Is Portland/Phoenix of Any Interest?

No because the Suns are a “lucky” 3rd seed in my opinion.

Define a “lucky” 3rd seed?

Yeah not quite sure what that means either. I watched a lot of PHX games this year. They are really good. Amare played like a beast in the 2nd half and their bench is pretty deep. PHX has drafted very well over the past few years.

I don’t think they will get past the 2nd round because PHXs defense leaves a lot to be desired, but they are certainely not the NYK defensively. Once they run into the Lakers or Dallas, teams with good sized talented players in their front court they won’t be able to win 4 out of 7.

Is it bad that I’m only really watching to see some of the players that will be available in a few months. I wanna see if Felton can play in a playoff series against a pg he will more than likely being seeing for the next few years if everything works out well. Jameer Nelson going off doesn’t look good. Otherwise I could care less about these entire playoffs.

The suns are weak this year imo. They need monster games from Amare in order to win. Too reliant on scrubs like Dudley, Frye, Dragic, Collins. Plus, while Nash is having a fantastic year, its tough to matchup against other teams with big pgs who drive well, as Nash can’t defend them.

Their bench is just atrocious in my opinion. Its too tough to win like that. Especially when Gentry sat Nash out for so long and didn’t put him back in until like 5 minutes left in the 4th last night. I can’t say enough how bad Dragic is…One of the most overrated players in the league. Frye played really well last night, but he’s not good at all usually. I like Dudley more, but again most teams in the West have better guys coming off the bench. PHX might be upset this round..Unless Amare soundly outplays Lamarcus.

The Jazz, the Nuggets and the Blazers have all been injuried – Melo & Co. would destroy the Suns in a playoff series IMO. I don’t think the Suns are a SOLID 3rd seed.

Dwight Howard is the 2nd best player in the league.

9 Blocks yesterday.

Nothing goes down in the paint when he’s in the game.

NOTHING!!

I agree, and while I don’t think you build a team around stopping one player on one team, I don’t think you can discount his presence and if the Knicks plan on building any type of playoff team with an aspiration to reach an NBA final there has to be someone/ or enough bigs that can beat him or at least keep him from being able to sit there and swat shots like he’s a grown man playing with kids. Somebody that can on the offensive end get him in foul trouble or be a legit scoring threat that he can’t leave his man to destroy everything that enters the lane.

Exactly Big Blue…and you know what’s crazy?
He had 5 points and like 6 or 7 rebounds (I forget).
He doesn’t even have to contribute that much on offense.
His defense changes games.
The Cats….don’t they have like 3 seven footers?
He is a man playing with boys…just like you said.
Needless to say…Lebron won’t be shaking hands with him this year either.
The Magic are NICE!!

The Cavs will beat the Magic in the playoffs this year.

Dwight Howard is going up against Nazr, Ratliff and Boris Diaw. A triumvirate of weakness.

Are the Lakers a “lucky” 1 seed?

You forgot another 7 footer on their team.

All good though

FYI
Diaw is not 7 feet

Why because of Shaq and Jamison?

Keep dreaming buddy.

Watched the entire PHX v POR game last night – here’s what I saw:

- Amare came out flat.
- Amare stayed flat.
- Camby played lights out.
- Gentry’s substitution patterns are maddening.
- Phoenix defense was decent.
- Camby’s missed dunk was pure awesomeness – it looked like his legs lost their spring. Dudley missed a 3 that would’ve cut it to one.
- Memo to Dudley – this is the NBA get some tattoos.

How about you give PORTLAND some credit. They’ve been playing awesome since they traded for Camby plus they have a great coach, a great point guard, and played great!

Can’t believe you slept on Miller, Tommy. He is definitely a baller. For some reason, he gets traded a lot. Maybe he’s crap in the Clubhouse.

Next year should be D’Antoni’s last as coach of the Knicks. No matter who they sign, he will play with their heads and his ego will destroy any positives. He is not a New York style coach, or for that matter an Eastern Confernce coach. I think Walsh will realize his mistake and bring in Mark Jackson in 2011 and put an end to this nonsense.

Hedo was a huge factor last year, especially down the stretch. Letting him go will haunt the Magic this year in a seven game series IMO.

Magic/Cavs is going to be a great playoffs series though. A classic. I think the Cavs will win, but I would def not be shocked if the Magic get past them.

Unfortunately, only the Cavs or Dallas have a chance against the Lakers. D. Howard will be neutralized by Bynum/Gasol/Odom and the constant double teams.

Dwight Howard is who we thought he was If you want to crown his ass. Then crown him!

Nate’s the coach of the year in my opinion. He has done a phenomenal job with Portland and all the injuries. But he’s done a horrible job with Rudy Fernandez. He is a shell of his former self and lacks any confidence. They might as well trade him.

“Keep dreaming buddy.”

You’ll see.

Defense has kept the Trailblazers relevant in spite of all the injuries.

_’antoni could learn a lot from Nate McMillan.

It is tough when the Knicks are out. I hate almost all other teams so I don’t even know who to root for. There is at least one player or person on every team in the playoffs I don’t want to see win it all (with the exception of Portland and OKLwho have no chance of winning):

Boston (whole team except Nate)
Bobcats (Larry Brown; Larry Hughes)
Bulls (whole team except Rose)
Cavs (whole team)
Miami (Riley and Q Rich)
Atlanta (Crawford)
Mil (owner/Skiles)
Orl (don’t want Big Pat getting a ring with anywhere by NYK)
Utah (fans, I hate their fans)
Denver (Kenyon Martin)
Suns (Kerr)
Dal (J. Kidd)
SA (T.Parker; Duncan; and I just hate the organization)
Lakers (Phil and Kobe)

Maybe I really am a “hater.”

For the life of me I don’t understand why we would not adjust our “system” to the players on the roster. Ok, we have sucky talent, why not emphasize defense then. Why would you still go out and try to outscore other teams with a roster that includes Duhon, Jeffries, and Larry Hughes. It was just insane chucking up three pointer after three pointer with streaky and erratic shooters. Then loss after loss say we just couldn’t make shots . . .hmm, how about trying to stop them from making shtos? How about going with Tony Douglas, Jordan Hill, and guys who would play hard and scrappy on the defensive end.

Oh well, season is over and we will have a dynamite roster next year . . .right?

Not really a hater, just take things a little too seriously. Maybe if you took a “whoever wins, then great, my life is still awesome.” approach, you wouldn’t care as much.

We already know the answer. THis system sucks!! Seven seconds or less is everything I was taught basketball was not about. Lets chuck up as many shots as possible. What about clock management!! My whole problem is that this offense is created to give our team more shots to score but does that not mean the other team gets just as many shots. When you play a superstar like Wade or Lebron or Durant or Kobe the strategy should be to limit the amount of times the ball is in their hands. By slowing the game down, playing hard nosed defense, keeping the game close by limiting the stars shots and winning the game late. THis 7 seconds or less only gives Kobe more shots and if your a betting man Kobe is going to beat you if you give him more chances 9 times out of 10. The only way this system works is with a team packed with allstars but then again most any system will work if it is packed with allstars so the idea of a good system losses all its freaking meaning. The fact that a system needs three or four allstars to work effectively means its a flawed system. The suns with nash made it work its most effective but even with nash, amare, joe johnson, the matrix, and diaw. They still could not get to the finals. So even at its best its flawed. THe knicks can only hope for a few years of going to the playoffs and being bounced out in the first or second and the coach finally getting fired but probably no championships. Its simple no Defense= NO Championships.

You hate Jamal Crawford? Im with you on every other guy, I hate them all. But how do you hate Jamal?

To be honest, I never cared about changing the system. I actually thought he should have kept it the same as it was PHX. My problem was that he never benched the veterans who were doing a terrible job running it and handed the ball over to guys like Wilson and Gallo and Douglas and HIll, people who presumably did fit the system really well.

But thats just me. I couldn’t give a rat’s a** about this roster or team for the past 2 years. DW made it clear that this was the case when he came to the team, and I agreed with him and his plan. Unfortunately Dantoni was a poor choice of a coach for a rebuilding team. Hopefully he will make up for it next year now.

“lacks any confidence”

other than Drazen Petrovic, there aren’t any Euro’s in the NBA (I HOPE GALLO ISN’T ONE OF THEM) that have supreme confidence.

shall we list the Euro-clowns:

Dirk (look at the man beast he bedded)
Kukoc (i think he was scared of Michael)
Paul Gasol (he looks like someone just fouled him even when he’s shooting on the free throw life)
Bargnani (it’s Italian for soft cotton)
Kirilenko (AK47 only by initials and jersey number)
Mehmet Okur (he never met an opposing center he liked that’s why he stays at the 3 point line)
Nene (he’s brazilian however he plays like a Euro)
Anyone named Sasha (a nickname for Alexander never sounded so feminine)

The TRIANGLE system that Phil Jax uses is not predicated on defense.

It’s base one thing…

HAVE THE BEST TALENT!

Defense doesn’t win championships, talent wins championships. Unless you’re the Miami Heat and you’re playing against the Dallas Mavericks – who’s owner is the biggest anti-referee owner in the league. If I was a ref, I’d give Miami all the calls too.

Nowitzki a euro clown because he missed a critical FT against Miami and didn’t respond when David West pushed him?

Some people just don’t want/like to fight – not in their veins. It doesn’t mean that they’re soft.

Dirk came a long way – he’s one of the greatest PF’s EVER and one of the best players in the NBA – especially down the stretch! Great players respect Dirk.

Just my 2 cents, but I’m with K4L with the Jamal hate. He was a maddening player to root for. Sure, he’s extremely talented (on the offensive side of the ball), but he played out of control way, way too much, and his shot selection was an abomination. He, like Lee and Nate, exhibited 0 effort or pride on the defensive end (and he was barely even here with D’Antoni).

What I don’t agree with on K4L’s hate list is Orlando. IMO, we need the Magic to take out the Cavs in order to have a shot at LeBron. But more directly to K4L’s point, I want Patrick to get a ring just in spite of our organization. He deserves it after our front office and ownership couldn’t find him a position anywhere on this coaching staff, when he basically was yearning to come back. Herb Williams is inexplicably still here, while Ewing helped vastly improve the games of Yao and Howard, and is advancing deep in the playoffs with the Magic every year.

Honestly I don’t care – I just don’t want to see the Spurs win because they are boring even though I love Pop. The Cavs are kinda flat too IMO.

But I’d love to see Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard, Melo or Dirk win the title. I couldn’t care less about the rest – I just want to see my favorite players win the championship. I think you have a natural tendency to focus on the negative side of things!

c’mon man, a euro clown? DId you see him get into it with Matt Bonner last night? I would be pissing my pants as would any player, including KG? You don’t mess with the Red Rocket unless you are a baller with no fear? haha

lol. Wade gets the most embarrasing treatment by the refs. They treat him like he’s a little girl. Its despicable how many calls he gets.

I don’t know man. Couldn’t you say the same thing about Nate then? I agree Jamal was maddening to root for, but unlike Nate he carried himself with class and dignity throughout his entire career. He was never involved in embarrassing incidents, never got into fights with his own teammates and coaching staff, and never showed up opposing players. Just pure class- even if his game was maddeningly one-dimensional.

Plus, I will never forget the Miami game where he scored 50 on hitting like 16 straight shots. That was quite possibly the craziest thing I have ever seen in a nba game.

LOL

Detlef Schrempf = Supreme Confidence! Gallo is on his way.

Cavs-Magic is a toss up.. because Shaq is still That Dude. Hoping Jameer, Vince, Barnes, and Pietrus can do enough to get them past lebron again, so i can see him storm off the court after he drops 40-15-15, only to lose because their 4s aren’t well rounded enough and Mo chokes again

Having watched most of the games, there are a handful of things MDA should have done differently, in-game.

however, look at this year’s roster!

that we won 35% of our games is appropriate and not really a failure. For the 2nd straight year, MDA was stopped by the 2010 plan; we were beginning to play better with Jamal and ZBo before they were traded, and again this year, in December, we were looking a bit better with Jeffries being incorporated, and this without the contributions of Nate.

We had no business even winning 35% of our games when we started _avi_ Lee as our 6’9 center, and on top of that had no playmakers.
Sure, we have some ppl who can score; Gallo, Lee, TD..
but no playmakers.

i feel like a playmaker upgrade (lebron? a PG?) will make MDA look a LOT better… Good Riddance Du-Du!

Getlef is a good call, not in the same league as Drazen. That guy was a stud.

Yep, I’ve “slept” on him. SMH.

http://www.theknicksblog.com/2009/02/01/miller-to-portland-being-discussed/

I respect the heck out of Dirk’s game. However, he shrinks in big games. See Miami – Udonis Haslem shut him down. See Golden State, Dirk was shut down by Biedrins and Stephen Jackson. Denver last year, Kenyon took him behind the wood shed.

What about game 7 in San Antonio?

What about the 50-point game against the Suns in the Conference Finals?

He’s the reason the Mavs reached the Finals. And he played better than LeBron in the FInals man!

You absolutely can say the same thing about Nate, which is why I hated Nate too. I’m an equal opportunity hater, haha. But honestly, the last 10 years have been so hideously awful, the players that have passed through here that I DIDN’T hate can probably be counted on one hand.

“The TRIANGLE system that Phil Jax uses is not predicated on defense.”

Not true.

Phil Jackson has always preached defense, he hardly ever “champions” his offense the way _’antoni often does. You can tell defense is a priority when speaking to Phil as it was when he played on the Knicks.

Also, yes he’s had great players, but what separates good players from great players? Defense.

DEFENSE IS A TALENT. Name me a team with all offensive players who play no defense who when championships. ZERO. Name me a recent team with very little offense and Great defense who won championships. PISTONS. A lack of offense skills or talent can be covered up with hard nosed defense whereas a lack of defensive talent is never made up with more offense. It works that way with almost any team sport. Giants vs Patriots. Id take a Great defensive team over a Great offensive one anyday. Guess what Jordan was all defensive and so was scottie and rodman. The bulls were a great defensive team.

I agree with you except for when you say the Pistons didn’t have offense. Billups, Rip, and Sheed can all flat out score the ball. Prince was a beast on the break and could score as well. Stuckey and Lindsey Hunter off the bench. Those guys were not a team of stiffs (on offense).

But they would suffocate you on defense. I wish more current Knick fans would understand this concept that defensive wins championships. Guys like Lee, Crawford, and Curry and even Gallo until he improves, are sixth men, instant offense off the bench until they improve defensively.

if you like Howard then how could you like D’antoni so much?Christ D’antoni would bench him for his lack of offense

haha yeah thats true. Thats why im sticking up for Crawford..I need someone from the past decade to actually like.

I think the Suns are a lot better with the traditional line up that includes Lopez at C so Amare can shift to his natural position of PF. That gives them more rebounding, better defense in the paint, and a second efficient scorer on the inside.

I think people tend to overrate scorers like Roy, Kobe etc….

I love Roy and think he’s an excellent player, but it’s simply not as hard to replace a scorer as most people think unless he’s a super freak that scores a lot at super high levels of efficiency (like Lebron).

So it does not surprise me that Portland won the first game.

When they got Camby, they replaced the really valuable aspects of the team (rebounding, interior defense, shot blocking, low usage but high efficiency scoring etc..)

If the Knicks had Camby this year, they probably would have won more than 45 games. If the had Roy, they probably would have won just under 40.

All that said, I think the Suns win the series.

True – PJ is from the Red Holzman school. Shame he never coached the Knicks when he was in our backyard coaching the Albany Patroons (CBA – you know, the league Isiah brought down)

It also helps to have Jordan, Pippen, Bryant and Shaq. Last year was a massive fake job. The Nuggets were a better team however Kobe gets the calls. Last year The Raping Mamba clocked Artest and should’ve gotten at least 1 game suspension – the Lakers would’ve lost the series to the Rockets. KG does the same thing this year – 1 game suspension.

I don’t think PJ would’ve done Jack with the Knicks this year.

Stuckey wasn’t on that team. Mehmet Okur who’s decent on offense, terrible on defense was on that team. Corliss Williamson was on the team as well, a 6th man of the year award winner and those awards typically don’t go to defensive players.

Roy is the heart of that team. The heart can be on the sidelines and the team can still win – Boston did it last year with KG on the bench.

“Mehmet Okur who’s decent on offense, terrible on defense was on that team.”

Mehmet isn’t that soft and while he isn’t a great individual defender, but he is a good team defender. He couldn’t play for Sloan if he wasn’t.

“I love Roy and think he’s an excellent player, but it’s simply not as hard to replace a scorer as most people”

Roy isn’t just a “scorer” he is a playmaker and a leader, those things are very “hard to replace”.

I hope the Suns get swept, I hate Nash and never thought he should have gotten the MVP.

Magic’s title run rides on how much Vince can account for what they lost in Turkoglu.

Haha I’m guessing because he’s a terrible defender?

I agree about Roy, he’s a leader and a worthy franchise player for that Portland team.

Let Bosh go sign with the Heat, then u could see Amare sign in NY and boozer would go to the bulls. For those that want Dantoni out, that is what u should be rooting for, amare to the knicks, that is where the first clash could be, between walsh and dantoni, the coach will want lee back, the gm will want amare. Could be a NY SUNS look with Amare and Joe Johnson, then we take Okafor and Collison for chandler and Curry. Gallo at the 3…

“FYI
Diaw is not 7 feet”

Neither is Howard.

I hate Dirk, but he has gotten a little tougher (now he’s a hack/cheap shot artist who looks for the refs help all the time) since being bounced in the 1st round that year. What I respect most about his game is that he became a better rebounder after being a poor one, most players don’t become better at that if it was never their strong suit.

I just think that the MVP can’t have such a glaring weakness in his game. How does Nash have TWO MVP’s and point guards like Jason Kidd and John Stockton have none? Also I think in order for you to claim MVP honors you have to take your team to the Finals, Kidd and Stockton did that twice while Nash will never get there.