RJ Barrett and
the Loss of an Idea

By W. M. | 10 January 2022 | 3-Minute Read

In their perpetual chase for superstars, and their resounding success in this enterprise since the turn of the century, the New York Knicks gave life to a fantasy that would remain unfulfilled for almost two decades. If only they chose to rebuild through the draft, their fortunes would finally be reversed.

From Stephon Marbury to Eddy Curry, from Amar’e Stoudemire to Tim Hardaway Jr., the Knicks spent most of the last twenty years recycling talented but flawed veteran players who were set up to fail by unreasonable organizational expectations. Surprisingly, this strategy did not bring any success, besides a short interlude rendered by Carmelo Anthony and the Bully Knicks.

For a basketball aficionado who irresponsibly pledged allegiance to the Orange and Blue in 2007, a decade spent searching for illegal streams (shout-out to all the pop-up windows) only to watch the Knicks lose would finally find meaning in the summer of 2019. The franchise had just ended the season with the worst record in the NBA. It was rewarded with the third pick in the draft, its highest since 1985.

The Knicks might have lost out on Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and Zion Williamson in the 2019 offseason, but the selection of RJ Barrett on draft night infused a renewed sense of optimism throughout the fanbase. After all, the Duke swingman was drafted by the same geniuses who selected Kevin Knox ninth overall a year prior.

More graceful prospects were still on the board when the Knicks made their pick, but Barrett fit the archetype of a power wing who had just delivered a championship in his hometown of Toronto.

Turn the 6 upside down, it’s a 9 now.

After failing to make either All-Rookie team his first year in the NBA, Barrett came back a much improved player in his second season. His work ethic bore fruit, as his relentless motor was finally met with on-court production. Perhaps in a rush to prematurely crown the young prince, the Knicks made him a symbol of their resurgence. However, Barrett showed no signs of becoming what he was predestined to be: an NBA star.

Two years and a half into his NBA career, the aggregation of Barrett’s slow first step, earth-bound athleticism, robotic coordination, inconsistent jump shot and vulgar touch around the rim appears to be an insurmountable roadblock on his path to stardom. The eye test indicates an unmistakable lack of flair in terms of shot creation. The numbers unequivocally corroborate this impression: Through 33 games in the 2021-22 season, Barrett ranks in the 27th percentile in isolation scoring (0.75 ppp) and in the 37th percentile as the pick-and-roll ball-handler (0.78 ppp). He ranked in the 36th and 33rd percentile in 2020-21, and in the 17th and 22nd percentile in 2019-20, respectively.

In an offense led alternatively by Julius Randle, Kemba Walker and Derrick Rose for the past year and a half, Barrett has mostly been relegated to a 3&D role, or 3&Drive, as coined by Realgm poster 3toheadmelo. Unfortunately, his efficiency has not been significantly better in a support role: 31st percentile in spot-up shooting (0.87 ppp), 20th percentile off cuts (1.08 ppp), 36th percentile in transition (1.02 ppp). His regression from 3-point range in particular leaves him with no efficient shot to make a positive contribution on offense.

As the games accumulate and the sample size expands, the narrative that Barrett’s leap is imminent and that the patience of the fans is merely being tested appears increasingly dissonant, if not entirely delusional.

Barrett’s overall scoring efficiency has not met the standards of an effective NBA player, despite an offensive burden that does not require him to regularly create for himself or his teammates. His true shooting percentage of 50.3% over 13.9 field goal attempts per game this season ranks 6th worst among players who have averaged over 30 minutes per game and attempted 13 or more shots per game. This reality is consistent with his pattern of inefficiency throughout his young NBA career, which features league-adjusted true shooting marks of 85, 94 and 90 (with league-average set at 100).

Started from the bottom now We Here, still at the bottom.

Somewhere between the Knicks’ 2021 playoff exit and the advent of Omicron, Barrett instigated an inner war of faith between my romanticism as a sports fan and my general objection to basketball mediocrity.

In theory, RJ personifies the purest mid-2000s Knicks fan’s dream. A top three pick. The product of tanking. A bright, hard-working young player who wanted to be a Knick during the apex of LOL Knicks culture. At the 2019 draft, Barrett was the anthropomorphic manifestation of an uncorrupted hope – and it had been faceless for so long.

Let down by numerous false prophets over the last twenty years, many fans (i.e., I) yearned for the Knicks to tank and find their cornerstone through the draft. It would finally turn this franchise around. Except it did not, for the Knicks cannot evaluate talent under James Dolan’s hand-picked regimes.

For all his virtues, Barrett does not possess the elite talent to live up to the ideal of a homegrown star. More worrying is the possibility that he might never develop the skill set to become a positive contributor on a championship contender, which should open a conversation about his long-term future as a Knick.

With the shadow of Barrett’s contract extension silently starting to hover over the ruins of Madison Square Garden, perhaps the hardest decision that Leon Rose could make would be the wisest.