The Knicks’ Frank Ntilikina – Maybe You Really Can’t Rebuild In New York

The argument has been raging in New York City for years, especially where the New York Knicks are concerned. As the saying goes, you can’t rebuild in New York. Because this is New York. You have to win now, or you have to at least try, or give the appearance of trying. This ain’t Sacramento or Charlotte. This is New York. We don’t have time to wait for young players to become good. You can’t rebuild here.

FRANK NTILIKINA IS JUST THE LATEST CASE

On June 22nd, 2017, The New York Knicks used the eighth pick of the 2017 NBA Draft to select a 19-year-old, Belgium-born, France-raised, 6’5″ point guard named Frank Ntilikina. Since this young man had never played in the United States, it’s probably fair to assume that most Knick fans had never seen him play. But that didn’t prevent some from claiming expertise regarding his playing ability or potential. We’d seen the guys who played college ball on television and had our favorites, and of the players still on the board when it was the Knicks turn to pick, many (myself included) wanted them to take a flyer on North Carolina State’s athletic point guard Dennis Smith, and it only brought more pain when the Dallas Mavericks snatched him up with the very next pick.

The pain only intensified once word got out that the later-deposed Knicks’ President of Basketball Operations, Phil Jackson, thought Ntilikina would be a better fit for the Triangle Offense that had already been proven pretty useless without Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant around to make it look like a base offense of genius.

WHERE IS HE FROM?

Knick faithful were already wary of hoopsters hailing from France, having gotten burned in the 1999 NBA Draft and watching in horror as the brass selected seven-footer Frederic Weis with the 15th pick while local St. John’s hero Ron Artest was still on the board. Weis never suited up for an NBA game, while Artest carved out a solid 17-season career, winning several individual awards and a championship. Fans were equally disinterested on Draft Night in 2013 when the vertically-challenged Knicks bypassed the towering defensive-minded Rudy Gobert and selected Tim Hardaway, Jr. instead–to loud cheers, presumably because his father was good–with the 27th pick. Gobert was selected First-Team All-NBA in 2017, but would have been loudly booed by the locals had he been selected by the Knicks that evening.

INAUSPICIOUS START

So with that backdrop, Ntilikina gets off the plane in a basketball-crazed city whose fan base was looking for someone to run alongside Kristaps Porzingis, with folks already skeptical and ready to pounce on the first Dennis Smith, Jr. poster dunk as evidence that the Knicks blew it by taking this “international” player instead.

The NBA’s Orlando Summer League begins a short time after the draft, and the fans are anxious to see Ntilikina in action, but he misses the entire tournament with an injured knee. Folks are already suggesting that he’s too brittle to play at this level.

WAIT, TRADE RUMORS ALREADY?

Then in late July, stories begin to circulate about Kyrie Irving wanting out of Cleveland. Naturally, the locals–media and fans alike–begin constructing trade proposals the Knicks could offer to the Cavs to bring Irving to New York. Knick fans clamoring for a guy like Irving is understandable. He brings star power, had already won a title, he’s from the area, he’s exciting, breaks ankles, Uncle Drew commercials, etc., but with the Knicks lacking tradeable assets and with the Carmelo Anthony situation still unresolved, many of those proposed player packages included Ntilikina’s name, even though no one had really seen him play.

We all know how rapidly these rumors spread, even if they originate from someone’s basement. Before ever setting foot on an NBA court, the 19-year-old Ntilikina now finds his name being tossed around in trade rumors after hearing doubts about his durability along with unfavorable comparisons to Dennis Smith, Jr. based on Smith’s outstanding summer league performance. Unfortunately, the kid misses most of the preseason, too, which did nothing to silence the cynics who’d already stuck the “brittle” tag on him.

Welcome to New York, where you can’t rebuild.

HERE’S WHAT WE DO KNOW

So the season begins and some of the positives we’d heard about Ntilikina were accurate: long arms, gets in a defensive stance, has good footwork and picks up a lot of steals. After a few games it was already clear that he’s way ahead of the rookie curve on the defensive end. And on this Knicks’ roster, anyone who merely gets into a defensive stance will stand out.

Offensively, he can pass, but looks a bit tentative, he doesn’t have the quickness to get to the basket regularly and his shooting percentage is sub-par, both from the field and free-throw line. And he appears hesistant to shoot at times, as if he lacks confidence. This was the case before he hit the rookie wall in January. He’s not starting, but playing behind a 34-year-old Jarrett Jack who is fresh off an ACL injury and earned a roster spot without a guaranteed contract.

But…

CAN WE AT LEAST GIVE HIM UNTIL THE ALL-STAR BREAK?

While all this was going on, there was a former 2013 lottery pick from the University of Michigan named Trey Burke playing for the Knicks G-League affiliate in Westchester, and he’s lighting up the stat sheets averaging 26 points and 5 assists. Two NBA teams had already given up on Burke, including the team that used a lottery pick to select him, the Utah Jazz.  He’s listed at 6’0″ tall and is a point guard in name only. He is primarily a scorer who will occasionally pick up some assists and is a liability on defense. Anyways, the noise was getting louder that the Knicks were thinking about bringing Burke up to the big squad to give the struggling backcourt a jolt, and, of course, he’d be playing Ntilikina’s position.

On January 14, the Knicks signed Burke and released the seldom-used veteran Ramon Sessions to make room on the roster. With three point guards, we’d likely see one of them get Sessions minutes, which were negligible, or either Jack or Ntilikina would see their minutes reduced to give Burke some measurable court time.

Early returns clearly point to the latter–the rotation of three point guards. In the 13 games the Knicks have played since Burke’s arrival, Ntilikina’s minutes have dropped from 22 to 16, and each of four games during that stretch where he’s played over 20 minutes have included garbage time minutes in blowouts. With the team going nowhere, one would think they’d play this kid until his tongue hangs out, especially since he missed the summer league and much of the pre-season.

HEAD MESSED UP YET?

But the Knicks live for the moment, and if the aforementioned transaction wasn’t proof enough, and if Ntilikina’s head wasn’t already destroyed, the Knicks swung a deal on trade deadline day (February 8) to bring in another point guard, this time the athletically-gifted 21-year-old 2015 lottery pick Emmanuel Mudiay from the Denver Nuggets, whose brief career has been lowlighted by erratic shooting, ballhandling and decision-making.

The spin is that every effort will be made to play Mudiay and Ntilikina together, but the fact remains that the Knicks’ last two major roster additions have been guys who play Ntilikina’s position. To date, neither has shown the ability to shoot; Mudiay brings a 37 percent career shooting percentage from Denver while Ntilikina hovers around 35 percent to this point. Knick fans will love Mudiay’s athleticism, but will grow impatient with his penchant for hitting paying spectators in the beer cup with errant passes.

HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF

Some will argue that Ntilikina will just have to toughen up and deal with the competition and trade rumors, but over several decades the Knicks have been lagging behind in terms of player development, duplicating positions (see Hernangomez, Willy) or opting to let other teams develop players before making a run at them in free agency, usually overpaying. The Knicks recently did this with their own 2013 draftee, Tim Hardaway. They didn’t develop his game in his first two seasons in New York, then they traded him to the Atlanta Hawks (for a rookie, Jerian Grant, they ended up trading as part of the deal for Derrick Rose one year later) who stripped his game down, sent him to the D-League and taught him how to play the NBA game. Then the Knicks paid over $70 million to get him back as a free agent this past summer, and it now appears he’s regressing back to his rookie season level of play.

Last season the Knicks had an NBA All-Rookie First-Team player on their roster in Willy Hernangomez. This season, with centers like Hernangomez, Kyle O’Quinn and Joakim Noah already on the roster (and another in Kristaps Porzingis who should be playing there, IMHO), the Knicks brought in Enes Kanter in the Carmelo Anthony trade, essentially giving them four centers (I say five) in a league now dominated by wing players.

Take a wild guess whose playing time suffered. It would be the second-year player Hernangomez, who brings the same skills–good offensive footwork, rebounding, but defensively-challenged–to the court that Kanter does. So in a matter of months, this kid goes from First Team All-Rookie to complete afterthought on a losing team. He demands a trade a gets one to Charlotte for a couple of future second-round picks.

All this while the Knicks came into the season touting their rebuilding program and their brand new emphasis on youth. They just can’t stick to a plan like that.

IN ORDER TO REBUILD, YOU HAVE TO HAVE BEEN BUILT IN THE FIRST PLACE

The moral of the story? A Knicks’ lottery pick needs to have an NBA-ready game when he first steps off the plane in New York City or he’ll be labeled a “bust” by Christmas of his rookie year, and his own team will dangle him in trade talks or bring in veteran journeymen at his position to cut into his minutes if he’s not developing quickly enough.

Remember, Ntilikina is a 19-year-old playing his first year in the largest market of a country new to him, and he’s learning the most difficult position.He may yet survive in spite of all these tranactions and distractions (Clyde?) but he will have had to overcome a lot to get there.

In spite of winning zero titles in 45 years and averaging 34 wins per season since the Year 2000–a “plateau” they will struggle to reach this season–the Knicks still cannot do a true rebuild. It’s as if they’d rather have guys with recognizable names who used to be good than develop a young player with potential. Maybe it’s the ticket prices, maybe it’s something else. But even if they lose most years, even more than teams who are actually rebuilding. and though we’ve witnessed several good teams bust up their rosters, hit rock bottom and become good again while the Knicks remain stuck in at sub-mediocre, the Knicks cannot bring themselves to do a true rebuild.

They simply cannot do it.