NEW YORK \u2014 Mike Brown, as frustrated as he had been all season, offered up a threat.<\/p>\n
After Sunday\u2019s game against the Golden State Warriors, the New York Knicks coach took the podium to vent about yet another poor start from his team. Brown was perturbed by the starters\u2019 lack of focus and defensive physicality. Brown was so angry, he didn\u2019t name a Defensive Player of the Game, a ritual he does after every victory.<\/p>\n
Yes, the Knicks won on this night, but they struggled mightily against an injury-stricken Warriors team that more closely resembled frat bros in jerseys cosplaying as Golden State than the actual Warriors. Because of the slow start of New York\u2019s starting lineup, it trailed by 15 going into the second quarter against a Warriors team starting someone named Malevy Leons.<\/p>\n
The Knicks\u2019 starting lineup was supposed to be the franchise\u2019s everything when it came together two summers ago. Jalen Brunson, Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby, Josh Hart and Karl-Anthony Towns cost the Knicks all of their flexibility in exchange for the pursuit of a title.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not too late to do anything,\u201d Brown said when asked whether he considered a starting lineup change. \u201cIf I feel the need, I will. I\u2019m not thinking that right now. I\u2019m concentrating on each individual because, like you said, we\u2019ve started different people at different times. It\u2019s collectively.\u201d<\/p>\n
If the time comes, though, when Brown decides he\u2019s going to make a change, Bridges, not Hart, should be the casualty.<\/p>\n
Why do I single out those two? Well, Brunson is going to start. Duh. Anunoby will start. Towns will start. Hart and Bridges are often the targets of fan frustration. Hart isn\u2019t naturally a shooter, which allows defenses to guard him with their center and put more athletic wings on Towns. That can muck up the Knicks\u2019 offense and doesn\u2019t make life easier for Towns, who more often dominates when a traditional center is guarding him. Bridges\u2019 inconsistent play has caused many watchers to pull their hair out. If his jump shot isn\u2019t falling, which it hasn\u2019t been for quite some time now, his flaws only become more obvious.<\/p>\n
The usual starters didn\u2019t get a chance to redeem themselves Tuesday night in a win against the Indiana Pacers because Brunson was sidelined with an injury. However, the starting lineup with Jose Alvarado in place of Brunson started the game just OK. New York was up just four points against a mangled and bad Indiana team when Brown brought in his first substitute.<\/p>\n
Brown has yet to rule out a possible starting lineup change. He apparently still needs to see more of his normal starting unit before he does that. The Knicks had a slow start in Utah when Landry Shamet replaced the injured Hart. It didn\u2019t have a great start with Alvarado in for Brunson. The original starting five hasn\u2019t blown anyone away during most of its time together. This season, it has a net rating of plus-1.5 in 380 non-garbage-time minutes. Last year, the net rating was just plus-1.6 in more than 800 non-garbage-time minutes. Technically, that\u2019s positive, but nowhere near good enough given the resources invested.<\/p>\n
Hart brings many things to the table that this starting group needs. I didn\u2019t need his 33-point, seven-rebound and five-assist performance against Indiana to come to this conclusion. The veteran is low maintenance. He doesn\u2019t need the ball handed to him to be impactful. Hart chases down 50-50 balls and wins them more often than not. He\u2019s one of the best rebounding \u201cguards\u201d in the sport, and the starters don\u2019t have any consistent glass hitters outside of Towns. Hart acts as a pseudo secondary point guard in a unit that doesn\u2019t have any natural ballhandlers outside of Brunson. When teams blitz Brunson, Hart can take advantage of a four-on-three situation by attacking space and finding a teammate or finishing at the rim, which he does as well as anyone who is 6 feet 4 and under in the NBA. The slow-playing group would play even slower without his presence because of his ability to grab a rebound and go.<\/p>\n
And when he believes in his 3-point shot, as he did against Indiana, Hart can often make teams pay for leaving him open.<\/p>\n
He does it all. Every starting lineup needs someone like Hart.<\/p>\n
\u201cJosh does a lot of things to make options available,\u201d Towns said. \u201cHe can get a rebound, outlet it quick, pushing pace and making the defense have to converge on him. Around the basket, he does the full-court dribble with the euro, gets to the basket and kicks it out to the corner for a 3.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bridges, on the other hand, is going through a trying period, to say the least. The man the Knicks traded five first-round picks for is shooting 39 percent from the field and 30 percent from 3 in March \u2014 the latter number he\u2019s doing for the second month in a row. Bridges primarily takes high-variance shots in this offense, and part of that is on him. The 3s are a natural part of Brown\u2019s offense, but the mid-range jumpers Bridges relies on heavily are a choice. His layups mostly come in transition and, because of that, he rarely gets to the free-throw line. So, when the jumper isn\u2019t falling, his performances can be loud for the wrong reasons.<\/p>\n
Defensively, Bridges has been fine. But he\u2019s better off the ball, jumping passing lanes, than he has been as the primary on-ball defender. This starting lineup needs a dogged on-ball defender, and that role just doesn\u2019t consistently suit Bridges. Shamet has done that job more consistently this season. The injured Miles McBride, too, might be a better option in that department.<\/p>\n
The five draft picks are gone. The optics of benching Bridges shouldn\u2019t matter if the goal is to win. If it works, no one will think about those picks. If it doesn\u2019t, the five picks are already bad press anyway. Bridges is only 29 years old, but he has a lot of miles on him. He hasn\u2019t missed a regular-season game in his NBA career. To an observer, the drop in production sometimes feels like it\u2019s because of the wear and tear on his body, though he\u2019s never acknowledged that. Coming off the bench and limiting his minutes might be best for Bridges at this point in his career. Also, if he\u2019s able to play in a lineup where he can have the ball in his hands a bit more, maybe that swings the variance in his offense to more favorable levels.<\/p>\n
Whatever Brown decides to do, he has to do it fast. There are 12 games left until the playoffs, and the starting lineup has almost two years\u2019 worth of data showing it\u2019s just not good enough. Some people believe Hart should be the one to go. I think it should be Bridges. Regardless of who is right, we can all agree that a change is needed.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we play better from the start, we don\u2019t have to play catch-up,\u201d Brunson said Sunday. \u201cIt\u2019s definitely something we need to get better at. It needs to be our focus.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK \u2014 Mike Brown, as frustrated as he had been all season, offered up a threat. After…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169194,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[21,9,24,55,54,1104,56],"class_list":["post-169193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-nba","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-new-york-knicks","tag-ny"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169193"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169193\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}