able to take the floor.
But if Thibodeau’s Knicks can get healthy in time for the postseason — and that’s a major if — it’s not hard to imagine a world in which they’re making the kind of deep playoff run their franchise hasn’t seen since falling to Reggie Miller’s Pacers in the East finals nearly a quarter century ago. After all, they have nearly a month of compelling evidence (Jan. 1 to Jan. 27) that they can play like title contenders when at full strength.
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During that span that followed their trade with Toronto for Anunoby, and included Randle, the Knicks went 12-2 while boasting the league’s No. 1 defensive rating, ninth-best offensive rating and second-best net rating. It was some of the best basketball any team has played this season — Celtics included.
Yet the uncertainty that comes with all these ailments makes it harder to handicap New York’s postseason prospects. It’s not yet known when, or if, Randle will return. And as our Fred Katz wrote on Thursday, the Knicks have learned the hard way before that Randle rushing back after an injury is not a wise plan.
Julius Randle has been out of action since late January. (Brad Penner / USA Today)
Anunoby’s timeline is unclear, too, as he returned for three games recently only to need time away again because of pain caused by lingering inflammation. Robinson, meanwhile, was a full participant in Knicks practice on Wednesday but, per Thibodeau, will still need “a while” to regain his form and must also be cleared to return by the team’s medical staff. Even big man Isaiah Hartenstein, who has played so well while helping fill the void left by Robinson, remains on a minutes restriction because of an Achilles issue that has dogged him all season.
Which brings us back to Thibodeau.
As is the case with any coach whose contract situation is in question, the outcome of the postseason will surely matter when it comes to what comes next. His current deal runs through the 2024-25 season, but league sources say he hopes to secure his future with the Knicks when both sides plan to revisit the topic this summer. At this rate, the Knicks might wind up hoping they’d decided to get something done with Thibodeau before the recent explosion of coaching salaries.
For those who might have missed the economic boom on this front, take a look at this list of recent deals that have drastically changed the market:
- Monty Williams signs a six-year, $78.5 million deal with Detroit in May.
- Gregg Popovich signs a five-year extension reportedly worth more than $80 million with San Antonio in July.
- Erik Spoelstra signs an eight-year extension worth more than $100 million with Miami in January.
- Doc Rivers signs a deal with Milwaukee in January that runs through the 2026-27 season and is worth approximately $40 million combined.
- Steve Kerr signs a two-year, $35 million extension with Golden State in February.
It makes perfect sense too. This roster, which was largely built by the Leon Rose-led front office with Thibodeau’s gritty mentality in mind, is full of players like DiVincenzo who thrive in a demanding and professional environment. In that sense, it’s a much better fit than Thibodeau’s Minnesota mess that came before (the fact Jimmy Butler was the only core player who was cut from the Thibodeau cloth was … problematic).
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Franchise centerpiece Jalen Brunson is known to be among his biggest backers, as is his father and Knicks assistant coach, Rick Brunson. Randle is his kind of player too, a bruiser who is surely trying to rush his way back right about now. Ditto for Anunoby, who fought through obvious pain in his recovering elbow before the decision was made to give it more time to heal.
For a more specific example of their simpatico ways, consider that 29-year-old Josh Hart played all 48 minutes of the Knicks’ win over the Warriors (tallying his fifth triple-double) and seemed ecstatic to do it. He’s signed through the 2026-27 campaign. And as an intriguing and relevant aside, third-year point guard Miles McBride (a 2021 second-rounder from West Virginia) has shown the kind of developmental progress of late (including a career-high 29 points against the Warriors) that only adds to their depth.
Even with all these injuries, in other words, the Knicks have no shortage of reasons to be optimistic about what lies ahead. As Katz reported after the Anunoby trade in mid-January, the search for another star to pair with Brunson will continue this summer — whoever that might be. New York has all of its own first-round picks going forward, along with protected firsts from Dallas (2024), Detroit (2024), Washington (2024) and Milwaukee (2025). Those kinds of assets help greatly, of course, in these sorts of star-player pursuits.
In the here and now, though, Thibodeau’s focus is on these Knicks fighting through all this adversity and raising as much hoops hell as they can when it matters most. And the coach so many players would least like to play for, it seems, has total buy-in from the ones who couldn’t be happier that he’s their coach.
“It’s a team, and that’s what we prioritize,” Thibodeau explained before the Warriors game. “That’s (why) we want guys to sacrifice and put the team first. But there has to be that belief. And I think when your best players have that belief, your entire team ends up having that belief. We know we have a great group that we work with. They’re great to be around every day. They give you everything they have. So we know we’re fortunate, but we know we still have a lot of work to do.
“And I think confidence comes from demonstrated ability, like the fact that we’ve won with players being out (means) there’s a belief that we can do it. If we stay disciplined and do the things that we should do, we’ll have a chance to win.”
Amick: Why players couldn't be more wrong about Tom Thibodeau
"From the outside world, there's always (a different view). But in our house ... we have a good dynamic," one Knicks player says.
theathletic.com
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