Day 4 of Knicks Training Camp

Link:The two-a-day schedule ended after three days on Friday with a single practice in mid-afternoon that included a scrimmage of two 10-minute periods. Subs beat the starters, if anyone cares, 41-35. Isiah Thomas cut it short with about a minute to go in the second period.

The Blue team was Stephon Marbury, Jamal Crawford, Quentin Richardson, Zach Randolph and Eddy Curry. Subs were Jared Jeffries and, interestingly, Wilson Chandler along with camp invitees Roderick Wilmont and Walker Russell, Jr.

The White team was Nate Robinson, Mardy Collins, David Lee (playing 3…also interesting), Malik Rose and Randolph Morris. Subs were Fred Jones, Demetris Nichols and Jared Jordan.

(Keep in mind these aren’t exact squads. The subs generally flip jerseys and go in where they are told.)

The media was invited in to watch the last 7 minutes of the second period. One observation is that the Knicks second unit will be very athletic. Fred Jones is all over the place. They didn’t do it today, but you can easily picture he and Nate at the top of a full-court press.

Q-Rich had subbed out when we walked in, so we got to see the starters with Jared Jeffries at the 3. Very active, as usual. Clearly Jared needs to start over after last season, but he can be very useful in the defensive role. Just have to find a way to hide him on offense, where he really can only be consistently effective as a rebounder. The Eddy-Zach thing is going to take some time to figure out. Eddy was caught up in a few double teams. Zach made shots from inside and outside.

The guy who really stood out in the time we were in the gym was David Lee. Very, very active at the three-spot, where I think he can fit in well. David scored on a nice cut (and feed from Fred Jones), outhustled Randolph to a couple of boards and also popped out in the corner for a 15-footer that he nailed. If he can do that consistently, Lee’s value only increases.