New York Knicks: 3 issues for Tom Thibodeau to address

3. Julius Randle’s role

Yes, the Knicks explored trade options for Randle during the season, and I’m sure they’ll do it again. But don’t write Julius Randle off on a Thibodeau team just because he struggles on defense. Thibodeau played Carlos Boozer for 1,882 minutes during the 62-win season in 2010-11, and the team was first in defensive rating anyway. Thibodeau has won with minus defenders before, and he can do it again.

Despite all the criticism, Julius Randle faced from fans this season, myself included, it’s not because he isn’t talented. But from day one, he was asked to do something that he wasn’t capable of doing. Ex-head coach David Fizdale wanted Randle to run the offense similar to LeBron James.

Fizdale put Randle in a position where he was doomed to fail. I don’t believe Thibodeau will do that. It doesn’t take a basketball savant like Thibs to recognize that Randle shouldn’t be playing the point forward position.

Being the top guy was too much for Randle. After shooting a whopping 34.4 percent from 3-point range in 2018-19, Randle fell into the classic big man trap and decided he was going to take more threes this season. He averaged more field goal attempts, 3-point attempts, and turnovers this season than last, but his points per game and shooting percentages plummeted.

With Thibodeau in charge, hopefully, Randle will move back towards the role that he thrived in during his breakout season with the New Orleans Pelicans. He wasn’t running the offense on the same team as Anthony Davis and Jrue Holiday. A vast majority of Randle’s field goals were assisted while he played off the ball a lot, and he did it very well.

Randle’s play type data was extremely balanced. According to Synergy, his most common play type was transition (3.6), followed by spot-up (3.5), post-up (3.4), isolation (2.5), cut (1.9), offensive rebounds (1.8), and roll man (1.4). The big man sprinkled in a little of everything last year.

This season was a different story. Randle’s isolation possessions increased significantly to 3.2 per game while his spot-ups took up 4.1 possessions per game. His transition possessions took a sharp decline to just 2.3 possessions per game.

To add some context to the transition numbers, the Pelicans were third in pace for the 2018-19 season, while the 2019-20 Knicks were 22nd. Just a simple case of fewer opportunities there. Maybe that’s not a good thing for Randle because he stands out the most when he’s playing off the ball.

According to Synergy, Randle finished in the 91st percentile of efficiency on 101 roll man possessions last season. Although he had great chemistry with Elfrid Payton — sometimes to the detriment of their teammates — Randle’s productivity didn’t measure up this season. He finished in the 28th percentile on fewer attempts.

Moving to a lesser role is not an insult to Randle. If his best role is coming off the bench as a rim runner who crashes the offensive glass and just beats the crap out of guys in the paint, then that’s what he should be doing. The Knicks could try him in more of a Montrezl Harrell role next season, as opposed to a LeBron James one. Unfortunately, Thibodeau’s history of ignoring his bench makes it unlikely Randle will move there.

After being the primary option on a team for the first time in his NBA career, you can’t imagine Randle will be happy accepting a demotion anyway. But Thibodeau is old school. If history repeats itself, Randle won’t get an explanation from Thibodeau anyway. He’ll just get benched.