The New York Knicks are going to run the triangle offense, whether you or anyone else likes it or not. Knicks president Phil Jackson spent 30 minutes teaching his guards the offense before a team workout on Thursday, according to ESPN.com’s Ian Begley.
If Phil Jackson keeps personally teaching players the Triangle offense, he should just coach
The Zen Master, who is the team’s president, spent a half-hour teaching the Knicks guards his championship offense.
Adam Hunger-USA TODAY Sports
The mini walk-through comes weeks after a mandate to implement more of the Triangle into the Knicks offensive game plan after the All-Star break. New York is 3-6 and virtually out of the playoff race since Feb. 15, and the team hasn’t won two consecutive games since Dec. 22.
It also comes after head coach Jeff Hornacek told reporters that players would be evaluated at the end of the season based on their understanding of the system.
“As times goes on, you say, can they get it? Are they getting better at it?” Hornacek said, according to Begley. “End of the year comes and we’re having our discussions and you say, ‘Can this guy play this offense?’ We’ll say either yea or nay or he’s getting it, he’s getting better. So I’m sure that’s part of evaluations this summer.”
Jackson won 11 NBA championships integrating the offense as head coach of the Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls and Kobe Bryant’s Los Angeles Lakers. But he has been unsuccessful in his three seasons teaching the offense as Knicks president, notably resulting to a franchise-worst 17-65 record two years ago.
Last season, Jackson held “triangle seminars,” according to the New York Daily News’ Frank Isola, where he and assistant coach Kurt Rambis attempted to teach players the offense through watching film. That team finished with a 32-50 record amid reluctance to run the system.
This time around, nothing has changed.
Carmelo Anthony has grown ill talking about the Triangle. Derrick Rose has been openly frustrated with learning the offense, calling it “random basketball,” but he conceded that he had to come to grips with the Triangle if he wanted to remain in New York beyond this season.
“S—, do I have a choice? Do I have a choice?” Rose told reporters, according to theNew York Daily News’ Stefan Bondy. “I just want to win games. Winning takes care of every category for an athlete.”
After starting the season 14-10, New York (26-39) plummeted down the East’s standings and 5.5 games out of the conference’s eighth seed. The Knicks would need to win 16 of their last 18 games to finish .500., and 11 of those opponents are playoff-bound.
Being an executive and coaching the team are two different things.
Jackson has proven himself to be an all-time great head coach, arguably the greatest of them all. But his insistence on running the Triangle — a system with which only he has succeeded — has maimed several Knicks rosters struggling to grasp the concepts of the read-and-react offense.
Jackson had burned the Knicks roster, rebuilt it, then burned it down again before putting together this year’s team. He’s been through more coaches than seasons, and this year is on pace to follow the last three.
It’s time for Jackson to do what he should have done when he first came to New York and return to the sidelines. Because it’s become clear, only the Zen Master fully understands the offense.
And if that’s the system he wants the Knicks to run, there’s obviously no better teacher.
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