New York Knicks head coach David Fizdale is greatly encouraged by his conversations with unicorn Kristaps Porzingis and his potential growth after a return from injury.
The newly-hired boss recently spent time with his star player in his native Latvia, picking his brain about the culture, his offseason plans and his relationship with a re-shuffled front office.
“It's already happening,” Fizdale told Bruce Beck of NBC New York. “Kristaps (Porzingis) will come back healthy. He was already having a big-time season last year when he got knocked down. We had an awesome draft with Kevin Knox, Mitchell Robinson, and Allonzo Trier — our two-way player.”
“Scott (Perry) and these guys are big-time sticking to an awesome plan of bringing in guys that maybe didn’t work out at a place where they were at before but are high draft picks. Under some good player development and some culture, maybe they can turn into something close to what they were expected to be… We’re doing it the right way.”
The Knicks took flyers on Trey Burke (No. 9 pick in 2013) and Emmanuel Mudiay (No. 7 pick in 2015) last season, while adding other talented pieces this offseason in Mario Hezonja (No. 5 pick in 2015) and Noah Vonleh (No. 9 pick in 2014).
All of these represent lottery talent with the opportunity to show it under the right coaching and developmental team.
Fizdale has already seen that potential with Trey Burke, who forced himself to go the G League route, which paid dividends late on the season, racking up a career-high 42 points against the Charlotte Hornets in late March.
Porzingis is still recovering from a torn ACL suffered in February, with no clear timetable for his return. If he misses times, it only bodes as additional chances for these reclamation projects to display the harnessed talent they weren't able to put on display with their former teams.
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