Hoops Tonight - Knicks TRADE for OG Anunoby, send RJ Barrett & Immanuel Quickley to Raptors

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eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms and responsible gaming resources. All right, welcome to tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Saturday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having an incredible weekend. We were planning on taking the weekend off, but the Nixon Raptors have other plans. As og Ananobi is headed to the Knicks are gonna be breaking down that deal from the perfect of both teams. You guys are the Joe before we get started. Subscribe to a brand new

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let's talk some basketball. So the full trade details. The Knicks get og and Andobi, Malachi Flynn and Precious Atchua, and the Raptors get RJ. Barrett, the manual quickly and one second round pick. Not too much when you really look at it. And that's first of all, why I love this deal for the Knicks. They didn't give away anything of real franchise altering value. Right. RJ. Barrett, in my opinion, is a better player than his reputation at this point. I think the pendulum has swung a little

too far with him. There's so much focus on his offensive limitations that people are forgetting like he's actually a really good athlete, that strong, physical, and a pretty good defensive player. That said, the offensive limitations are real. He just hasn't developed in terms of his skill set the way you'd hope for a player of his pedigree. He's a good shooter when he has, like all day to get into his muscle memory. But if you can disrupt that even to the slightest extent, it falls apart. You

can see that in the numbers this year. Forty seven percent field goal percentage on unguarded catch and shoot jump shots drops to eighteen percent when he's guarded in twenty seven percent off the dribble. So again, you just look at it from the standpoint of resource management. He's a good defensive player that is a bad offensive player on and off the ball. So if we piece all of that together, and you factor in that he's making in the mid twenty million range, it's just a tough, you know,

chunk of your cap space. Given the amount of production you're getting, you'd be better off taking his usage and giving it to more efficient players and then in the future looking for another athletic two guard that can fill that position. First of all, you've got a bunch of the those guys between Josh Hart, Quinton Grimes, and Dante DiVincenzo, right, and you're just better off giving those guys more minutes, focusing them on defense, and then playing a real three.

Because that's the other part of this too, is R. J. Barrett was playing the three a lot of the time, and he's not big enough or good enough offensively to really be a dominant, you know, starting three for a really good team in this league. So again R. J. Barrett better than his reputation, but a poor use of cap space. So I looked at him as like basically a loss the Knicks could afford. Now, Emmanuel Quickly is.

in the league. He's good on and off the ball one point zero three points per possession and pick and roll one point per possession in ISO, fifty seven percent effectiveield goal percentage on catch and shoot jump shots, fifty two percent effective field goal percentage on pull up jump shots, has a nasty floater nine on high volume. And he's actually, I think Quenton, excuse me, I think Emmanuel Quickly is

actually a decent point of attack defender. He's just a little bit small, right that said, all of that put together, he's still a redundancy. Jalen Brunson is just a better player than him, and everything we've talked about on this show about like, you know, if you want to be, if you want to be a really seriously good basketball team, I don't think you can in your core lineups play

two small guards together. And time and time again, we've seen moments where the Knicks are going into a fourth quarter in Emmanuel Quickly is cooking to start the fourth and then you have to go away from him at the end of the game. It's kind of like what we've been talking about with Austin Reeves and D'Angelo Russell. It's like it's not so much whether or not D'Angel Russell's one of the Lakers' top five players, because I

think he is. I think he's their fifth best player, But you can't play him alongside Austin Reeves because they're both below average athletes. And you know, we look and this is gonna be a big theme in this show today. This position. You know, basketball has become positionless in my opinion,

but it's not roleless. I think the ideal form of a modern basketball team, in my opinion, as I've said many times on the show, is a skill guard, an athlete guard, a perimeter forward, a bigger, you know, more interior oriented forward, and then an athletic center that can defend in multiple coverages.

roster imbalance. So as good as Emmanuel Quickly is and as sad as I know most Knicks fans are going to be to see him go, I looked at him as another guy on that roster that is a redundancy and therefore someone that is, you know, not not a devastating loss to the future of the franchise for them to give up. And then in addition to all of that,

they only gave up one second round pick. Honestly, I'm stunned with how famously stingy the rafters are that the Knick Scott this deal done without giving up a first round pick. Now, the intel is I saw a report this morning that Apparently Ojan and Obi and his team have behind the scenes been kind of telling everybody like, hey, my next deal is gonna be forty plus million a year unless I'm in New York, and so maybe that did some to dampen the interest in him around the league.

I also wouldn't be surprised if, just in general, the fear of a long term deal surrounding ogn Andoby in some of his injury history played a role there. But whatever it was, this ended up being the price right. So like first and foremost, what I love for the Knicks is to me is a significant positional need that they addressed without having to give up too much. Now,

how is Ognnobe a positional need? Like we talked about, I look at Jalen Brunson as the skill guard now without Emmanuel Quickly you kind of look at Evan Mobley as a guy or not Evan Mobley. So Evan Fournier is a guy that kind of slots back into that backup point guard role in that two three spot. Now, Ognnobi is a surefire, obvious above average starter at the

three he slots in there. We're gonna talk about his individual skill set in a minute then you have three guys that you look at as like one's gonna start the two and the other two will basically spell at the two and the three. And that's Josh Hart, that's Quinton Grimes, that's Dante DiVincenzo, right, and so that kind of balances things out. Then at the forward position, you've got Julius Randall, precious to chu as a guy who can play both the power forward position and as a

backup center. That's gonna be immensely valuable now with Mitchell Robinson being out out of the lineup. The one thing that's a huge bummer here is this just would be so much more interesting if it was like, Okay, we're going down with Jalen Brunson, Dante DiVincenzo, og Anobi, Julius Randall, Mitchell Robinson. And unfortunately, as a result of the injuries, it's it's just not an option at least within the

scope of this season. That said, Ojannobi's a very good perimeter defensive player, to be honest, he just represents a player that the Knicks just don't have on the roster, which is a big forward that is quick on the perimeter. They don't really have this type of guy. Ognobi six 's eight with shoes on a seven to two wingspan. He's an excellent defensive player. He can guard multiple positions on the ball. He actually led the league in steals

last year. Don't forget about the slotting element. A lot of this, A lot of the issues for the Knicks defensively over the years, especially in high leverage moments, is they just haven't really had that primary point of attack guy. And so what you end up doing is taking good point of attack defenders, not great ones, but good ones in giving them high leverage assignments. You guys might remember

the Miami Heat series last year. It's like Quinton Grimes is guarding Jimmy Butler, and like Quentin Grimes is a solid perimeter defensive player, but Jimmy Butler is one of the best players in the league. Right By virtue of Ognobi being able to take all those high leverage assignments, it basically slots guys like Quinton Grimes, Doantet Di Vincenzo, and Josh Hart into more achievable defensive roles. I think

that's gonna play a huge role. And then even as we just look at the Eastern Conference, like you got to go through Yeah, you got to go through Jason Tatum,

you got to go through Jimmy Butler. Not only are those guys you know, small forward power forwards, but they're also big, strong, small forward power forwards, and og and Andobi is about as good an option as you can find in the league to slot against those guys because of his physical frame right so balances out the athletic profile of the lineup, gives you a primary point of attack defender. Now on offense for starters, he's just a

way better shooter than RJ. Barrett. Fifty nine percent effective field goal percentage on catch and shoe jumpers good when he's guarded or open. This is the opposite of the RJ. Barrett thing right sixty percent effective field goal percentage when guarded, fifty seven percent effective field goal percentage when open. He converts spot up possessions at one point zero seven points

per possession, which is above average. Just for comparison. RJ. Barrett converts spot up possessions at zero point nine points per one hundred possession, so almost twenty percent better at converting those off ball possessions. That's going to be a huge way and how many times for you Knicks fans in the last few weeks have you seen a play end with RJ Barrett catching the ball in the corner and missing a three. You've just made a significant upgrade

in that play finishing position. Now, he's not very good on the ball, only ran seventy two pick and rolls and ISOs including passes this year, leading to just fifty four points. But he won't need to do too much of that. You're gonna be giving a lot of that RJ. Barrett usage to more efficient players. I think one of the things that they can do in a lot of cases is run two man game with Ojannobi with Jalen

Brunson and expect teams to switch that. And one of the things that Ojannoby has done well on the ball is beat switches, particularly with the pass. I actually watched all of his post ups this morning. The rafters were really deliberate about posting him when he had a smaller defender on him, and he was consistently drawing double teams and making good plays out of it. As a matter of fact, oj Nnobi post ups including passes have been worth one point zero seven points per possession this year.

So I look at him as more of a play finisher for the Knicks, like a significant upgrade on both ends of the floor. Now, does it make you as good as Boston or Milwaukee, No, but it does maintain your flexibility. So, insummation, here's why I love the deal

for the Knicks. I'm a big believer that you don't really push your chips in like, and I mean like, throw all your draft picks and do whatever you gotta do to get a player unless you're getting a top tier superstar, right, or you already have a top tier superstar and you're looking for a secondary star. And when I say top tier superstar, I mean like one of the top seven or eight players in the league.

Luca is a top tier superstar. And when you slot a top tier superstar next to a legitimate number two, you create these small, achievable other roles and then you're able to do what Dallas did last summer and you can just quickly retool with one sign and trade and a bunch of veteran minimum contracts, and suddenly you look like one of the better teams in the Western Conference. But it only makes sense to do so if you already have a top tier guy, or if you're going

after a top tier guy. So, like when I see names, you know, like one of the advantages is Jalen Brunson. We all knew he was good in Dallas, but he turned out to be way better than we expected here with the Knicks. Right Like, as we talk about like, oh, should the Knicks go after Donovan Mitchell or should the Knicks go after Zach Lavine, one of the reasons why I've said no this season is Jalen Brunson's just better than those guys.

You have to demonstrate a winning environment. You have to appeal to superstars. This is a big step in that direction. Right now. You can in the future, you can do two things. You can be competent now. Like I don't know about you, guys, I'm excited to watch Jalen Brunson, a guy who's hooping his ass off this year, try to beat Boston, try to beat Milwaukee, try to beat Philly, flanked by og And Andobe, flanked by Julius Randall in

a really physical frontline. I'm excited to see that that's gonna be fun Nick's basketball, and they're still headed in the right direction towards the inevitable superstar trade that will happen in the future. So I just absolutely love this deal for the Knicks. I know they're gonna be sad to lose Emmanuel quickly, but I think I think this was the ideal type of deal that improves the team on both ends of the floor in the short term,

while maintaining that flexibility on the Raptors front. Like I said, I'm surprised to see og went for so little, But I do think those factors that I mentioned earlier played a role.

change of scenery. It's a position for him. He's gonna get some really high quality looks playing off Scotty Barnes too. It's a position for him to revitalize his career. It does feel like Toronto's headed towards a rebuilt, and I don't love this deal for them, But it's tough to judge the rebuild until it's completely finished. There's gonna be other trades. Don't be surprised if Pascal Siakam gets moved. Don't be surprised if Dennis Schroeder gets moved. Don't be

surprised if Yaka Purtle gets moved. Right, So like, all eyes are gonna be moving on to the other players on this Raptors roster. But I'm gonna reserve judgment on their rebuild until all the deals have been made. All right, guys, that is all I have for today. I'm gonna take the rest of the weekend off into Year'sday, so I'll see you guys on Tuesday. Borrowing asiakam trade.