Another Season in the Books, Another Big Thank You

Another season has closed and I wanted to take a moment and thank you guys for keeping up with the blog.

When I first started this thing, I was literally only writing to myself.

Somehow - and I’m still not really sure how - a lot of you guys started following.

Special shout out to:

therealbigs
blancita
tensionandthrill
iadoree-xb
steffierenee
thatrealish
marcusjohn
thenalu
rzepka
musicalgenius51

For being the first 10 to follow the blog.

If I had the attention span to individually call out all my followers.. trust me, I would!

The season didn’t end the way we all wanted to, but … that’s what next season is for.. and the season after that and after that.. and so on.

What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over expecting a different outcome?

Is being a fan of the Knicks a form of insanity?

Ha, probably.

Anyway, thank you, thank you, thank you to my followers on Tumblr and certainly to my readers outside of Tumblr.

I post as a result excitement, confusion, anger, distaste.. pretty much every emotion on the spectrum.

But, what has emerged as the main reason I post?

You guys.

Oh… as with every off-season, the frequency of posting will slow down a bit. I’ll figure out new things here and there over the next few months to keep things interesting.

The Season that Could Have Been… is Over.

I’ll start this by saying, I realize the Knicks are light years apart from the piece of crap squad James Dolan had running around on the Garden floor throughout the 2000s. The team this year was INFINITELY better.

But, with low expectations… it just doesn’t hurt as much when your season is over.

The 2012-2013 New York Knicks were built to win “now.”

I believed in the plan of surrounding our core guys (Melo, STAT, Chandler, Felton, JR, Shump) with veterans.

This year’s team was different. I expected them to perform well. In fact, they exceeded my expectation by winning the Atlantic Division and earning a two seed in the Eastern Conference.

Before the season started… I wanted just a first round win. Maybe I should have stuck with that expectation.

But along the way - I started believing. Things were just falling into place. There were key injuries (Rondo, Granger, Rose, Bynum) and key departures (Dwight Howard to LA, Joe Johnson to BK) that pretty much opened up the Eastern Conference for the Knicks.

As the season progressed, I truly felt we were on a collision course to face Miami in the Eastern Conference Finals. From that point, who knows what would have happened?

I know Miami would have beaten us, but deep down - I want to believe we had a shot … based solely on Miami one weakness - defending the three pointer - being our biggest strength. There is a reason why we went 3-1 against them in the regular season (granted key players were out for Miami that last game).

If the Knicks had any chance at winning a title in the near term… it was this year.

But that all came crashing down against the Pacers. The f*cking Indiana Pacers.

So what happened in that series? Pretty simple.

We had no answer for Roy Hibbert - yes Tyson was hurt, but… Kenyon couldn’t keep him out of the paint either. Makes you wonder where the hell was Camby?

Indiana OWNED the glass - they are the best rebounding team in the league and it showed. Each player on their team rebounds the ball well… and it annoyed the hell out of me that we couldn’t keep Lance Stephenson off the boards. Every rebound took so much effort from us. Nothing was easy.

Non-Existent Three Point Shooting - Indiana showed off why they were the best at defending the three ball. Yes, JR was in a slump… but the Pacers had something to do with it too.

When you look at it like that - our chances were pretty slim against Indy. They’re two biggest strengths - Rebounding and Perimeter Defense - is the formula for shutting our team down… and it worked big time.

So now what?

In short - we’re stuck with this team for the next two season. A lot of little things can happen to change the make-up… but for now - be prepared to go into next season with mostly the same squad.

My next post will take a look at our options in the off-season.

Till then, I’m going to go back to curling up in a little ball of sorrow that I came out of just to write this post.

Just kidding… not really, but.. you know.

One thing I’m looking forward to next season? Iman Shumpert.

Q:if you were GM and JR Smith ended up taking an offer elsewhere, who would you be looking at in free agency? Personally, its tough to find a replacement to fill in JR's shoes, but if we develop Shump into a 10-14 a night scorer... i wouldn't mind looking at the possibility of taking Tony Allen. We need more players with that tough grit & are consistent perimeter defenders. Also i remember few weeks back over ESPN-NY radio that a push for KG is a possibility...

robbyrise

great question - I’m going to put together a whole post on options for the summer.

No doubt a need is a consistent second scorer and a rebounding big man. Defense all around needs an improvement.

Stay tuned.

I will be back next season along with my big brother @TheRealJRSmith … Will be a blessing to wear my Knicks uniform.. Prep for 2014 is now

Chris Smith (JR Smith’s Brother) via Twitter - to be honest… if we get JR Smith back here for only 5 million per season - that’s not bad at all. He can definitely get more in the open market - but he said it himself - he wants to retire a Knicks.

Let the offseason moves begin!

Oh, I’ll have a end of the season recap post coming soon.

Better team won this series

Hibbert was just way too much, had no answer for him. Couldn’t get him out of the paint, couldn’t attack him.

Melo was huge this game, but faded at the most important time.

Can’t say enough about Iman. Gave us a shot.

Good luck against Miami, Indy.

Game 6 @ IND - May 18th, 8:00 PM EST on ESPN

Series: Indiana Leads 3-2
Betting Line: Pacers by 5.0 (O/U 178.5)

Let’s see if we can keep this momentum going… well, we kind of have to, don’t we?

Knicks are in full on survival mode.

JR Smith took a huge step forward last game in regaining his shot/confidence. He’s not all the way there yet.

We haven’t won a game in Indiana yet this series. It’s a tough place to play and the Pacers seems like a completely different team when they play at home… especially Hibbert. Appears his motor jams up when he is traveling.

I’m going through every single emotion you can right now waiting for this game to start.

I don’t want the season to end just yet.

Let’s bring this shit back to the Garden!

Game Note: Frank Vogel said he is preparing for the game as if George Hill is NOT playing. Won’t know for sure until we get closer to the game.