Knicks' Poor Rotations Place Strain on Carmelo AnthonyTim Hardaway Jr.-Amar'e Stoudemire Combination Costs Team Pointshttp://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10...
By Chris Herring
Updated Feb. 28, 2014 8:35 p.m. ET
After the Knicks' latest defeat—a game in Miami that started out close, then turned into a beatdown in the latter stages of the third quarter—Carmelo Anthony took yet another question about how often he feels like he has to put the Knicks on his back. And again, he was candid in his response.
"A lot. It's a lot," said Anthony, who has averaged 39 points a game in his last five games while playing an NBA-high 39 minutes per contest this season. "But that's my mindset. In a game like this, or any game, where we're down, I feel like I have to go out there and do it…I've gotta take it upon myself, whether that's good or bad."
But Anthony wouldn't feel such a burden—and likely wouldn't have to log so many minutes—if it weren't for the defensively challenged lineups that that coach Mike Woodson puts on the floor nine minutes into every half.
The poor rotations Woodson trots out have essentially put Anthony on a hamster wheel: He'll often give his team an early lead or keep it close, only to watch that work be undone when he goes to the bench. Then, minutes later, once Woodson has flooded the court with ineffective lineups, Anthony is reinserted trying to play catch-up.
That was certainly the case Thursday in Miami, where the Heat feasted on a porous Knick defense, outscoring New York by a whopping 30 points in the 19 minutes that Tim Hardaway, Jr. and Amar'e Stoudemire—the team's worst two stoppers—spent on the court together.
Knick lineups with those two proved incredibly costly, given that the Knicks outscored the Heat by 10 points, 39-29, in the 14 minutes that Anthony played without Hardaway or Stoudemire.
But as jarring as those numbers sound, it is important to note that they aren't anything new. Of NBA duos that have logged at least 500 minutes this season, the Hardaway-Stoudemire tandem, getting blasted by 17.3 points per 48 minutes, ranks second-worst in the league.
Over the past 10 games, things have only gotten worse. The Knicks have been outscored by more than 24 points per 48 minutes with Hardaway and Stoudemire on the floor together, according to NBA.com. With them sharing 18 minutes per game over that span—up considerably from the 11 minutes they were averaging together earlier in the season—New York has lost about nine points per night with that duo.
The numbers highlight an obvious problem: The Knicks have far too many players who can score, but can't keep the man they're guarding in front of them. That leaves Woodson without a choice but to play some of those players together to find them all enough playing time.
"I mean, they're gonna be on our roster," Woodson said when asked about the defensive liabilities playing alongside one another. "The guys off the bench, they're just as important as the guys who start. I'm gonna need them to pick it up from a defensive standpoint, because the bench and the starters go hand-in-hand."
The bench's struggles on defense help explain how the Knicks—who, according to NBA.com, technically own the NBA's most efficient starting five in Raymond Felton, Pablo Prigioni, the injured Iman Shumpert, Carmelo Anthony and Tyson Chandler—often get smoked in games they once led.
This isn't to harp on Hardaway, who's enduring growing pains defensively as a rookie. Yes, he has been awful on defense: His 0.1 defensive-win shares—an estimate of how much a player's defense helps contribute to winning—is the worst in the NBA among players who have logged at least 1,000 minutes, according to Basketball-Reference.
Still, Hardaway has been a net positive, meaning New York has outscored its opponents with him playing—when he's not paired with Stoudemire. In other words, the Knicks can usually get by with one or even two defensive liabilities on the floor. But throwing Stoudemire into the mix usually tips the scales too much.
So yes, the Knicks are putting a lot of strain on the shoulders of Carmelo Anthony. But in looking more closely at why he's doing the heavy-lifting, it becomes clear that the Knicks are making things more difficult than they have to be by consistently playing bad lineups.
