Whose idea was it to put this Knicks versus Pacers game on ESPN? I know, I know, you don’t want to show the same few teams over and over again, not every game should be Warriors versus Rockets, you want to show the entire league even if they’re not that good or exciting. But this is the Knicks (horrible team with no redeeming factors for the casual fan) versus the Pacers (excellent team with no redeeming factors for the casual fan besides MAYBE Victor Oladipo). No exciting rookies, only one sorta-star player, huge talent disparity, it just wasn’t a good matchup. You don’t know for sure how things are gonna shake out during the regular season, but this is the kind of game that should’ve raised alarms for lameness while the schedule was being created.
Sorry, done complaining. Not even complaining, really, because I watch whatever games I want and not the ones spoonfed to me on national TV. But whatever. ESPN made their bed, and now they can lay in it. There were probably only 300 people still watching while Emmanuel Mudiay went off in the second half, and while they might’ve been impressed, role-player accomplishments don’t hold the same sway with them as they do me.
Mudiay’s still scoring (sorta) after that little stretch of 30-point games, but he’s definitely turning back into the pumpkin that he always was. A slightly better version of the pumpkin, a version that can average 14 points per game on career-high efficiency, but all that minimal excitement he generated a month ago is gone now.