The Knicks may have been onto something with Tim Hardaway Jr. all along. As Marc Berman of the New York Post writes, the shooting guard, whose four-year, $71MM contract was ridiculed at the time of signing, is starting to live up to his lofty contract.
Over the course of the past nine games, the 25-year-old has averaged 20.4 points and 5.3 rebounds per game. Now, as Newsday’s Barbara Barker writes in her own feature, the swingman is stepping up as a valuable No. 2 option for the Knicks behind Kristaps Porzingis.
While the deal was initially panned when it was announced, Berman reasons that Steve Mills and the Knicks’ front office, leery of losing out on another coveted free agent, had to offer a big enough deal to discourage the Hawks from matching.
There’s more Knicks news today:
- First-year point guard Frank Ntilikina has thrived for the Knicks on both ends of the ball. His impact thus far into his rookie campaign has been beyond what most predicted, Ian Begley of ESPN writes. “It’s great that a young guy comes into this league with more defensive principles than the offensive principles,” head coach Jeff Hornacek said. “It’s hard to teach.”
- The Knicks have more confidence in their offense now that Jeff Hornacek has been cleared to run his own plays, ESPN’s Ian Begley writes. “Our guys are feeling comfortable with what we’re running,” the coach said. “We’re going to get better at that. It’s a style most of those guys like to play. It makes it easier for them.“
- With Phil Jackson out of the picture, the Knicks’ front office is easing tension with Janis Porzingis. Marc Berman of the New York Post writes that the brother of Kristaps Porzingis, who also serves as the star’s agent, was recently seen amiably chatting with team president Steve Mills and general manager Scott Perry.
Can’t really give the Knicks credit for Hardaway, they traded him away in the first place.
Yea but they gave him a deal that everybody said was overpriced and so far it looks to be working out
Actually, the contract looks worse than it did when they gave it to him. For a rookie, maybe looking at what a guy has done in the last __ games is meaningful. He’s a veteran at this point. His overall numbers (FG%, DPM) stink. He’s a guy with excellent isolation type offensive talent who can make his own shot. But extremely streaky and (most importantly) is subpar in all other areas of the game. He upgraded his defense to well below average last year (oh how great!). He has no vision (other than tunnel vision) and is a reluctant and poor passer in any case, and, with Melo gone, our #1 ball stopper. He’s an 11-12 mm player like Atlanta (and it appears the rest of the league) thought. He would make a good leading scorer for the second unit (when he’s on, and benched when he’s in one of his 1-10 moods), but a complete enough player to be a starter on a contending team. Not a piece a rebuilding team really needs, if the goal is to be a contending team. He’s not worthless, but a horrible signing.
You obviously haven’t watched him play last year or this year
Sure have. You think he’s a player who will ever start on a contending or even a very good team? You and Steve Mills. Atlanta didn’t think so (they saw him for 2 years) and didn’t think it was close (teams will overspend to match on a RFA if its close). His numbers as a 30 min player this year and career wise are anemic.