Apr 22 2013

What Would Ryan Lochte Do? “Pilot”

Ryan Lochte did some stuff on TV yesterday and you might have tragically missed it. Here’s the recap!

ryan-lochte-face-wwrld

We’ve decided to give the Knicks a break here at the Meloship and provide some essential writing on the wonderful national treasure that is Ryan Lochte. So begins a weekly thing, for better or worse, where I will write recaps of episodes of “What Would Ryan Lochte Do?” in an attempt to make Mondays a little less terrible. Or more terrible. We’ll see. Jeah, this should be interesting.

We begin the inaugural episode of What Would Ryan Lochte Do? (WWRLD) with our hero and a large group of people called the “Lochterage” (Spectacular wordplay. We’re already off to a great start.) walking down the streets of Gainesville, Florida getting ready to play quite possibly the most intense game of flag football ever. Quickly, we are introduced to Lochte’s assistant/BFF Gene and his younger brother Devon. Devon, of course, is rocking a tuxedo shirt. Ryan, not to be out-bro’d, is wearing a tank-top that says “LochteNation” on it and keeps saying that over and over again to describe the group. The teams split into a shirts-vs-skins game, and shockingly, the real-life Aquaman quickly takes off his shirt. Some things to know about the game: More

By • Uncategorized • 0

Apr 22 2013

JR Smith Wins Sixth Man of the Year

Hey! JR Smith won Sixth Man of the Year!

JR

I have no issues with JR winning this award as I would’ve voted for him if I had a ballot. My mock ballot looked like this:

1. JR Smith

2. Ryan Anderson

3. Matt Barnes

4. Jarrett Jack

5. Jamal Crawford.

Winning 6MOY has become an award about wing scorers, and JR certainly would fit into that category, but that isn’t why I think he’s deserving of winning. If you looked at the majority of this season, he was largely inefficient shooting the ball (remember the ridiculous JR for all-star campaign?). Over the last month and a half, he’s been fantastic, but the season isn’t comprised of just it’s last month and a half. If this was an award about efficient scoring, Ryan Anderson is my runaway winner. But it’s not. More

By • 2013 Playoffs, Analysis/Opinions • 1 • Tags: ,

Apr 21 2013

Thoughts From Game 1

Instead of doing normal recaps of the games, I’m going to do something different. Due to the length in-between games, I’m going to have ample time to review each game and I’ll write about things I did/didn’t like about each game.

JR Dunk

The Knicks took out Boston 85-78 in game 1 at Madison Square Garden. It was a defensive grinder and in the end the Knicks ball security and offensive rebounding were the difference. New York finished a +6 in offensive rebounds (scoring 12 second chance points) and won the turnover battle 20 to 13. In what finished as a 7 point game, those 13 extra possessions ended up playing a huge role in the Knicks victory.

Let’s start with the Knicks defense, which was subpar in the first half. For whatever reason, they were super lazy with their rotations, allowing Boston to shoot a bunch of open corner threes. The Celtics were unable to capitalize because they can’t shoot, but the Knicks still have to clean this up.

Avery Bradley, running point for Boston by default, was a thorn in the side of both the Knicks and the Celtics. I’ll explain. Exposing a bad habit that’s been a problem all year for New York, Bradley took advantage of ball watching, bad double teams, and lazy/non-existent help defense to score on a series of cuts in the first half.

If you notice Carmelo Anthony on those plays, his help defense was pretty pitiful. Though Bradley shouldn’t have those kind of open looks to the lane, a simple close off rotation from Anthony into the lane would have negated some of those baskets. His effort was much better in the second half, as was the team’s. Bradley’s cuts weren’t an issue for New York after halftime. Regardless, look for Boston to try and manufacture some baskets throughout the series with cutters. I would. More

By • 2013 Playoffs • 1

Apr 19 2013

Knicks-Celtics Playoff Preview

It feels right that the Knicks will have to go through the Celtics on the road back to NBA prominence. Though the Knicks won 54 games, this season means absolutely nothing if they flame out in the first round of the playoffs. The Celtics may not be the the same dominant force we’ve seen been in recent memory, but they are certainly not a team to take likely. We’ve seen unlikely playoff runs before from Doc Rivers’ group in the past, and with the third ranked defensive in basketball another deep run is certainly possible. With all the chaos and tragedy that struck the state of Massachusetts over the last week, you know the Celtics are going to come out fired up and ready to play. All that being said, the Knicks are the much better team and should win this series handily.

Mike Woodson has been a very pleasant surprise this season – re-inventing his previously ball-sticky isolation oriented offense into a spread pick and roll attack that finished third in the NBA in offensive efficiency thus inserting himself into the conversation for coach of the year. Carmelo Anthony had the best season of his career after a wildly disappointing 2011 campaign. JR Smith is going to win Sixth Man of the Year, having transformed himself from an inconsistent long range gunner to an efficient multi-faceted scorer over the last two months of the season. This was the best Knicks season I’ve seen in my basketball watching lifetime, and it’s not close. It’s time for them to take the next step. More

By • 2013 Playoffs, Analysis/Opinions • 0 • Tags: ,

Apr 19 2013

JR Smith: The Chosen One

LOL

Written by JS Gunther

Rejoice!! Not only are the Knicks headed to the playoffs but they wrapped up the Atlantic Division and the 2 seed in the East!! If you had told me in September that the season would play out this way, I would have assumed you were the devil and were interested in attaining my soul. Undoubtedly, the Knicks had a season to celebrate. And on top of that celebration, we also had the NBA’s scoring champion (congrats Melo!) and the potential (probable?) 6th Man of the Year.

Allow me to take a trip back to the previously alluded to past September before the 2012-13 NBA season started, back in the days when many believed the Lakers to be a potential 70 win team and the Andrew Bynum acquisition was a steal for the 76ers, Jonathan Abrams wrote a piece (link to JR Grantland article) about that potential 6th Man of the Year, one Earl Smith III, a.k.a. J.R. Smith, for Grantland. In this article, Abramsʼ general thesis questions J.R.ʼs erratic nature and whether or not it is a function of him being misguided or is it simply a case of J.R. being misunderstood by fans, coaches, teammates, and anyone else even remotely associated with the NBA. While Abrams did a phenomenal job, what he did not stress enough is what J.R. Smith truly has been over the course of his 9 seasons: frustrating. Frustrating to his teammates. Frustrating for his coaches (see Karl, George). But mostly, he has been frustrating to the fans of the teams that have employed him through the years. But that changed this season…potentially? More

By • 2013 Playoffs, Analysis/Opinions • 0

Apr 18 2013

James Will Be Talking Knicks Today With Art Rondeau

Today at 8 PM EST, James will be talking Knicks-Celtics with Art Rondeau. You can watch it here, or go to the spreecast site itself. Be sure to tune in and participate in the chat

By • 2013 Playoffs, Spreecasts • 0

Apr 18 2013

Meloship of the Ring Podcast – Episode 1

Dan and I recorded the inaugural Meloship of the Ring podcast. We set out with the goal of talking basketball, which we did relatively well. We discussed the Knicks new signings, as well as the upcoming Knicks-Celtics playoff series.

*Note* We know Dan’s sound was a bit quiet and muffled. It won’t be next time.

Tonight, join us on Spreecast as James talks Knicks with the great Art Rondeau. Here is the link to that:

http://www.spreecast.com/events/talking-knicks-with-art-rondeau–2

 

 

By • Podcasts, Uncategorized • 0

Apr 17 2013

Knicks Sign Earl Barron

Earl Barron Jason Kidd orange boarder

EARL BARRON IS BACK. Following Rasheed Wallace’s retirement from earlier today (he’ll find a rec league), Earl Barron is back with the Knicks after a three year period of being in exile from New York. Yes, the same guy that Knick fans thought was going to be the team’s starting center during the 2010-11 season. Barron will be eligible for the upcoming playoffs this Saturday against the Celtics. What a weird turn of events the last couple of days; first, King Solomon Jones was waived a couple of days ago, resulting in the signing Quentin Richardson to fill in that roster spot yesterday, then today with Earl Barron filling in Sheed’s vacant spot. Some things about Earl:

  • No, Ronny Turiaf isn’t replacing him. 
  • Who knows what we’ll get in him? Knick fans said the same with Kenyon Martin, but hopefully Barron can do something like this in limited significant minutes. That was Barron’s breakout game, in which everyone thought he was going to become a superstar, because, you know, he was essentially the only hope.
  • Barron is happy to be back in New York, apparently, and it makes a lot of sense.
  • He also has a championship ring. So, you know what that means…PLAYOFF EXPERIENCE (pfffft)!

Lots of people jokingly said Earl may come back to New York, but those jokes turned into facts. Welcome back, Earl! Two Earls is better than one!

By • Free Agent Talk, Management • 0

Apr 16 2013

Taylor’s All-NBA Teams

 

Tyson

All-NBA Team discussions are always fun this time of year so I thought I’d chip in and put mine up here with a little bit of justification for each. Let me know if you agree/disagree with my selections.

First Team

G – Chris Paul

G – Russell Westbrook

F – LeBron James

F – Kevin Durant

C – Marc Gasol

The two spots for debate here are Westbrook’s guard spot and the center spot. More

By • Analysis/Opinions, Carmelo Anthony • 0

Apr 16 2013

Knicks Sign Quentin Richardson

qrichEarlier today, basically out of the blue, the Knicks signed Quentin Richardson, closing the open roster spot they had from cutting King Solomon Jones. Richardson played with the Knicks from 2005-2009, and holds career averages of 10.3 points per game, 4.7 rebounds per game, and is a 35% three point shooter. This move isn’t that significant, or at least lets hope it isn’t that significant. Also, Richardson is playoff-eligible. Some brief thoughts:

  • Once a Knick Always a Knicks! It looks like the Knicks are becoming very committed to this slogan. However, I was kinda hoping that players from Knicks teams we try so, so hard to forget would be, um, forgotten from this new campaign. If the Knicks bring back Jerome James, look for them to have a 10 year anniversary night for the 2005-2006 Knicks, where every fan in attendance gets a replica NBA Draft Lottery ping-pong ball.
  • Here’s Q-Rich blowing a dunk against Maccabi Tel Aviv.
  • For those of you that weren’t following the Knicks during those terrible years (and god bless you, really) or have drank enough alcohol to forget them, you may not know that Q-Rich is not a big fan of Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett. That being said, I’d very much like for those guys not be extra-angry when playing the Knicks. 
  • And here’s Richardson and Garnett getting into a skirmish.
  • Hopefully Richardson doesn’t have to play unless the Knicks are up by 25 and Woodson clears the bench. If he gets burn in a situation other than that, I guess he can’t really be worse than James White. So there’s that.
  • Headbands! Melo and K-Mart are already avid wearers of headbands, and I can’t remember Richardson playing for the Knicks without one. I suggest a rule change for the playoffs where the team with the most headbands wins.

And that’s it! The Knicks close out the regular season against the Hawks tomorrow, and then get ready to play the Celtics on Saturday, time still to be determined.

By • Management • 1

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