Phil Jackson carps about the triangle, will let Kurt Rambis run Knicks' league-worst defense

Everything’s fine in New York. Everything … everything’s fine, OK?

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The Knicks are stuck at 2-4 to start the 2016-17 season, which shouldn’t be too much of a whopper to argue away. It’s something that only those with Knick tattoos would holler at. This is a team that won 32 games last year prior to signing two rapidly declining former All-Stars from a flailing Bulls franchise that missed last season’s playoffs.

The team’s two wins included quality victories over those re-jiggered Bulls and a solid Memphis Grizzlies team, and its showing in a loss against Utah on Sunday afternoon should have pleased Knicks fans in spite of the team’s typical fourth-quarter meltdown. Yes, the team’s defense is horrendous, but the first reports out of NYC on Tuesday had team president Phil Jackson complaining because the offense wasn’t pointy enough:

From Ian Begley at ESPN New York:

If that.

“A handful of times” seems like quite a reach, which is odd because Jeff Hornacek actually used elements of the triple post offense during his time as head coach in Phoenix, and high-post center Joakim Noah did well working out of reverse schemes that reminded of it during his near-MVP turn with the Chicago Bulls in 2013-14.

Noah, one of those two Chicago signees, did not play much with Knick point guard and former Bull Derrick Rose during that season, as Rose was sidelined for the majority of the season after a meniscus tear.

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Upon Rose’s return, Noah’s role in that free-flowing (if not always potent) offense dwindled a bit in the two years that followed. Partially because of Noah’s ongoing knee issues, but mostly because a diminished Rose’s role in any offense that allows him to dominate the ball will destroy spacing and render his team lacking offensively save but for the times where he turns himself into a threat.

Rose has been allowed to dominate the ball in New York’s wins and losses, and he’s averaged a respectable 16.3 points on 44 percent shooting along with 4.8 assists and 4.5 rebounds a contest. The team is 13th in offensive efficiency, though, working with the league’s 19th-fastest pace while watching as Derrick’s inability to contribute when his palms aren’t on the basketball once again keeps the team an arm’s length away from a consistently productive, top-end offense.

One would point to Rose as the villain in this case were it not for Jackson, who strangely traded for the ball-dominant point guard in the offseason in exchange for Robin Lopez, coupling the downgrade at center by hiring Noah through 2020 on a $72 million deal.

In a perfect basketball world, one where Jackson was 25 years younger, actually coaching, and Rose was working prior to three knee surgeries, the 2011 NBA MVP could work as a perfectly-placed hybrid guard for the triangle offense. Dominating the ends of quarters, driving defenses batty with unending movement away from the ball, opening lanes for others and feeding off of a (let’s continue with this bit of Basketball Xanadu, if you’ll allow) healthy Noah.

Jackson isn’t coaching though. And while Rose and Noah (4.7 points, 7.3 rebounds, 4.7 assists and 1.5 combined blocks/steals in 24 minutes a contest) aren’t exactly limping around the court anymore, they aren’t the same. And you don’t blame the players or the coach for these sorts of things, you blame the person that supplied him with the materials.

Actually, you might be able to blame the coach for the defense. Phil certainly has:

The Knicks are dead last in defense, despite the presence of Noah (the 2014 NBA Defensive Player of the Year), the dogged Courtney Lee and 7-foot Kristaps Porzingis at big forward. The team allows unending great looks that, thus far, opponents have knocked down. It can’t handle the defensive boards to save its early season, and the squad has already complained about its inability to prepare for the pick and roll-heavy NBA opponents that dot this league, as it routinely practices against triangle-runnin’ teammates on off days.

As if every member of the 2016-17 Knicks needed until this season’s practices to learn how to guard a pick and roll.

As if guarding against triangle “sets” in practice hindered Jackson’s old Bulls, who routinely made their way through pick and roll-heavy outfits from Cleveland, New York, Phoenix and Utah on their way toward six NBA titles in the 1990s.

Kurt Rambis, infamously, presided over a series of terrible defensive clubs in Minnesota during his time as head coach. He also worked as Jackson’s lead defensive anchor from the Los Angeles Lakers’ bench during a tiring Jackson’s “next year I may only coach road games!”-last few years running that team. Those teams, despite Derek Fisher’s limitations and Kobe Bryant’s indifference on that end, were quite good on the defensive side of the court.

Rambis took that job over from Jim Cleamons, who once left Jackson’s bench to coach the Dallas Mavericks after serving as defensive coordinator under Phil in Chicago. Cleamons attempted to use the triple-post offense in Dallas during his time as head coach, oddly on a team featuring Jason Kidd. It did not turn out well.

This … this may not either.

At this stage there are too many disparate, negative influences to get in the way of Jackson pushing a successful triangle run on the Knicks from afar. Rambis might be after the lead gig, Rose is after a new contract, Carmelo Anthony is still biding his time with boffo stats until that no-trade clause release for 2017-18, and so many other leveraging factors are at play in this hopelessly convoluted realm.

Betraying the principles of the offense in favor of (as I’m sure Phil sees is) penny-wise yet pound-foolish offensive work in random wins over Memphis or a new’ish Bulls group that doesn’t really care that never-were ex-teammates like Rose and Noah are in town is fine for a spell, but not for a long term run in Jackson’s eyes.

If the Knicks were 5-1 and toasts of the NBA while running screen and roll to Rose’s heart’s content, it might be passable. Not with a mediocre offense and 2-4 record, though.

Even then, with Phil Jackson, it might not be passable. Good cheer and good standings are two entirely different concepts that don’t always relate, sometimes.

He’s got a legacy to defend in his first real chance (for those with short memories, who forget Pete Myers and 1993-94) at quashing the idea that the triangle is only best suited for when Michael Jordan is around. This is the man who needed months’ worth of scorn to be convinced that Rambis wasn’t the right coach to lead these Knicks, and it’s hard to tell at this point if he prefers actual wins over moral victories lost The Right Way.

The Knicks couldn’t even pull that off against Utah on Sunday, at home, and that had to chafe at Jackson. And with this new bit of chatter, the team will once again earn the jokes it is already taking in:

Which is a shame. Because there are too many strong and impressive basketball personalities at work for this team, from the front office on down. This isn’t a squad that should be routinely falling down, yet here we are.

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Kelly Dwyer is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at KDonhoops@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!

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