The Knicks are in a dangerous spot right now as far as confidence and cohesion is concerned. They took out Boston and the Kings because both teams were missing something. Boston didn't have Paul Pierce or "P P man" as I like to call him. Sactown just fired their coach so they are far worse than us as far as being ready to play a nba basketball game. Are the Knicks in trouble tonight against the Wizards? Hell yes.
Public enemy number one on the wizards is their shooting guard, Nick Young. The dude plays lights out when he's playing the Knicks. John Wall understands the lights will be on and he wants them to shine on him so he will be ready to play. Blatche and McGee are two young carbon copies of Amar'e and Tyson Chandler. Only thing is these kids have been playing with each other for a while now. Judging by what Boris Diaw did the other day to the Knicks, how can you not expect the worst? Add Rashard Lewis shooting from the outside as well. Somehow the Knicks always find a way to leave him open. All hell can break loose and we might finally hear a "Fire D'antoni" chant sooner than later.
Can the Knicks win? Not just against the Wizards. I'm talking anyone. Right now the Knicks are playing to the strengths of the other team. First off, running the offense through Melo lets the whole defense take a break because whoever is guard in Melo is preparing for 26 points to be put on them anyway. Keeping the ball handling duties on him lets the rest of the team relax. They need to run the offense as if Baron Davis is starting. Toney Douglas is not a point guard. Yeah we get that. He's still a decent guard. The lame duck right now is Landry Fields. I talked about him in my last blog. Right now the Knicks have Balkman and Novak coming in at small fwd. They have Jorts coming in for the power fwd and center spots. Where is the Knicks weakness you ask? Landry Fields is not built for prime time. His confidence is shot. How you fix a professionals confidence is you take his spot and give it to someone who is playing better. That man is Iman Shumpert. The kid deserves to play 35 mins a game. Landry on the other hand needs to take Balkman and Novak's minutes backing up the forward spots. Landry lead all nba guards with like 7 rebounds a game last year before the Melo trade. The dude is a natural rebounder. Sounds like a forward to me. He practiced the corner 3 pointer all summer? Sounds like a forward to me. Shawne Williams has left a void on the bench when he took the well deserved money from New Jersey. Landry should fill that spot easily.
As far as the back up guards? Well you need to start both Toney and Shumpert. They are the best the Knicks have. The Knicks don't have the luxury of keeping talent on the bench. If Shumpert or Toney need to play 48 minutes then so be it. Baron will solve that as soon as he's back making Toney a deadly 6th man. The bench is not dead though. Billy Walker is not going dunk on anyone any time soon. He is however a legit threat behind the 3 point arc. He shoots the 3 well were the shooting guard usually gets it, straight on or at the elbows. That's a nice contrast to the dynamic play of Shumpert. Walker also has a mouth that makes players want to choke him after games (ask Kevin Garnett). That's highly valuable in my humble and absolutely correct opinion! At this point Mike Bibby is done. Jeremy Lin however is not. The kid needs his little 15 minutes of real playing time now while Baron can't play. Lin is a point guard. If you YouTube the kid you can see how good he is. "Jeremy Lin vs. John Wall" is all you need to search for. Oh snap! How convenient is it that the Knicks are playing John Wall tonight!
Lets hope our team wakes up. I don't need my television filing for another restraining order on me. Go Knicks
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