The New York Knicks are still trying to figure out where they stand in the Eastern Conference and it feels as though a lot of their immediate and long-term success hinges on the play of 3rd year forward RJ Barrett.
It has been a rocky season for the Knicks and Barrett so far.
New York Knicks: Where does RJ Barrett currently stand?
I’ve said it before and I’ll continue to say it: RJ Barrett has been one of the trickiest young players to pin down in the entire NBA.
Sometimes his strengths look like weaknesses and his weaknesses look like strengths? He has some stretches of basketball where he looks like one of the most promising young 2-way players in the league and some stretches where he is simply one of the worst players in the league.
The highs and lows have been extremely drastic and consistency is something that just hasn’t been there for Barrett.
Consistency is maybe the hardest single thing to achieve as a young player. A lot of players can flash outstanding play on the court but it’s the great ones who can do it on a nightly basis.
What exactly do the Knicks have with RJ Barrett? Where are the struggles most alarming and where is he flashing all-star potential?
New York Knicks: Where has RJ Barrett struggled?
Before I get all negative Nancy, I’ll quickly highlight what was initially the biggest question mark for RJ Barrett — the long-range shooting.
We love talking about 3-point shooting in 2022, and Barrett came into the league with some scary shooting metrics and form.
To his credit, he has put in a ton of work into his long-range shooting — from the follow-through to the release time, his improvement as a shooter is a testament to his hard work and the power of good shooting instruction from coaches, but I’ll get into the positives later.
What you still notice with Barrett is a lack of a “shooter’s touch” and it’s something that pops up on all three levels of scoring.
When I watch Barrett play, it’s most visible in the “in-between” game: the floaters, mid-range shots, hook shots — it just doesn’t always look pretty.
RJ Barrett doesn’t have that soft touch. A lot of his misses are hard clanks off of the rim or wide to the left or right. It’s not just the lack of soft touch, it’s the lack of vertical explosion.
So many times, RJ Barrett’s attempts at the rim are under-the-rim, non-authoritative finishes. He’s not getting those above-rim, easy lays that are so important for players of his archetype.
Finishing at the rim has been a real challenge for Barrett, and although there’s been a slight improvement since coming into the league, the numbers are still far from great.
He is shooting a porous 29% from mid-range, which ranks near the bottom of the entire league, in the 16th percentile.
It’s these areas where scoring comes naturally for a lot of high-end wing prospects.
Sure, players will add to their offensive arsenal as they spend more time in the NBA (which RJ Barrett has) but when your shooting numbers are near the bottom of the league in year 3, it’s not a great sign that it will ever reach an elite level. It’s going to take almost unprecedented development.
It’s not as if the opportunity hasn’t been there for RJ Barrett, who has been playing 35+ minutes a night for years now
A 46.7% effective field goal percentage is flat-out bad for a wing player, and it has nothing to do with circumstances around him. The game’s best young scorers aren’t going to rank this low and grade this poorly in scoring metrics, no matter how bad the team is around him.
This is why RJ Barrett’s NBA career has been so confusing. There are the indicators that he clearly won’t be an All-Star, but then there are the qualities that look truly special.
RJ Barrett can look like the New York Knicks savior
It feels like with perimeter players it can be easy to just focus on the flashiness. The players with 5-dribble combos and the athletes who explode by defenders with a quick first step.
There really isn’t a lot of love for things like body control and strength and how they can be a massive advantage on the court. RJ Barrett has some of the best body control and strength of any young player in the league.
You see it on the court. Defenders just cannot knock him off of his spot. He is an absolute wrecking ball when he drives to the rim and it’s such an advantage for someone with his physical measurements.
Barrett has a filled-out frame and long wingspan and you can see how hard it is to get a proper contest on his shot because of that strength/length combination.
Even when it comes to his bag, Barrett may not have the moves of a flashy guard, but he has really developed some excellent maneuvers that allow him to get to the rim.
Little hesitations, head fakes, long crossovers, silky smooth eurosteps — Barrett has no problem getting to the rim. That’s what makes his lack of finishing so maddening and confusing… he has ZERO problem getting to the rim, he just doesn’t have the softest touch when he gets there.
He grades exceptionally well in drawing fouls (84th percentile for wings). Barrett has been fantastic in transition as well.
That same natural ability to find his spots has shown up in his long-range shooting as well. Barrett is light years more comfortable taking 3-pointers from where he was in his rookie season.
It’s not just scoring either, Barrett has a great feel for where his teammates are. The “tunnel vision” from his college scouting reports really has not been bad in the NBA. Whenever RJ Barrett has gotten the chance, he’s been a great wing facilitator for the New York Knicks. He has a knack for making extremely effective, simple reads when he’s running the 2-man game.
That ability to use strength and athleticism to get to your spots is just not something you see frequently with young players, and it’s what gives fans hope that RJ Barrett, who is still just 21 years old, can develop into an All-Star level player.
New York Knicks: Consistency, assertiveness are keys for RJ Barrett in 2022
You can blame external factors (the offense, the coaching, teammates) all you want, but I promise you, players with RJ Barrett’s pedigree aren’t struggling in year 3 if they’re budding stars, no matter what their circumstances are.
I bring up his pedigree because, well, RJ Barrett has been a top prospect for a long long time. He was one of the players to ever be the player of the year in his junior and senior years of high school. He was a star at Duke University. He was the 3rd overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft.
He isn’t some raw prospect who picked up a basketball when he was 16, he has been at the top of his competition for a long time.
Now, here we are in year 3 of his NBA career and we’re going to be talking about his 2nd contract. So far, he hasn’t been a max player.
For RJ Barrett to be that “untouchable” young player for the New York Knicks, it’s all about consistency.
Like I said, some of his struggles, no matter how bad they may look, actually seem very fixable. The shooting touch and finishing around the rim… There are times, like in the team’s last game against the Thunder, where you never would have guessed it was a weakness of his.
He needs that same assertiveness and drive every single time he touches the ball.
Right now, we actually know that Barrett is a really strong catch-and-shoot weapon. If he starts driving to the rim with more frequency and establishing himself as an actual 3-level threat, it’s going to open up his whole game.
I am not exactly sure what RJ Barrett’s value is today, on January 1st, 2022, but we’ll hopefully get a clearer picture soon enough.