After a very strange game featuring a dreadful and depressing first half followed by a very dynamic and fun second half, we defeated the Chicago Bulls at home and moved up to 13 wins on the season. Tonight though, we hit the road again and this time it's to Madison Square Garden, where we will take on the 10-28 New York Knicks.
Before that though, let's check out our injury report:4 Pelicans ruled OUT for Friday's game at the Knicks
— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) January 9, 2020
Injury Report: https://t.co/HpnRhjuEN1
That's correct: Jrue, Kenrich, Zion, and Darius all remain OUT for this game.
So, what's the deal with the Knicks? They've sucked for years, still sucked this year, but they fired Fizdale and since then they've been slightly less terrible than they were before that. They've gone 3-4 over their 7, and their losses have generally come against good teams: Lakers, Clippers, Utah; these are teams we lose to as well. Meanwhile, they've beaten Portland, Brooklyn, and Washington; these aren't great teams, but dammit, we're not a great team either Since starting the year 4-18 under Fizdale, they've gone 6-10 under Mike Miller. This is an improvement, at least so far. Who knows if the novelty will wear off sooner rather than later?
What are the Knicks? Well, they're 27th in ORtg and 26th in DRtg, if that helps. Their second leading scorer is Julius Randle and he's OUT for this game, for personal reasons, and their leading scorer Marcus Morris is questionable. They're 9th in the NBA in rebounding, but 29th in assists, 19th in steals, and 20th in blocks; they're 23rd in the NBA in FG%, 22nd in 3PT%, and they are the worst FT shooting team in the league, mustering only 68% from the line as a squad.
Well, with no Randle and possibly no Morris, their 3rd leading scorer is rookie RJ Barrett. How has he been this year? Many of us were highly sceptical of him in the draft, but some others really wanted him.
RJ Barrett, so far this year, is averaging 13.8ppg, 5.1rpg, and 2.5apg, on 46% TS. That is about 10% below league average. He's shooting 39% from the field, 30% from 3, and about 58% from the FT line. He has a -21 Net Rating (including a stunningly poor 92 ORtg), a BPM of -4.6, a VORP of -0.8, is averaging negative Win Shares per 48, and has a TOV% higher than his AST%. His PER is 9.9, his PIPM is -3.33 (the 14th worst rating in the NBA, exactly 1 spot better than fellow Duke alumni Cam Reddish), and he's bad at basketball right now.
Of course, young rookie, bad system, sub-optimal teammates, etc, all of those apply, but so far this year most of the reservations people had about him re: bad decision making, poor shooting projections, shaky defense, and suspect finishing have all played out.
So this game should be a cakewalk? Well, as we found out against the Bulls it's not always that easy. But this IS a game we should go into ready to make a statement and clean up. So let's do that. #WBD