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Andre Snellings, ESPN
One of the more underrated and underreported components of a successful NBA team is fit. Unlike in fantasy basketball, an NBA team can’t just be a sum of good players; it has to be good players whose skill sets and games fit well together.
The recent trade between the Raptors and the Knicks is the latest example of this phenomenon, as both teams come out of the deal stronger than when they went in because they traded away redundant talents for players that fit their team needs. But let’s focus on the Knicks, here, because the ramifications of this deal could solidly impact their daily betting and futures value.
The Knicks gave up RJ Barrett, Immanuel Quickley and a second round pick in exchange for OG Anunoby, Precious Achiuwa and Malachi Flynn.
Barrett and Quickley were the third and fourth-leading scorers on a Knicks team whose biggest criticism was a perceived lack of a “dude” (shoutout Becky Hammon), an MVP-caliber player to hitch their wagons to. So, intuitively, one might think they should have held onto their best supporting scorers if they wanted to compete this season.
But in this case, that is false because their two best players, Jalen Brunson and Julius Randle, are both high-volume, high-usage scorers that create shots off the dribble. As such, the ideal secondary scorers for that nucleus would be catch-and-shoot guys that can efficiently finish the looks that Brunson and Randle create for them.
That is not the strength of either Barrett’s or Quickley’s games. Both prefer to create their own looks off the dribble. Only 39.8% of Quickley’s 2-point shots and 71.9% of his 3-point makes were assisted. For Barrett, 53.7% of his 2-point attempts and 100% of his 3-pointers were assisted. So, Barrett was did operate as a catch-and-shoot guy from behind the arc at least, but the problem is he still only shot 33.1% from long range.
Enter Anunoby.
What the new-look Knicks look like
On offense, Anunoby’s primary function is to spot up behind the arc and wait for his teammates to deliver the ball for him to finish. With the Raptors this season, 72.9% of his 2-point buckets and 95.15 of his 3-point makes were assisted. And he knocked down those shots at good efficiency, including a 37.4 3P%. Also, more than half of Anunoby’s field goal attempts were from downtown (50.8%) versus only about a third of Barrett’s (33.5%).
The upshot is that, for the Knicks’ offense, Anunoby is the better fit.
Not only is he more comfortable taking and making the shots that Brunson and Randle create, but also, his ability to do so stretches the opposing defense and gives Brunson and Randle more space to get their own looks. That’s a nice synergy that allows the Knicks’ best players to both play more like the “dude(s)” the team needs while helping the entire offense be more efficient.
And then, there’s the defense. The most impactful defenders in the NBA are almost universally big men. Last season, Anunoby was one of only five non-big men to rank among the top-20 of Defensive Real Plus Minus (DRPM). Anunoby had a 5.08 DRPM score, meaning his presence on the court correlated with the Raptors’ defense improving by more than five points per 100 possessions. Anunoby measured out as the third-highest impact small forward defender in the NBA, behind 6-10 Franz Wagner (7.49 DRPM score) and teammate Scottie Barnes (6.36 DRPM).
Barrett is a solid wing defender (his 2.72 DRPM would’ve ranked 15th among small forwards), but Anunoby is elite. And with the Knicks missing their defensive anchor Mitchell Robinson for the rest of this season they needed both Anunoby’s defense and Achiuwa’s size to give their defense a boost and increase their presence in the paint.
Betting impact
The Knicks have only played two games with their new players in the lineup, but the early results support my stance that this move makes a much bigger difference in their level of play than would be intuitive. In those two games, the Knicks beat the team with the then-best record in the NBA (the Timberwolves) as an underdog, then followed that up by beating the Bulls by 16 when they were only favored by nine points.
I fully expect the Knicks to continue to outperform betting lines until the models catch up to the fact that the impact of this trade goes well beyond a basic swap of stats, and really gets to the heart of the way the team performs. I believe, with this move, a healthy Knicks team is comfortably one of the four best teams in the Eastern Conference and one of the best eight teams in the NBA.
Going into Friday night’s game, by-record the Knicks are eighth in the East (would be in the play-in) and 15th in the NBA. Based on this, I expect that for at least the next several games, I will likely pick the Knicks against the spread. This will be immediately tested on Friday against the 76ers, another team I rank higher than their current record and one featuring the biggest interior mismatch in the game in Joel Embiid, but I would still likely take the Knicks +6.5 at -120 on ESPN BET.
How to bet the futures market
The Knicks’ season win totals line currently sits at 46.5 wins. They were 17-15 (43.5 win pace) before Anunoby’s debut, and are currently 19-15. I project they win at a 52-win pace over the final 50 games of the season with their new-look team, which would result in 49 wins on the season.
So, I would hammer the over on the Knicks’ team record future. They aren’t likely to catch the Celtics or 76ers to win the Atlantic Division, because both of those teams are elite, but the Knicks’ odds to win the division (+10,000 on ESPN BET) are longer than their odds to win the NBA title (+4000).
Because injuries can happen to any team, and if they stay healthy I think the Knicks could challenge for 50 wins, I might consider taking some longshot fliers on the Knicks to win the Atlantic as part of some lottery ticket parlays as well. Moving forward, I believe the Knicks will be a much more formidable team.