Immanuel Quickley is a significant part of the Knicks future – he’s a rookie who is already making an impact and earlier this year it looked like he was on track to form an All-Rookie Team. He needs to learn how to play him through his mistakes.
Frankly, the idea that Payton “deserves” more playing time than Quickley because he doesn’t spin the ball that much is ridiculous. Quickley doesn’t need to be a 35-minute player per game, but the fact that he has played less than 15 minutes in multiple games is absolutely ridiculous.
Again using Cleaning The Glass stats, Elfrid is a decent defender, but he’s not some sort of security guard. He ranks in the 51st percentile in the opponent’s 3-point field goal percentage. His ranking of him when defending shots at the circle is 4th worst among the point guards-he really has a hard time with the athletic guards downhill.
I’m not even suggesting that the Knicks make Quickley the starter. In fact, I love the yin and yang of the two different units. The starters set the bully ball tone, first defense for the game, and then the 2nd unit enters the attack. Payton is the starter and he with an average of less than 20 minutes per game need not necessarily be mutually exclusive.
We’ve seen it happen so many times this season – Towards the end of the game, the Knicks can’t buy a basket. They need an attack injection, and arguably their second best attacking player, Immanuel Quickley, is rotting on the bench. Thibodeau’s reluctance to read the game and change his lineups on the go played a big part in the Knicks’ recent disappointing performances.
Elfrid Payton isn’t the only reason the Knicks attack fought, but he played a huge part in it. Does he deserve a role with the team? Absolutely, but there are no arguments as to why Payton should play heavy minutes skyrocketing with such a high usage rate. The Knicks have to recognize this early as the offense has kept them from truly establishing themselves as a playoff team.