I wont be at the BK game this time, but i was in the building last time and have a ridiculously bitter taste in my mouth still.
To whoever is gonna be there give em hell for me, and lets give those ******* their 5th straight L
Didnt really think we deserved the Charlotte win. They outplayed the **** out of us in terms of effort for 46 minutes, but we put it together in the last 2 mins, showed them why we have a winning record and they do not, and JR came in with the big time dagger.
The Miami game was just something beautiful to watch.
Sure Melo had been beasting it this season and I'm not in the least bit trying to take away from his influence/MVP-caliber season thus far, but his play was not the primary reason we were killing teams to start the season. Its always been a complete team effort.
When we go out there and give our best effort, play tough TEAM defense, and move the ball around to get our best shot opportunities, we can beat anybody in this league, even without Melo sometimes, and we showed that in the game vs Miami. Miami had talked alot of **** after our big opening day victory, about the effect of Sandy and them not even wanting to be there and all that ********, and we used that to motivate us. And as a result we showed up and played amazing team defense and shared the ball efficiently on offense like we did the 1st time we played them. This resulted in the kind of team effort that can beat any team on any given night with or without Melo. However this has been lost to us at certain points this season (Houston for instance) and realistically speaking will probably continue to be lost during certain stretches this season, and even with Melo it will result in bad losses.
This is why I thought the Bulls game had trap game written all over it.
We were coming off of a momentum high that had us thinking we were better than we actually are. Without Melo we dont have the talent to keep up with most teams, even though we might play like we do (like the Miami game). However without the motivation we had vs the Heat we did not play with nearly the team cohesion or the intensity we had played Miami with. Felton had come off one of the best games of his career, and got cocky vs Chicago, which resulted in him doing whatever the **** you choose to call his game vs Chicago.
However after another rough first 3 quarters in Denver we rebounded, and played almost flawlessly in the 4th quarter after we went down 8 points and Novak hit the 2 big treys to get us back within striking defense.
The primary reason to us closing those kinds of games so well this season is that Jason Kidd = composure.
It is truly unbelievable to watch him play. Games like Dallas and BK, which ironically were both on the road and in front of his former teams/"fan" (Brooklyn) bases, that he didnt play in and resulted both times in losses down the stretch, I think we easily pull off given his cool and calming influence during those kinds of situations. He has been essential to this team and in such short time he has made it obvious for me to see why every team he goes to gets immediately better and immediately worse when he leaves.
I have always hated Jason Kidd. Alot of you probably know that. However I was very much for signing him this offseason because of his championship experience, as well as his desire to stick it to the Nets, as he openly opposed organizational moves made to relocate to BK. However I did not expect him to impact this team as much as he has. And I certainly did not ever expect him to go from being easily my least favorite player in the NBA to one of my favorites. If he can keep this up for a full season, it will make us THAT much tougher in the playoffs.
I used to be a naive Knicks fan, and my love for guys like Stephon Marbury (and me having never experienced a winning team with winning players) had me believing that it was possible to build a championship team around that kind of player. However watching JKidd play this quarter of a season has made me realize why players like Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, Andre Miller, and even Pablo Prigioni are still in the league and effective while guys like Marbury and Iverson have been out for years despite being all around the same age. The numbers may not show it, but Kidd has been MVP caliber for this team and we are nowhere near 15-5 without him.
It's like that DUI car crash never happened.
