Kurt Rambis Is Not The Answer For The New York Knicks
By Ti Windisch
The New York Knicks weren’t exactly golden before, but they’re not getting any better with Kurt Rambis as their head coach.
The New York Knicks remain on top of the NBA in only Carmelo Anthony stinkfaces per game. The Knicks are pretty bad at just about everything else, including picking head coaches.
Derek Fisher was New York’s consolation prize after losing out in the Steve Kerr sweepstakes before last season, and Fish struggled early on.
Even Kerr would’ve struggled with New York’s roster last season, in the pre-Kristaps Porzingis era. He’s no longer around, thanks to some complicated and weird reasons. Plus the Knicks are no longer in the pre-Porzingis days.
The Porzingis hype is mostly dead now that he’s slumped off a bit and missed his last five games with a shoulder strain, but Kristaps is still seen as a top young player around the NBA. He’s the embodiment of hope in New York basketball right now (Lord knows he’s better than anything Brooklyn has).
That means that developing Porzingis into a better player is the Knicks’ most important goal at the moment. As heavy and unfair a burden as it is on the young Latvian, New York’s future title hopes are currently squarely on his wide shoulders.
So throw away the coaching record of Fisher and his replacement, Kurt Rambis. None of that matters — the Knicks weren’t going to make the playoffs led by a rookie. Even a much better rookie in Karl-Anthony Towns isn’t close to being able to do that in Minnesota.
Porzingis mania was strongest in his time under Fisher. He cooled down under Rambis, both in terms of statistics and hype. It’s easy to write that off as just a rookie hitting a wall, but it’s not like Rambis hasn’t said anything suspect about Porzingis.
Last month Rambis told the Wall Street Journal that he envisioned Porzingis playing some small forward going forward, which is a fairly ludicrous idea considering the spacing he can provide at the power forward and center spots.
In that same article, Rambis claimed Kristaps takes a lot of shots he “flat-out [doesn’t] like.”
A coach leading a playoff team saying that about a role player biting off more than he can chew would make sense. New York should be thrilled about every shot Porzingis is taking — they’re all steps on his journey to becoming a good (and maybe even great) player.
Coincidentally (or maybe not), Porzingis has been a worse three-point shooter under Rambis than Fisher. As cited in that Wall Street Journal article and plenty of other places, Porzingis could very well be hitting a rookie wall.
He’s never played this many minutes before, especially at this level of basketball. It is interesting how Porzingis’ stats have changed though, from Fisher to Rambis.
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Kristaps under Fisher averaged 13.8 points, 7.7 rebounds, 1.2 assists, 0.8 steals and 1.9 blocks in 28.2 minutes per game. He shot 42.3 percent from the field and 34.9 percent from beyond the arc.
Kristaps under Rambis averaged 15.6 points, 6.1 rebounds, 1.6 assists, 0.6 steals and 1.7 blocks in 29.0 minutes per game. He shot 41.7 percent from the field and 29.7 percent from beyond the arc.
Porzingis is scoring and assisting more lately, but his rebounding, defense and efficiency have dropped off. Is a rookie wall responsible for all of that, or is it on Rambis?
The answer, as always, is likely somewhere in the middle. Numbers don’t lie though, and some of the things Rambis has said about Porzingis are worrying.
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These Knicks won’t be contending next season no matter who they have at the helm, but the wrong coaching choice could prevent New York from bringing a trophy home years down the line. At the moment, it seems like Kurt Rambis is the wrong choice.