l***o
发帖数: 1111 | 1 Howard Beck写的几篇文章都很客观，he understands Lin and Knicks situation well.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/09/sports/basketball/for-the-kni
For Knicks, Distraction by Addition
By HOWARD BECK
Published: March 8, 2012
The optics are troubling for any Knicks fan who has spent a moment
poring over the standings or pondering the counterintuitive influence
of Carmelo Anthony.
The Knicks are 2-5 since Anthony rejoined the lineup, after going 6-1
without him. They have lost three consecutive games for the first time
since January. Their offense is deteriorating, their cohesion is
withering and Jeremy Lin is slipping.
Every whispered fear that Anthony might ruin the Lin renaissance has
gained visual traction. The truth is more complicated.
The schedule has been much tougher since Anthony returned, with the
Knicks (18-21) losing road games in Miami, Boston, Dallas and San
Antonio. And the rotation has undergone a drastic overhaul, with
Anthony, J. R. Smith and Baron Davis joining the fray over the last
two weeks.
The sudden abundance of talent, which may ultimately be an asset, for
now looks like a burden, with Coach Mike D’Antoni trying to assimilate
too many players and placate too many egos. The Knicks were at their
best last month with a tight eight-man group, with narrowly defined
roles. The rotation is now 10 deep, with fewer minutes and fewer shots
for everyone.
“A little bit of a transition,” D’Antoni said earlier this week, “but
it’s a good transition.”
The hope is that more talent means fresher legs and more production
across 48 minutes. But it does not always work out that way in the
N.B.A. This may be a case where more is less.
Lin is trying to maintain his head of steam — against increased
defensive pressure — while balancing the need to keep Anthony, Amar’e
Stoudemire, Tyson Chandler and Smith involved and active. It is a
heavy responsibility for a virtual rookie who has been starting for
only the past 15 games.
The logjam at shooting guard, where Landry Fields is now splitting
time with Smith and Iman Shumpert, seems to be diminishing all of
them, Fields in particular.
Overlooked amid the tumult, and the intense focus on the Anthony-Lin
dynamic, is that Davis and Smith have mostly been horrible.
Smith is shooting 38 percent from the field, and 27 percent on
3-pointers, which are supposed to be his strength. Davis has been
worse, shooting .237 from the field and a horrific .150 from beyond
the arc (3 of 20). Both players have lived up to their reputations as
free shooters who are liable to break the offense at any moment to
launch a 26-footer.
D’Antoni has been patient, knowing that he will need Davis’s
playmaking and big-game experience in the spring, and that Smith is
favored by top team officials. They could pay dividends in the
playoffs, but their erratic play is hurting the Knicks in the short
term.
Then again, it is early for both players. Davis is still regaining his
form, after taking nearly 10 months to recover from a herniated disk.
Smith was playing in China four weeks ago.
And then there is Anthony. After a 6-point, 2-of-12 night in Dallas on
Tuesday, he flatly admitted that he was having trouble adjusting to an
offense in which Lin is the primary ball-handler and playmaker.
“I think anytime you go from the early part of the season, just having
the ball and me just having the ball and being the distributor, and
now just running the wings and waiting for the ball to come to me,
that’s quite an adjustment for myself,” Anthony said.
The results so far are discouraging.
In the 240 minutes that Lin and Anthony have shared the court, the
Knicks’ offense has produced a rating of 97.8 points per 100
possessions, according to an analysis by Tom Haberstroh of ESPN.com.
When Lin plays without Anthony (394 minutes), the rating shoots up to
105.2. When Anthony plays without Lin (719 minutes), the rating is
98.7.
Anthony’s player-efficiency rating — a formula that tries to quantify
every contribution — is 21.7 when Lin is on the bench. When Lin plays,
Anthony’s rating drops to 13.2, according to Haberstroh.
The sample sizes are small, and the relationship between Anthony and
Lin is still developing. Their chemistry could improve over the final
seven weeks. It has to for the Knicks to get anywhere in the playoffs.
•
Anthony is the Knicks’ most dynamic player and their franchise star.
But there is little chance that D’Antoni will take the ball out of
Lin’s hands now. The Knicks’ offense ranked in the bottom third of the
league with Anthony as the primary ball-handler. It has been at its
best since Lin became the everyday point guard.
So the Knicks are coping with yet another midseason upheaval,
mirroring the struggles after the trade for Anthony last year.
In the N.B.A., stability is critical to success. The Spurs — still
dominating with a lineup led by Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony
Parker — provided a vivid reminder while routing the Knicks on
Wednesday. Those three have been together for 10 years.
Stoudemire and Anthony have been teammates for 12 tumultuous months,
with Chandler arriving in December and Lin (effectively) in February.
The rotation today bears little resemblance to the one in January.
Twenty-seven games is not much time to make a move in the standings.
But it should be enough for the Knicks to reshape their identity in a
season of constant change. |
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