New York Knicks: Jason Kidd’s Historically Bad Playoffs Highlights Knicks’ Problems

In truth, Jason Kidd can’t be held entirely accountable for the New York Knicks’ second-round playoff exit.

To pin the blame on a 40-year-old who averaged only 27 minutes per game during the regular season is just bad on principle, especially since his +/- for the whole Indiana series was actually only -5 overall. I recently wrote about the Knicks’ disappointing semifinal against Indiana: How they were dominated on the boards, how their big men vanished on both ends of the floor, how Raymond Felton‘s numbers dipped, how Carmelo Anthony came up short in the fourth quarter of an elimination game and how J.R. Smith should’ve worn black before that game against the Boston Celtics in the first round to honor the demise of his jump shot.

But out of all of that, one of the things that was easiest to pick on was Jason Kidd and his inexplicable inability to hit a shot. We make fun of the Sixth Man of the Year for shooting less than 29 percent from the field and 23 percent from long distance but what about the guy who puts up a goose egg in both? Although Jason Kidd is not directly responsible for New York’s failed season, his struggles highlight the Knicks’ biggest playoff nightmare: 3-point shooters who can’t make a 3-pointer.

Just take a look at the following facts: Jason Kidd went scoreless in 10 playoff games, a span during which he averaged just less than 19 minutes and and two field-goal attempts per game. During the regular season? J-Kidd averaged six points and 5.4 field goal attempts in 27 minutes per game.

So we can already see that Kidd’s offense was so nonexistent that coach Mike Woodson decided the only way his team could advance was to limit a future Hall of Famer’s minutes. The guy who provided veteran leadership, offensive enlightenment, terrific ball movement and an occasional 3-pointer every now and then during the regular season was so bad that literally Woodson couldn’t play him, in the hopes that Pablo Prigioni would be able to make up for Kidd’s lack of offense.

I know this isn’t Jason Kidd in his prime, but after watching him rejuvenate New York’s offense by always making the extra pass and knocking down open looks when he got them for an entire season, getting replaced with a pass-first guy like Prigioni is less than flattering. I mean, what the hell happened to the Legs-Kicked-Out-To-Draw-The-Four-Point-Play-In-Crunch-Time Jason Kidd from the middle of the season?

Kidd scored eight points in Game 1 of New York’s first-round series with the Celtics, so it’s not like injuries and anything like that were holding him back. The last time Jason Kidd scored in the 2013 NBA playoffs was in Game 2, a game in which he scored three points. But from there on out, Kidd was held scoreless in 188 minutes of basketball.

He went 3-for-25 from the field in the playoffs overall. That’s just unacceptable, even for a 40-year-old playing limited minutes. As a shooter, sometimes you just hit a stretch when you can’t buy a bucket. A few of Kidd’s shots just lipped out, like there was an invisible lid on the rim. When you don’t get that many shots every night and none of them are falling, it’s understandable that this happened.

I mean, think about it. What would be the perfect-storm scenario for this unfathomable stretch to occur? Wouldn’t you guess it would be an aging 40-year-old who didn’t play much, didn’t get many shots, played on a team with Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith and was up against a solid defensive squad like the Pacers? It’s still an unquestionably bad streak for any NBA player, but it’s not hard to understand how it happened.

We made fun of the Knicks all year long for their age, but I believe Jason Kidd was a great addition to a team in need of someone with playoff experience and playmaking prowess. Kidd was the guy that showed the Knicks how to get open looks with good ball rotation, he helped Carmelo Anthony develop his passing abilities and he got the entire roster to invest in defense. Because of that, I still say that in the grand scheme of things, Kidd was a beneficial pickup since the Knicks would never have been a threat in the East without him.

But when you’re an aging veteran who doesn’t have the legs to get to the basket anymore, you HAVE to hit down the open looks you’re given, especially if you’re no longer the Jason Kidd who could dish out 10-15 assists on any given night.

Kidd is one of my all-time favorite players. During his prime, he was a triple-double machine, a brilliant passer and a much-improved shooter who was an absolute joy to watch for any basketball fan. When he was in Dallas, people said he was washed up and wrote off the 2011 Dallas Mavericks.

Kidd proved them wrong, showcasing tremendous perimeter defense and his ever-present 3-point shot in the NBA Finals. When he left for New York, I figured he would prove everyone wrong again and during the regular season he did. But it’s what a player does in the postseason that defines how the season went and Jason Kidd dropped the ball there. Now he’s taking some time away from basketball to mull things over. There’s a chance that he negotiates a buyout with the Knicks or, in an even more depressing scenario, decides his time in the league is done.

After such an embarrassing playoff stretch, I really hope this is not the last we’ve seen of Jason Kidd. Because in our short-term memory society, people won’t remember that Kidd is third on the all-time list of triple-doubles leaders (107) or that he’s second on the all-time list of assists leaders (12,091), behind only the incomparable John Stockton. They’ll forget how many teams he led into the NBA Finals or that he finally won a much-deserved ring with the Mavs. No, all they’ll remember is the time Jason Kidd went scoreless for 10 straight playoff games, meaning the lasting memory of him will be a small stain on an otherwise fabulous NBA career.