Over time, Tom Thibodeau has garnered the status of the top coach who runs his gamers into the bottom by taking part in them extreme minutes.
Throughout final 12 months’s playoffs, the Knicks misplaced OG Anunoby and Mitchell Robinson to accidents, and even franchise star Jalen Brunson ended his postseason marketing campaign with a fractured hand. After New York crashed out of the playoffs, Celtics legend Paul Pierce blamed Thibodeau for mismanaging his gamers and inflicting them to endure accidents.
This season, Thibodeau is seemingly proper again at it once more. Via the primary quarter of the season, three of the highest 10 gamers in minutes per recreation are Knicks starters — Mikal Bridges (1st: 38.2), Josh Hart (sixth: 37.2) and Anunoby (tenth: 36.6). Though Jalen Brunson (34.8) and Karl-Anthony Cities (33.5) are logging fewer minutes, each All-Stars have seen a major uptick in minutes over the previous week or so.
On Wednesday, Brunson logged 36 minutes within the second night time of a back-to-back in opposition to the Mavericks after taking part in 38 minutes the earlier recreation. Cities, too, logged 70 minutes throughout the 2 video games. The 129-114 loss in Dallas wasn’t shocking, as New York was coming off taking part in within the Denver altitude lower than 24 hours earlier than.
The Knicks starters had been clearly fatigued, and in an excellent world, Thibodeau would have been sensible sufficient to scale back their workload, particularly after the Mavs ran away with a 60-37 lead on the half. Nevertheless, even because the Knicks starters had been out of fuel — and struggled to run again on transition — Thibodeau stored them within the recreation for prolonged stretches.
At that time, one could not assist however marvel if Thibodeau hadn’t realized his classes from his earlier years within the NBA.
Knicks want a bench
It additionally would not assist that the Knicks have an almost nonexistent bench, with solely Miles McBride (25.6) and Cameron Payne (18.3) taking part in over quarter-hour an evening.
As compared, their Japanese rivals such because the Celtics, Cavaliers and Bucks all have a number of gamers off the bench logging over quarter-hour. Whereas the Celtics have 4 such gamers — Payton Pritchard (27.3), Sam Hauser (21.3), Neemias Queta (19.2) and Luke Kornet (17.2) — the Cavaliers are blessed with a deep bench within the type of Caris LeVert (24.4), Georges Niang (20.0), Sam Merrill (19.5), Isaac Okoro (20.8), Dean Wade (21.9) and Ty Jerome (19.3). Even the Bucks have Gary Trent Jr. (25.5), AJ Inexperienced (19.8), Pat Connaughton (17.9) and Delon Wright (16.7) to assist ease the workload on the starters.
The Knicks must desperately bolster their bench. If not, they may very well be staring down a redux of the 2024 postseason.
