The Knicks Fix

Watching the Knicks go through the motions for three quarters against the Bucks this afternoon and yet still have the ball and a shot to win it at the buzzer has to be maddening for any fan. To your benefit, however, you didn’t have to sit through that game because it was on tape-delay and therefore by the time it ran on MSG Network, you knew not to bother.

If you bothered anyway, that's two-and-a-half hours of your life you'll never get back my friend.

Still, these cruise-control-to-full-throttle performances have been a notable theme for the Knicks this season. And it should be of great concern for Isiah Thomas.

Look at the six losses in the past nine games and point to the most frustrating losses. Games you feel the Knicks should have had. I see five.

But toss out the last-second losses to the Wizards and Nets because those games were tight down the stretch and could have gone either way. What I’m talking about are two L’s that you might have penciled in for W’s. Desperately-needed W’s. W’s you knew you had to have.

The games that stand out are Jan. 15 against the Charlotte Bobcats, Jan. 22 at Miami and Sunday’s loss here to the Bucks. Gotta have ‘em. Three killer losses that will come back to haunt you when the playoff standings are settled.

In each game the Knicks had far more talent on the floor, most especially in Miami, when Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O'Neal were out. But in each game the Knicks defense was shredded by high screens that freed up guards to make open shots or blow-by for layps. Matt Carroll. Jason Kapono. Mo Williams. Not exactly the Big Three.

In fact, who the hell is Matt Carroll?

Never mind. We did that blog already.

I asked Isiah Thomas about his team's defense performance, especially against the screens. The was I see it, the Knicks' interior defenders do a poor job “showing” on the screens to make the guards pause long enough for the Knick guard to get through the screen and recover.

The times the opposing guard does penetrate, another thing I noticed was the Knick bigs rarely, if ever, use a hard foul. Jerome James was in the game early against the Bucks and he actually tried to avoid making contact with Williams as he drove to the basket. This was minutes after he flexed his massive biceps to me and said, "It's been banned by the NBA. Can't use 'em anymore."

Jerome, you have six, baby. Six fouls. And they're not there to save up for another night.

I have to give props to wiley veteran Malik Rose, who played the high screen for Williams to perfection in the final 10 seconds of the game. Rose went with Brian Skinner up for the screen, but as Williams tried to go right – which he did like 99 times out of 100 – Rose stepped out and forced him to go left. Stephon Marbury pushed off the screening Skinner and was step-for-step with Williams, who forced up a right-handed runner while fading to his left. The damn thing went in, but still, it was solid defense.

Thomas wouldn’t talk about his defense, or the 60 points in the paint the Knicks allowed or much of anything else. He just kept talking about the free throws. How free throws cost his team the game. If you check the fourth quarter, the Knicks made all four of their attempts then, when it mattered most. What they didn’t do is get a critical stop when it mattered most.

They could do a better job on the foul line, sure. Especially for a team that leads the league in attempts per game.

But the reason why the Knicks won’t be a playoff team this season has to do with defense. Or a lack thereof.

All of you who think David Lee should start, I don't disagree. But I don't believe he should start at power forward. I think he's better suited at small forward (depending on the matchup) and, as I've said before, the Knicks need to find themselves a very athletic, pogo-stick big forward who can block and alter shots, rebound, defend the post and maybe hit a 15 footer when need be.

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Speaking of David Lee, I think we've seen him dunk enough this season -- especially when he explodes among the tall trees -- to think he might deserve an invite to the Slam Dunk Contest. Why not? He'll already be in Las Vegas in the Rookie-Sophomore game. And we've already seen what he can do going back to his high school championship in 2001 (as featured on this blog....if you haven't seen it yet, check the archives). Lee would probably defer to Nate Robinson, however, because he's a teammate and he's defending his title.