Sixers 109, Knicks 89: “I’ve thrown away better”
The 76ers played with their food for a good thirty minutes, but the raw talent differential was too much to overcome for our mediocre City-Jersey-Beclothed, point-guardless gang of try-hards. Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid were too much to handle despite Julius Randle’s best efforts. Prez has your recap.
The quote above was courtesy of Clyde Frazier, already in midseason form, after Mike Breen asked him what he thought of the new Knicks City Jerseys designed by longtime Knick fan and streetwear maven Ronnie Fieg. It could also double as commentary on our point guard situation and our offense as a whole.
The first thing that will jump out at anyone who missed the game and decided to check the box score is that our new hopes, Immanuel Quickley and Obi Toppin, both sat with injuries. Of the two, Obi’s calf strain was of the slightly more severe variety (out 7-10 days). Say what you want about rookie learning curves, but entering the game vs. the brutalist, Morey-upgraded 76ers without your two most impactful shooters is a tough ask. Yes, I said Obi is one of the two most impactful shooters: while other guards are better shooters (and IQ is our best shooter), spacing from the 4 spot goes further than spacing from guards, who are all mostly expected to command some level of respect from deep (except Elf, as we’ll get into shortly).
The second thing a box-score reader would note is RJ Barrett’s 2-15 shooting night from hell. Coach Rivers stuck Defensive Player of the Year candidate Ben Simmons on RJB for the duration of the game. Ben is half a foot taller, longer, faster, just as strong, and cerebral. Combined with some genuine bad luck, it’s a recipe for the exact opposite of the near-perfect shooting performance RJ put on vs. the Pacers. RJB is many things, but even when he’s cooking, he isn’t a tough shot maker, and he would have needed to make tough shots or to get Simmons off of him entirely to win this battle.
What you won’t see in the box score is that most of the shots still came within the flow of the offense, and he continued to try to impact the game through other means too — namely on defense and by passing. After about 20 minutes of play, he did begin to press a bit, resulting in predictable passes than Ben was able to easily pick off. Rough night for RJB. At least he went 6-8 from the stripe! It will be interesting to see how he bounces back *checks notes* vs. the elite defending Milwaukee Bucks today. Yikes.
On that note, let’s take a quick cruise through the game:
In the first quarter, Julius was making quick decisions of both the scoring and passing variety. His first step on offense right now is as fast and deadly as i’ve ever seen it, and if he’s going to make quick decisions, pass out of double teams, hit cutting teammates, and use his spin move and fallaways not as crutches, but as weapons to be deployed during choice possessions? Yes, I will sign up for that. Did I mention the Knicks have now been cutting consistently for two games, after being the worst cutting team in the NBA? I’ll sign up for that, too.
The Knicks were fake competent in the first, and we even saw a little two-man game from Julius and RJB, as seen in the clip above. Nice to see, in light of their… let’s say, “frosty,” on-court relationship. Hopefully we see more of that.
The 76ers countered with Joel Embiid testing out his midrange jumper, his gift and his curse. Fortunately for the Knicks — and Mitchell Robinson and Nerlens Noel — he largely decided to take midrange shots rather than post up or play physical. Unfortunately, most of them went in. There was a lot of praise on Twitter for Mitch staying out of foul trouble vs. Joel, which I get… but to me, him fouling on perimeter play was never the issue. Dealing with physicality that causes Mitch to wack, reach, grab, and bump is where the important improvement lies.
The 76ers also took advantage of their size and length and the Knicks lineups to pack the paint, which made RJB’s struggles more understandable and Julius’ shot making all the more impressive. Specifically, they played five on four on defense and on offense for most of the game:
Elfrid Payton continued to do nothing helpful on either end for Mitch, RJ, or Julius. The book is out on him now, and it’s not even a question of if teams will zone up the Knicks: they’ll simply abandon Elfrid, whose shot looks worse than ever. He ended up 0-6 with three rebounds and one assist in 18 horrible minutes, getting lit up by Seth Curry in the process. On offense, he hardly provides meaningful penetration now because teams know he’s a mediocre finisher without a floater, so they can cheat between New York’s (limited) shooters and him. Joel would stick with Mitch as he rolled and dare Elf to pass through him or shoot a pull-up/floater, which he would never try. On defense, everything Elf gives you with passing lane prowess is given back on screens, where he consistently dies and insists on never rear-view contesting, driving me fucking crazy every time, especially when his mark — the ever underrated Seth Curry — is a master of moving off screens and off-ball.
In the second quarter, DSJ, Burks, and Kevin Knox were first off the bench. I don’t know if it is part of DSJ’s new playbook or Thibs’, but the majority of possessions for him this game involve crossing half court and getting the fuck out of the way, spotting up somewhere, and maybe running secondary action. It was really point guard by committee. DSJ continued to be a brick-fest, and you could see Thibs’ patience being tested as he missed a few off-ball rotations and sprinkled in some awful closeouts, both of which you can see on the play below.
The Knicks managed to stay afloat thanks to the combination of Alec Burks’ continued remarkable shot making, along with Randle continuing to be lit aflame. Burks has been quite impressive early on with his combination of spot-up shooting, off-the-dribble shooting, and decision-making. Rarely does he do something I wholly disagree with on either end.
Doc eventually deployed new 76er Dwight Howard and fully exposed Nerlens Noel’s limitations as a skinny center and Kevin Knox’s limitations as a skinny power forward. Nine points and six boards for Dwight, most of which came in a short span in the second quarter. We often talk about Noel and Mitch’s similarities, but forget that Mitch has three inches of height, more inches of length, and 30 pounds on Nerlens, and it showed during this game. Mitch was much better able to handle Dwight. But Joel? At the end of the half, Ben and Joel began posting up, which resulted in a foul or bucket every time. I don’t know that the Knicks have an answer for that, when those two put their mind to it. Philly entered the half up 60-55.
During the third, Elf continued to find new ways to be bad beyond missing shots and dying on screens. Watch Elf and Seth on the play below. RJB makes a great pass, but don’t pay attention to that. Watch the Elf-brick and Seth’s close out. Seth ignores him and promptly sprints out, and Elf lolligags up the court. This shit happens all the time.
Sometimes Philly would put Ben on Elf, allowing him to play free safety and wreak havoc in the paint. At one point it felt like Ben had 25 deflections. Check another beautiful pass from RJB below, and watch how Ben is concerned with Mitch and RJB and only jumps back toward Elf when it seems like Elf is the only logical release valve for RJB. It was one of the rare instances where RJB got the better of Simmons, by going for a high difficulty maneuver to fool Ben, ignore Elf, and assist Mitch.
Things began to fall apart for the Knicks on offense, but they did show some consistent multiple effort rotations. They finally doubled Embiid on the possession below, and you can see them talking and rotating around before Danny Green turns it over via offensive foul. The rotations are clearly not instinctual yet, but you can see the Knicks thinking and talking, which is a step up from last year.
Dennis came in again in the fourth because Elf was so goddamn awful, and because the point guard-less lineup wasn’t faring too great either. Burks can pull up, but couldn’t pass like a point, and RJB could pass, but couldn’t pull up. Both were struggling with simple things like entry passes. Back to Dennis — in the five possessions DSJ brought the ball up the court he 1) let Julius initiate; 2) let Julius initiate but got in on the action by shooting a three that hit backboard only; 3) pushed in semi transition; 4) let Burks initiate; and 5) finally ran a pick-and-roll, creating a foul. He also showcased the limits of “good effort” in 1-on-1 defense, as Philly players simply shot over him from midrange. As much as certain Knick fans want to give him a participation trophy for having good effort, if you’re shorter with short arms that effort doesn’t mean a single thing to the opponent. This is why even when he tries on defense, he’s still a net negative on that end. Look at this shit:
The 76ers let Shake Milton iso on Dennis, and even though he tries his hardest, he doesn’t really impact the fadeaway. SHAKE MILTON!
Between him and Elf, the Knicks have no point of attack pressure at all from the 1, on top of providing no spacing and no pick-and-roll play. It’s not really sustainable, and it’s why I do expect IQ and Frank to be the nominal point guards by the time we hit game 20, even if both of them operate off-ball in some of their time on the court with Burks and RJB. At least both of them can get two feet in the paint and leverage that through passing and finishing.
The life was draining from both teams late in the game. RJB continued to miss layups and jumpers, and though the Knicks got it to single digits, the game outcome was never in question. Frank and Theo Pinson made guest appearances with two minutes left, causing me to wonder if Frank is 1) really buried behind Dennis and Elf and the other guards, or 2) Thibs prefers to use 10 man rotations so that guys can get into rhythm, or 3) Thibs was to some degree saving Frank for the Bucks game today. I suspect it’s a combination of 2 and 3, and if it IS No. 1, I suspect Elf and Dennis will continue to do all they can to ensure Frank gets a shot.
And that was that. Despite the game remaining close, this was mostly a piece of butter meeting a buzzsaw. But save for Burks and Randle drawing fouls and hitting off the dribble shots with aplomb, this would have been a blowout much sooner.
Lastly, this wouldn’t be a Prez recap if I didn’t leave you with a little something something related to the draft, so i encourage folks to check out this Sports Illustrated recap of Jonny Kuminga and Jalen Green’s latest exploits in the G-League, which has now settled on a 18-team bubble including Kuminga and Green’s G League Ignite team.
