What Julius Randle must become in this next stage of his career
Once a role player, then an offensive engine, and last season a disaster, Julius Randle has taken many forms in his career. What form does Randle need to take to become a winning player again, in New York or elsewhere?
I am a fan of Julius Randle.
**ducks**
I say that without sarcasm, and people think I say it full of sarcasm. I am not here to rehash his shenanigans from last year — the inefficiency on offense, the antics and body language, the disinterest on defense — are all well-chronicled at this point.
Stylistically, though, he’s become the kind of player who, when he’s right, I enjoy aesthetically. Longtime Prez readers know I live for vicious crossovers, finesse finishes, and graceful but brutally quick movement. That’s Randle! Or, at least, a version of Randle. Specifically, a version of him that lives in my head. That’s the guy whose game I like.
In actuality? We’ve seen many versions of Randle, and squinted at and imagined several more. In projecting how he should play to succeed, these multiverses of Randle — both real and imagined — are marshaled as examples of what he needs to do to make the most of his skills. Here’s the thing: I think most of these examples are kind of misguided. He’s truly unique among current players in that his prior career path doesn’t offer much clue as to what he might play like in the future.
But to get to what he needs to become, we have to discuss what he’s been. Let’s quickly review some of these Randles, before we get to what he could metamorphosize into – either on the Knicks, or on another team – as he approaches 30.
Looking back at Randle
VERSION ONE: Lakers Small Ball Big Man Randle
His first few years in the league, he mostly plied his trade as a power forward, with emphasis on the power. Then in his final year on the Lakers at age 23 in the 2017-18 season, he played half his time at the 5. He played all 82 games, and achieved his first positive on-off rating while playing 26 minutes per game, sharing time at the 5 with Brook Lopez and Larry Nance Jr. and time at the 4 with the aforementioned Nance and Kyle Kuzma.
The team was not good at offense, but actually solid on defense. Now, let’s be clear — this wasn’t a 5-out offense when Julius was playing, as he only took 0.5 threes a game (compared to 4.5 for Brook). He did benefit from Brook’s spacing, though. Julius did his damage at the rim, with a career-high 55% of his FG coming from 0-3 feet, on a mix of post ups, transition drives, duck-ins and cuts, and simply catching it on the perimeter and turbo boosting by opposing bigs. For reference, 20% of his possessions were post-ups (which for him look less like traditional post-ups and are really a mix up back-to-the-basket and face-up moves); 12% of possessions were as the roll man, and he had a career high free throw rate of .47 (i.e. drawing fouls on almost half of his attempts). He shot 73% at the rim and had 99 dunks, and almost 20% of his offense was in transition – all of those marks are career-highs to this day. Check the tape above — this is real big man shit.
VERSION TWO: Pelicans Sidekick Big Man Randle
In New Orleans, he famously was a second fiddle to Anthony Davis. Neither really spaced, but both raced as Alvin Gentry’s offense churned out the third ranked pace in the league en route to the third-highest points per game in the NBA, despite mediocre 3-point shooting all around (crazy how much the league has changed in less than five years).
Julius himself was, again, an absolute boulder in transition (both this year and in LA he was near 1.1 PPP in transition, and took nearly 20% of his shots in transition). This run-and-gun Gentry Pels offense was helmed by Jrue Holiday, Elfrid Payton back when he used to actually pass, and random fantasy hoops waiver wire legend Tim Frazier, all of whom were grab-and-go triple-double threats.
Individually, Julius' roll-man attempts were almost halved, and he began dipping his twinkle toes into 3-point shooting, tripling his 3-point rate from just 5% of his shots to 18% of them. PnR was the sole domain of Anthony Davis, so instead Julius dabbled in both dunker spot and corner threes for the first time. He was not the main scorer, nor the main ball handler, but he did do a little self creation for the first time, even if most of his work was capitalizing on advantages created by others. He also still drew a ton of fouls and still took a hair under half his shots near the rim. Many catch-all metrics had this as his best year to date at the time, as part of the 13th-ranked offense in the league that year.
VERSION THREE: Prototype Wing Randle AKA FizRandle AKA Beyblade Randle
The less we say about this Julius the better. His first year in NYC was tumultuous, characterized by David Fizdale oddly giving him the keys to the offense as a wing creator and letting him bumble and spin move his way into oblivion many times per game. He played almost no center, and hardly got out in transition. His minutes and FGA both hit career highs by decent margins. He set then-career-highs in 3-point and mid range frequency, but still took 36% of his shots from 0-3 feet. Those threes were almost all assisted, as was the case in New Orleans. Finally, his turnover rate spiked to match his assist rate. The Knicks were not good.
VERSION FOUR: Prime Wing Gawd Randle
You know the story, so I won't belabor it. Insane jump shooting. Mismatch nightmare. Dime offs. Heroics, awards, playoffs, etc. What a time to be alive.
His number of dunks, his frequency of shots at the rim, and his cutting and roll-man frequency all plummeted. Thirty-seven percent of his shots were midrange jumpers (compared to 10% in New Orleans, for example), which he regularly cashed efficiently. He fully transformed into a jump shooting big wing who happened to be a good rebounder, and became a committed defender capable of being a 250-lb. help-defending roadblock, or a switchable menace 25 feet from the hoop. He ran the Knicks’ offense — not that it was a good one, but he carried it nonetheless. Some say the offense was capped by this style of play, but that sentiment didn’t really enter the public purview til the following year, and more blame was (rightfully, to me) laid at the feet of a lackluster supporting cast and an uncreative, slow-paced offense from coach Tom Thibodeau (recall all pre-Knicks Randles got near 20% of their offense on the break).
VERSION FIVE: Grasping Straws Wing Randle
The version we saw this year and are all expecting next year. In terms of play type and style, it resembled Version Four early on. The only problem was the jump shots were not falling. He wasn’t just regressing, his ability was vanishing. It was more than statistical regression, it was self-doubt manifested. He began passing on easy shots and demanding tougher, began getting into it with fans and teammates alike, if only to prove that Version Four — that alpha dawg — was still in there somewhere.
He did eventually try to adjust slightly — his roll man percentage ticked up, as did his percentage of shots near the rim as coach Thibs tried to get him easier, higher-percentage, less-ball-pounding-more-quickly-decided buckets. Alas, it was not enough to cure what ailed him. They were asking him to throw changeups more, when his fastball had no zip. The fastball — his shooting — was the problem, one that more changeups — be it rim rolls, quick decisions, transition — could not make up for.
The passive aggressiveness on offense morphed to just passiveness on the defensive end of the court, where the animal from 2021 was gone. He was replaced by someone who neither provided great wing defense nor good big man defense from the 4 spot, who schematically executed the bare minimum at most and abject laziness even more often.
IN SUM:
Randle, Looking Forward
So that list is kind of remarkable, is it not? Most guys — whether stars, role players, whoever — don’t have anywhere near the role variance Randle’s had in his still-young career. Taking my Knicks fan hat off, it’s fascinating and weird. With my Knicks hat on, it’s frustrating and weird.
OK. So my theory is that once Versions 4 and 5 were let into the world, the earlier versions — wholly big man Randle — became locked away forever. I don’t think you can ask someone who reached the highs he reached in 2021 by playing like a big ball-handling wing to morph back into an un-glamourous big. He has the contract, he had the feeling of adoration, he has a silhouette of the skillset, and you don’t let glory like that fade without trying to recapture the feeling. Not at age 27 entering your theoretical NBA prime.
I know many online who proclaim that “if only he played like he did before the Knicks, he could still be an effective player!” I don’t even think that is true, even if he could return to purely big man Randle. The role of the power forward is completely different now. Shooting back in 2017-18 was a luxury at the 4 spot, now it’s a necessity. You can count the teams with real stretch 5s on one hand, and assigning two spots or more to non-shooters for significant (if not a majority, in New York’s case) of the game automatically guarantees you will have a bottom-15 offense. If he played the 5 full time, a team would be sacrificing their rim protection (never a strong suit of his). Even the more switchable fives who roam like Bam Adebayo and Jarrett Allen and Precious Achiuwa and Maxi Kleber are probably better rim protectors than Julius. To me, there is no path to success for Randle that doesn’t involve him shooting at least decently and playing most of his minutes at the 4 spot. All the roll-man possessions in the world won’t make up for a lack of shooting if he’s a 4, and all the efficient small-ball 5 offense won’t make up for his lack of rim protection at the 5. It’s cool for a changeup, but not for a fastball.
(I don’t know enough sports to use other sports metaphors other than pitching/baseball ones, SORRY.)
Now, let us venture into the realm of the theoretical. There are three versions of Randle that have never been seen that I have heard hypothesized as the solution to what ailed him — and not just for the Knicks, mind you, but wherever he ends up. Julius could be playing in Utah for a tanking team, or could be back with Anthony Davis (and LeBron!) in Los Angeles.
Wing Randle: Take 4
This is probably the most commonly-imagined return to success, if my Twitter timeline is any indication. We’d see it for minute-long flashes.
The hypothesis is as follows: Randle will still be an offensive engine, just a little less so now that he will play with a TrUe PoInT GuArD like Jalen Brunson. He’ll still be a fulcrum, just not THE fulcrum. He’ll still be a big wing, but not all the time. He won’t shoot like Kawhi like he did in 2021, but he won’t shoot like Prime Jared Jeffries like he did last year either. As long as he hits some level of efficiency, he can still run New York’s offense passably. And maybe he’ll defend too! But also maybe he can roll more!
I think it’s unlikely simply because while two high-usage, on-ball guys are easy to incorporate, three becomes much harder. We see it with every super team — someone takes a backseat for pure time on the ball, Chris Bosh on the Heatles being the prime example. Almost always, one of the high-usage on-ball guys leans much more into spot-up duty or off-ball scoring (hi Ray Allen, hi Klay Thompson) or simply reduces their scoring role or minutes load heavily (hi Chris Paul, hi Manu Ginobli, hi Jordan Poole). I don’t think Randle – in NY with Brunson and RJ and Thibs – is reducing his minutes load significantly. Might he morph into an off-ball player at the 4? Highly unlikely. Even if he returns to passable shooting accuracy and volume, he’s not going to be nearly the off-ball guy many of those guys were.
Draymond Randle
Back to Benjy:
Look at that!
I’ve seen many Knicks fans lament that Randle doesn’t use his Draymond-esque combo of passing, size, speed, and handling to race up court and sprint into DHOs, swing the ball and then sprint to the recipient to screen for them, coordinate defenses, sack ball handlers, and surprise drivers at the rim. After all, we literally SAW him do it in that tweet!
That is unfair to Randle. Draymond really is a 1-of-1. Even other guys like Aaron Gordon who loosely approximate that intersection of size, length, speed, and strength don’t play like Draymond on offense all the time. They don’t have the latitude or the immense b-ball processing to do that THE WHOLE GAME, which requires encyclopedic knowledge of counters and counter-counters. Additionally, beyond the Xs and Os, there’s just no universe where Randle halves his shot attempts or something. Not at this point in his career.
Championship Jrue/Championship Wiggins Randle
Jrue Holiday and Andrew Wiggins hold the keys to success for Randle, in my opinion. This is ESPECIALLY true if the Knicks end up getting Donovan Mitchell, but it even holds true if they don’t. It’s also true if Randle ends up in Los Angeles playing off LeBron and AD.
The first thing to note is that both of them unequivocally accepted that they were not the first, nor the second option on offense. That doesn’t mean they were completely back-seated a la Chris Bosh – both Jrue and Wiggs had playoff explosions and big shots galore in their respective championship runs.
The second thing to note is that both are fully committed to defense. For Jrue, this surprised zero NBA basketball watchers.
For Wiggins, it was him fulfilling a promise left unfulfilled since his days as a teenage phenom in Canada and Kansas. Both consistently executed their schematic team defense responsibilities despite not being the best defender on their teams (though both great defenders, particularly Jrue), and both took pride in locking up high-level scorers of varying sizes when given a chance on the perimeter. For Julius, we’ve seen him do this before — once. Last year he was totally disinterested, so it would be a Wiggins-ian surprise if he returned to that defensive intensity while also reducing his role on offense.
The third thing to note is the nature of their shot diets.
For Jrue, he still initiated offense often, attacked mismatches, played both in the post and on the perimeter. He took seven threes per 100 possessions (not low frequency, but not high frequency, either), rarely hesitating when Giannis and Middleton helped create open threes for him, which he then hit at career-high rates. He attacked often and efficiently in transition. He did this while taking less total shots than he had in many years, including taking less shots at the rim and less at the line (due to not handling the ball as much) but making shots at the rim and the line at an increased rate (due to better shots at the rim and confidence at the line).
For Wiggins, he didn’t initiate, but he did attack mismatches both in the post and on the perimeter, took 7-8 threes per 100 possessions, and hit them at nearly 40%, rarely hesitating with Steph, Poole, and Dray created good threes for him. He attacked often and efficiently in transition (though not as much as Jrue or pre-Knicks Julius, but way more than Julius in New York). He did this while taking less shots than he had in many years, including taking less shots at the rim and less at the line (due to not handling the ball as much) but making shots at the rim and the line at an increased rate (due to better shots at the rim and confidence at the line).
You see where I am going here? This is the key! It exists, if he recommitted in the appropriate ways on defense and was respectable shooting jump shots on offense. It doesn’t require him to abandon being an on-ball player or even a passer, just him dialing down both. That being said, if he’s playing with Brunson and RJ, he needs to treat them with the respect that 31-year-old Jrue gave Giannis — the reigning best player on Earth — and elite high-usage bucket-getter Khris Middleton. He needs to respect them how Wiggins respected three future Hall-of-Famers and rising bucket-getter Jordan Poole. Brunson and RJ are awesome rising studs, but they have not achieved what those other guys have, and it is for that reason exactly that I believe that even though this solution exists on paper for Randle, it will never come to fruition in reality. He won't respect them like that if we’re keeping it 100. I just can’t envision an offense not run through him if the other “Main Guys” are RJ, JB, and Immanuel Quickley.
But what about Donny? Add Donovan Mitchell into the mix and you get MAYBE one player Randle will willingly defer to. He’s many things, but he’s not a guaranteed living legend express ticket HOFer like Giannis or Steph. Hell, Randle won’t even make that much less than Donny next year.
But LeBron and AD? I think actually he might do it in LA, to be honest. They hit the kind of unassailable criteria and clout levels that would unambiguously make Julius the third player in the Lakers’ hierarchy.
What the future holds
I don’t know if Randle will be a Knick this season. If he is, it will likely make for some strange times. Even if there is a theoretical way for it to work. If Donny Mitchell isn’t a Knick, I fully expect Randle to repeat what he did last year and all the mediocrity and mixed signals that likely come with that. RJ and Brunson aren’t going to take back seats to Randle, nor will he to them, and the resulting offense will be clunky and disjointed and full of oddities. If Donny is also a Knick, I really don’t think New York’s front office would commit to FOUR cooks in the kitchen. I think Randle would be gone. If not, then not only Randle, but likely RJ would have to take from the Wiggins/Holiday playbook, which becomes even harder. No successful stage play has had two actors playing one role on stage, after all. If Thibs could get that four-person (and arguably five, including IQ) ensemble to play their optimal roles, he should be an easy favorite for Coach of the Year, and also for the Grammy for best Orchestral Performance, and also the for Nobel Peace Prize, in my humble opinion.
Anyway, I hope, if anything, that reading this allowed for some odd appreciation to Randle’s unique, if not immediately recently frustrating career arc. He has immense talent, and has changed with a quickly-changing NBA, yet still somehow has not found a true identity. This crisis of self reflection was painful to watch, and for the sake of Randle and whoever his teammates are, I hope he resolves it. After all, no one likes playing with an asshole. But everyone loves playing with a champion. He doesn’t have to be the former, and if Jrue and Wiggins showed us anything, he could one day be the latter.
