Tag Archives: raymond felton

Iman Shumpert is Not a Forward

My man Jared Dubin (@jadubin5, to basketball Twitter) wrote this article a while back for my site on About.com.

It is still relevant today… but for different reasons.

Iman Shumpert is a shooting guard.

He may not be one right now due to the extenuating circumstances surrounding the Knicks and their lack of a true point guard, but that’s where he should spend the majority of his career. It’s better that we — and more importantly, the Knicks — recognize this now and proceed accordingly, because wasting precious minutes of his career playing out of position any more than he already has will harm and stunt his development.

via New York Knicks – Iman Shumpert is Not a Point Guard.

I’m not a doctor or an athletic trainer or even a basketball coach. I don’t know why Shump – and by extension, the Knicks – have been struggling of late. But to make an educated guess, I don’t think the three-guard lineups Mike Woodson has been using of late are helping matters. The Felton/Kidd/Shumpert grouping means:

Someone is guarding a much bigger player. (Felton on Rudy Gay? Really? On purpose?)
Shumpert is playing out of position on the offensive end. (Is he really the guy we want setting up for a corner three?)
And Jason Kidd is playing too much.

Not sure how to fix this… maybe shake the rust off of Ronnie Brewer and use him at the three more often. Or put Stoudemire back in the starting five and play Anthony at back at the three to start games. Or start Shump at the two and bring Kidd off the bench with JR Smith.

Waiver Wire: Injury Inquiry

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At this point, it’s best to read official injury reports with the same skepticism you’d reserve for a story in The National Enquirer.

Or the New York Post.

I submit as Exhibit A the headlines out of Salt Lake concerning Mo Williams’ thumb injury. Initial reports listed Williams as "day to day," which quickly turned into "out indefinitely." Then came the dreaded "seeking a second opinion," finally leading to "surgery needed, out 6-8 weeks."

That progression is eerily similar to what we got from the Knicks after Raymond Felton hurt his hand.

New York was similarly vague when discussing Amar’e Stoudemire’s season debut. The rumor mill was abuzz that STAT would rejoin the team at the Staples Center on Christmas Day … before Stoudemire himself stepped up to say that wasn’t happening. He finally did return a week later, but he has said that he’s only about 80 percent healthy. Stoudemire may have pushed for an early return to help compensate for the losses of Felton and Rasheed Wallace (foot).

What’s a fantasy owner to do?

Getting an understanding of common basketball injuries and the associated recovery times is a great first step – Jeff Stotts’ weekly column here at RotoWire is required reading. Jeff’s explanations will enable you to look at some of the press releases with a more critical eye. Of course, that assumes that the information in said press release has some basis in reality, and that isn’t always the case.

You’ll also want to keep an eye on the waiver wire – just to see what sort of players might be available should the need arise. That will be a big factor when dealing with injuries; in a shallow league, it makes little sense to hang on to a Williams or Felton through a two-month absence when a Jamaal Tinsley or Jason Kidd is there for the taking. In a deeper league, it might make more sense to try and get by with your bench until those starters are available again.

via Waiver Wire: Injury Inquiry – RotoWire.com.

There is No Joy at Madison Square Garden

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At Knicks media day, before the 2010-11 season, I had the pleasure of meeting Ronny Turiaf. Now, that sounds like a trite figure of speech, but I mean it quite literally. The guy has an infectious personality; you can’t help but like him the second you meet.

At one point, the assembled media asked Turiaf what he believed his role would be with the team. And I’ll never forget his response:

“To bring joy.”

Of course, Turiaf wasn’t long for the Knicks. Because Madison Square Garden exists to remove all joy from basketball.

The latest example is the apparent decision not to match Houston’s “ridiculous” free agent offer to Jeremy Lin.

Granted… it’s a lot of money. And there’s no guarantee that Lin will be worth $15 million-plus-luxury-tax in the third year of the deal. And with Jason Kidd, Raymond Felton and Pablo Prigioni in the fold, the Knicks might not need Lin this year. And it’s far from clear if Lin is the right sort of point guard to make sense of an offense built around Amar’e Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony.

(Of course, it’s also far from clear if John Stockton, Magic Johnson or Bob freakin’ Cousy would be able to make STAT and Melo place nicely together.)

On the other hand, Lin is a great story. The ultimate underdog, a nerdy Asian kid from an Ivy League school. The underdog who only wound up on the team because the Knicks were short a point guard and in California, who stepped up to save the season when Toney Douglas and Baron Davis couldn’t deliver. There are holes in his game. He doesn’t go to his left well. His jumper needs some work. He got exposed by some of the league’s better guards.

But he’s incredibly easy to root for.

Can’t say the same of the rest of the Knicks. Amar’e Stoudemire poisoned the well with a whole lot of sulking an an assault on a fire extinguisher. Carmelo Anthony comes off as incredibly selfish, on and off the court. Kidd celebrated his new contract by wrapping his car around a telephone while ‘faced. Felton killed the Blazers last season by showing up to work out of shape, getting Nate McMillan fired in the process.

Does that matter? It might. Rooting for the Yankees is like cheering for a corporation, but fans can cling to the home-grown players – from Derek Jeter to Mariano Rivera to Robinson Cano – at the core of the team’s success. Eli Manning’s “aw-shucks” personality and big-game success have completely erased our collective memory of him pouting his way out of San Diego and made him a New York folk hero. Rex Ryan appeals to our brash, loud-mouth “I’m walkin’ here” side, Tim Tebow to our conservative, church-going peers. The Mets are classic underdogs, sticking in the pennant race despite their small payroll. And Deron Williams and the Brooklyn Nets are the new, cool thing.

The Knicks, on the other hand, have loyalty. Loyalty that Madison Square Garden seems determined to test as often as possible.

Will Knick fans get over it? Probably, yes. Eventually. We got over Howard Eisley and Shandon Anderson, and Mo Taylor and Antonio McDyess. And our therapist says we’re even mentioning the names “Stephon,” “Isiah” and “Frederic” a lot less often these days. If the team wins, we’ll (mostly) forget about today’s decision. Just like we’ve (mostly) blocked out Charles Smith’s blown layup and John Starks’ off night and Reggie Miller’s late-game heroics.

Winning makes everything better. But the next-best thing to a win is a great story. And now, it seems, that story belongs to the Houston Rockets.

Lin-Sanity and the Sanchize

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As you may have heard, the Knicks may part ways with Jeremy Lin. Yes, just days after we were told they’d match any offer “up to a billion dollars,” the Knicks ran a back-door cut, hooked up with Raymond Felton, and seem content to let Lin and his ridiculous contract return to Houston.

Why the change of heart?

Tommy Dee of the Knicks blog raised the possibility that Lin could be the next Kevin Maas – one of the great “flash in the pan” stories in New York sports history:

Lin could be a hall of famer or he can be Kevin Maas. Maas stepped in for Don Mattingly in 1990 when Donnie Baseball was hurt and had an all-time run as a young player. He was the fastest player to hit 10 home runs in the history of baseball. Some Yankee fans thought the unthinkable of actually trading Mattingly because of his back and the fact that Maas was younger.

Maas was released in 1994 because pitchers figured him out and the pressure to be the next great Yankee was too much. Simply put, he wasn’t that good.

Good analogy.

Now, I don’t necessarily think Lin is Kevin Maas. I suspect pretty strongly that he’s a better-than-average NBA player with a chance to become more than that. But he might take a year or two to develop into the floor leader the Knicks so desperately need, and the Knicks might not have the luxury of waiting.

In that regard, Lin is a lot like Mark Sanchez.

The Jets drafted “the Sanchize” three years ago and immediately handed him the reins of a team that was built to win immediately. And that gamble was effective, to some extent. They set up their offense to minimize his shortcomings, won games with a ground-and-pound attack and a stingy defense, and made it to the AFC championship game in two straight seasons.

Problem is, Sanchez is now in year four of his career, and the Jets still don’t really know what they’ve got.

For better or worse, the Knicks have set themselves up as a “win now” team. They’ve got a ton of money invested in would-be superstars with extensive injury histories and a collection of bench players old enough to be Anthony Davis’ dad. They may not have the time to allow a potential point prodigy to grow into the player some thing he can become.

Not saying that’s the right decision – but it’s a better reason to let Lin walk than “he hurt our feelings” and “we don’t want to pay the luxury tax.”

Personally, I think this “win now” attitude is a bit nutty. The Knicks are making moves like they’re the team that just won a title; like they just need to fill in with complementary players around an established core. To my eye, that core is anything but established. And I agree with the extensive list of people saying Lin has too much potential to give up for nothing. If it was my call, I’d hang on to Lin and use him in a rotation with Felton, Jason Kidd and J.R. Smith until Iman Shumpert is healthy… and assume that injuries would take care of any playing-time squabbles. And I’d put off worrying about that year-three salary bomb until the 2014 trade deadline.

Report: Denver asks for Felton, Gallinari Plus in Carmelo Anthony Trade

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The Denver Nuggets want Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, another player, a first-round pick and Eddy Curry’s expiring contract from the Knicks as part of any Carmelo Anthony trade, the New York Daily News is reporting. Point guard Chauncey Billups would join ‘Melo in New York as part of the proposed deal.

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