New York Knicks head coach David Fizdale isn't entirely opposed to the concept and purpose of load management. Despite the heat he's taken in recent weeks for playing rookie RJ Barrett, Fizdale is actually a believer in giving his guys some rest when needed, just not Barrett.
“I think some guys should have it,” the coach told Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic. “There are players — you got older players, you got guys coming back from injury. It’s different scenarios that you do have to manage a guy’s minutes. With RJ Barrett, I don’t feel like that’s the case.”
Fizdale is not an old school coach by any means, coming from a forward-thinking and tech-happy environment in Miami before he got his first shot as a head coach with Memphis. Yet succumbing to the pressure of sitting his star rookie isn't something he's willing to do.
Article Continues Below“Yeah, he’s 19,” Fizdale said, before knocking on the hardwood at Detroit Country Day School after a shootaround. “And he doesn’t have a history of injuries. No, I don’t feel like it’s something that should be a topic when it comes to him.”
Many worry it won't be long before Barrett does become injury-prone after logging nearly as many minutes as an entire college basketball game. Since playing 41 minutes in a blowout loss to the Sacramento Kings on Nov. 3, Barrett has yet to log more than 35 minutes in any of his last seven appearances.
Following that loss to the Kings, Barrett was third in the league in minutes per game at 37.1, but since then he's dropped precipitously to 29th with only 33.6 per game — something that will make Knicks fans breathe a little easier.