I think a lot of KAT’s deficiencies as a 4 were covered by Gobert. IMO, KAT will be playing as the 5 for the vast majority of the time in New York.
Jaylen and Jayson are going to iso him on the perimeter over and over and over. If you thought watching Lively and Gafford get repeatedly cooked was painful.....
If the Knicks and Celtics meet in the playoffs I think KAT will foul out of every game they play.
I think Randle’s fatal flaw is he is a bad fit everywhere. Saying KAT is a better fit with the Knicks is the whole point. Randle does some things well but he demands a usage rate so high and has enough limitations that it’s counterproductive. And then he gets hurt.
I don’t think anyone that watches him is. He’s got a ton of talent but there’s something missing. He’s one of the lowest IQ defenders I have ever seen play. He’s a foul machine and he’s not a particularly tough player.
Thibs coached him for 3 years earlier in his career.
That chart shows that even if you believe the trend... KAT is still much better (3.5 vs 2.1 current DARKO, 3.5 DPM is good for a tie for 17th best in the league with Steph and Ant, 2.1 is 37th in the league)
You would think MIN fans woyld have some faith in Connelly by now.
Yea that's exactly my gut feeling too.
He’s a very good offensive player (and actually high IQ on offense? It’s really weird to watch him play) and a good shooter but the Knicks still won’t technically be playing “5 out” because Josh Hart is such an unwilling shooter.
He's a better fit on the court and contractually (if things work out), but his fit with Thibs was occasionally an issue in Minnesota, I don't trust him playing in the NYC pressure cooker, and he's got a much longer list of playoff failures than Randle (32 games to 15, plus Randle was pretty seriously hurt for at least half of those). Randle's ultimate playoff problem feels like when his jumper was off, his offense (which is the majority of his value) was bad. KAT's biggest problem is that his basketball IQ is in the bottom 10% among all-stars, and I don't know which issue is more fixable.
Fair enough on Darko, that's a bigger gap than I initially assumed based on the image. I do think this was a good gamble for the Knicks, who despite the hype and vegas odds, were clearly a player short and there's a decent chance Kat is that guy.
DD isn’t nothing, in fact he’s a very good player, so it’s not a swap out talent wise.
Hart's 3 point shot is a mystery. There were some articles in NY in early March about how he had fixed his 3 point shot...then in a 2 week sample from 3/10-3/23 (7 games), he shot 2-30 from 3 (.067). In his 4 playoff series over the last two years, his 3P% has been .455, .238, .432 and .273. Trick or treat, the good news for the Knicks is that if Robinson is healthy they can confidently sit him at the end of games (Brunson, Bridges, OG, KAT, Robinson).
This is very clearly Anthony Edward's team now and Naz Reid had a breakout year last season.
I posted this earlier, but it's a much smaller sample for Randle. 3 series across 2 seasons for Randle compared with 6 series across 4 seasons for Kat, plus Randle was playing on a badly sprained ankle for two of those series in 2023. Kat has a solidly higher ceiling as a player (and is a better fit with the Knicks than Randle is with the Wolves, I think) but I think there's more reason to believe Randle's playoff failings are less indicative of future performance than they are for Kat.
It’s way more than shooting with KAT. He commits stupid fouls and loses control of his emotions. It’s hard to miss.
Is it really a take when we’ve all seen him commit some of the dumbest fucking fouls of all time in our faces? Dude plays like an absolute dumbass in ways that won’t show up in the box score. Like you and Ed said, maybe that changes, but man…
The problem is KAT's "failings" are still a better player than Randle.
Super odd that an NBA writer doesn't know this was done to avoid tax penalties. Minnesota fans can get in line behind Lonnie Walker to say thanks to CJ McCollum and Grant Williams for the awesome CBA.
Deuce is ready to step up and there's enough gritt with basically the whole rest of the roster. Not worried about anything in this trade except the drawbacks of KAT but I trust in Thibs.
Also live in MN and now all Wolves fans are freed from having to pretend that they liked KAT and thought he was good
Embiid will rest when they play the Knicks, like he does against Denver.
yeah, I think the bashing of KAT on this thread is pure hot take-ism. He’s a significantly better player than Randle in a vacuum and also a significantly better fit. And that series vs Denver was epic both for his offense and defense on Jokic. Randle is a worse player and just an awful fit next to Rudy. DD will help, but not enough.
Clearly part of this is they need *someone* who's an NBA player to play the 5 while Robinson is out.
