Stop me if you’ve heard this before — the Sixers may have problems this season in the front court when Joel Embiid doesn’t play.
In this case, it wasn’t for a lack of trying. One of Mike Gansey’s ancillary moves this summer was to bring in Ariel Hukporti on a one-year contract. At 24 years old, he was a much younger option behind Embiid than Andre Drummond, who ironically signed with Hukporti’s former team, the New York Knicks. Gansey was betting on Hukporti ascending and being a useful 10-15 minute per game guy on nights Embiid played and a viable starter for games Embiid was resting in. Well, now Hukporti is out for the season with a torn Achilles, and it’s back to the drawing board once again for the Sixers when it comes to an Embiid backup.
When we evaluate why this problem has persisted, we ask the question, can the Sixers truly do better here or are they always going to have a revolving door of backup big men while they have so much money tied up into their starting lineup? Let’s start with Drummond, their most recent attempt at solving this problem before Hukporti and work our way back to the earlier stages of Embiid’s career.
In Drummond’s case, a player in his 30s who had a history with the Sixers prior to his most recent contract and was still a solid rebounder in a bench role was probably a safe bet. Last season, Drummond finished out a two-year, $10 million contract and had some moments for Philly in the postseason. After all, he did do enough for the defending champion Knicks to bring him in as Hukporti’s replacement. Now, Drummond wasn’t always lighting the world on fire, but relative to some of the other efforts the Sixers have put forth as an Embiid backup, it’s safe to say Drummond was a worthwhile investment.
There have been some other options in recent years that have been used as centers as well. Dominick Barlow and Jabari Walker have seen action there in smaller lineups, Adem Bona has certainly played some 5 and Guerschon Yabusele saw plenty of frontcourt minutes during the lost 2024-25 season. You can probably look at all four of these guys and have four different opinions.
Yabusele was a good find by the organization and was a decent scorer, but he ultimately departed in free agency. For what it’s worth, between time with the Knicks and Bulls, Yabusele did have an underwhelming 2025-26 season.
The jury is still out on Bona, Barlow and Walker’s effectiveness, although they come with significant question marks as the answer at backup center this season. It’s looking increasingly unlikely that Bona will ever develop a steady offensive game and he can turn into a foul machine at times as well. Barlow is just 6-foot-9 and might have problems defending centers that are routinely two or three inches taller than he is. Walker has shined in the preseason, but is on the small side at 6-foot-7.
Nick Nurse has even used the 6-foot-9 Dean Wade some as a small-ball five in the preseason.
Speaking of smaller backup centers, did the Sixers let Paul Reed get away too easily? Reed is playing for the Pistons on a similarly priced contract to what Drummond just finished playing for the Sixers on. He was on the way up and now is seeing lots of minutes on another playoff team in the East. He was also a fan favorite. Sixers fans, do you miss him?
One thing that is for sure, all of these options were probably better than aging Dwight Howard, who played a lot for Philly in 2020-21. While we’re at it and looking back at the beginning of the decade, do you remember Kyle O’Quinn, Sixers fans? Before him, I think we all remembered Boban Marjanovic, but not for his play necessarily.
So, when you add it all up, backup center remains a topic of discussion amongst Sixers fans, but their options behind Embiid have at least felt more passable in recent seasons than they did 5-7 years ago. But without Hukporti for this season, Philadelphia will need Barlow or Walker or Bona to take a step and play lots of important minutes in the regular season and postseason. If none of those players proves himself by the trade deadline, Gansey will likely be in the rental market come February.
There’s a sense of déjà vu in what’s happening with the Montreal Canadiens this season. As in the last campaign, the guy labeled the number-one choice goaltender just isn't delivering. Last season, Martin St-Louis and co. gave Samuel Montembeault plenty of opportunity to find his footing before finally turning to Jakob Dobes. So much so that by the time they turned to him, Dobes himself was going through a crisis of confidence. By the end of the season, though, he had regained his confidence and had wrestled the starting job away from Jacob Fowler.
Fast forward to the current season, and Dobes emerged as the number-one choice, the guy earmarked to start. Montembeault looked good in training camp, certainly good enough to be the backup, and Fowler, on his ELC, could be sent down to the Laval Rocket, so that’s what the Canadiens did.
Dobes had a strong first game against the Toronto Maple Leafs, but for some reason he struggled afterward. He posted a .929 save percentage on opening night and followed it with two subpar performances: a .800 SV against the Pittsburgh Penguins and a .844 against the Carolina Hurricanes. At that stage, the plan was for the backup to get a start, because your number one netminder can’t play 84 games, but Montembeault was injured.
As a result, Fowler was recalled and stepped into the crease, since Dobes wasn’t meant to start anyway. However, two nights later, Dobes didn’t get his net back; after losing his first game against the Nashville Predators, Fowler got a second straight game against the Detroit Red Wings and shut them out through 65 minutes and a six-round shootout. After that performance, St-Louis decided to put Fowler in net once again, and the youngster won again.
With a second game in as many days, the coach went back to Dobes on Wednesday night, and unfortunately for the Czech netminder, he struggled again. Giving up five goals in just 24 shots. With the next game only on Saturday, Dobes will probably have time to reset before the Habs take on the Sabres for a second time this season, but it seems the Canadiens have learned from last year’s debacle. They want to go with the hot hand; they won’t give Dobes as long a leash as they gave Montembeault because, in the end, the Quebecer ended up hanging himself with it, which Dobes won’t have the opportunity to do.
The Canadiens are no longer a rebuilding team; it’s not about development or the process anymore, it’s about getting the two points, climbing the standings, and ultimately being in as good a position as possible come playoff time. Come Saturday night, they need a win, so who are they likely to go to? The masked man oozing confidence right now, or the one who can’t seem to make the big saves when he needs to? The answer seems simple enough, but what happens when Samuel Montembeault returns from injury?
Kent Hughes said at the golf tournament that he didn’t want a “ménage à trois” this season. Sending Fowler down at the end of September was easy because he was on his ELC and hadn’t outplayed the others in training camp. Now, though, for a second season in a row, Fowler came to the rescue and grabbed his opportunity with both hands. Can Hughes really send him back down if he’s the one giving the Canadiens the best chance to win every night? It seems doubtful.
Having three goalies is far from ideal, but both Montembeault and Dobes would have to go through waivers to be sent down to the AHL. Fowler's play may force Hughes to move faster to solve his goaltender conundrum. The GM signed Dobes to a new contract; Fowler is earmarked as the goaltender of the future, and Montembeault’s contract expires at season's end. The answer seems simple enough…once he’s healthy, Hughes will ne need to find him a new home, because Fowler has now shown that he is the hot hand, the one who gives the team the best opportunity to win, and at the end of the day, this is a results-based league.
Could things change before Montembeault returns? Perhaps Dobes could rebound, but it seems unlikely Fowler will falter. As St-Louis often said about Montembeault last season, Dobes hasn’t forgotten how to play goal. However, the Canadiens have the luxury of a young netminder waiting in the wings to step into the number-one role; they shouldn’t hold him back. Will the pressure be too much when chatter about him as the number-one goaltender picks up? Time will tell, but he had no problem starting three games in a row…
LOS ANGELES, CA - SEPTEMBER 24: Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow (31) pitches in the first inning during the game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres on September 24, 2026 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. (Photo by David Dennis/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) | Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
The Dodgers must win to stave off elimination for at least a day, but in order to do that, they must score, which hasn’t been an easy task in this series against the Brewers. So much is made of this team’s superior resources, and in a game such as this one—more than ever—the stage is set for that advantage to finally play a key role, helping the Dodgers stay alive. Tyler Glasnow takes the ball against Shane Drohan, who has yet to appear in a playoff game in 2026.
Formerly the ace of a Rays team that made the postseason multiple times—including a World Series appearance against the Dodgers—Glasnow hasn’t been asked to fill that specific role of an ace for the Dodgers, but for one start here, he is going to have to. The solid five or so innings with no more than two runs and a high pitch count—also known as the Glasnow special—are likely not going to cut it for an attack that hasn’t produced regardless of whom it has faced.
The experience of Game 3 was a rather deflating one; between the leadoff homer allowed by Blake Snell and Milwaukee answering in the seventh after Los Angeles scored in the previous inning, the crowd could never get into the game for a sustained period. Oftentimes with sweeps and commanding series wins alike, there is a clear momentum carrying a team—it’s up to Glasnow and company to disrupt that in some way.
Lastly, the immediate impact of Drohan serving as the opener is the likely absence of Max Muncy from the starting lineup. As far as how much leeway the left-hander will get, likely very little, with May ready to step in for a multi-inning appearance out of the bullpen.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA - OCTOBER 14: Shohei Ohtani #17 of the Los Angeles Dodgers looks on from the dugout during the ninth inning against the Milwaukee Brewers in game three of the National League Championship Series at Dodger Stadium on October 14, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images) | Getty Images
The mighty Los Angeles Dodgers have their backs to the wall as the Milwaukee Brewers look to continue their clinical dismantling of the two-time defending World Series champs. The Brewers hold a 3-0 lead and will look to put the Dodgers away tonight and advance to the World Series for the first time since 1982. With Shohei Ohtani struggling badly and an aging roster looking a bit past its sell by date, can the Dodgers pull it together a make a series out of this?
Meanwhile, the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cleveland Guardians are going toe-to-toe in a pretty evenly matched series so far. The Guardians have their ace, Gavin Williams on the mound and will be looking to tip the series in their favor at home. The Rays will go with a short start from RHP Griffin Jax, and hope their bullpen can get them the rest of the way.
Rays at Guardians gets underway at 1:10 p.m. ET on TBS.
Pierre Sage endured a frustrating return to Lyon in the Europa League as his Crystal Palace side lost 3-2 to his former employers at the Groupama Stadium.
Corentin Tolisso opened the scoring for the hosts and Ernest Nuamah doubled Lyon’s advantage late in a first half without a shot on target for the visitors. Yéremy Pino halved the deficit five minutes after the break before Pavel Sulc restored the Ligue 1 side’s two-goal advantage. The Palace substitute Daichi Kamada pulled one back with nine minutes remaining in a better second half for Palace, who could not find an equaliser.
TORONTO, ON - SEPTEMBER 27: Oswaldo Cabrera #16 of the Cincinnati Reds high-fives teammates in the dugout after scoring in the third inning during the game between the Cincinnati Reds and the Toronto Blue Jays at Rogers Centre on Sunday, September 27, 2026 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. (Photo by Michael Chisholm/MLB Photos via Getty Images) | MLB Photos via Getty Images
By September 18th of the 2026 regular season, the Cincinnati Reds were long toast. They were 10 games under the .500 mark and a lock to finish dead last in the five-team National League Central division, and the final home game of the year was just two days away.
You will not be blamed if you had long checked out by that point. If you had, though, you likely missed that the Reds picked up utility infielder Oswaldo Cabrera off waivers from the New York Yankees, which they did with just 9 games remaining in their season.
Cabrera, to his credit, turned his limited opportunities into something worthwhile. He went 4 for 13 and even swiped a bag, doing so while pinch hitting, playing some 3B, and even getting limited run out in LF. That versatility has become his calling card as he enters his age-28 season as the bat – which once showed promise during a rookie campaign in the Bronx back in 2022 – simply hasn’t managed to materialize much.
Part of why New York was willing to waive him when he did was due to his pending trip through the arbitration process for the first time this winter. That means a raise off the league-minimum salary, and if a player truly isn’t in a team’s plans for those years they’d obviously prefer to focus those funds elsewhere. For Cabrera and the Reds, though, there was seemingly a match on September 18th that officially remains relevant today.
That’s because the player and the team skipped formalities and went ahead with an agreement for a contract for 2027. The Reds themselves announced the move on Thursday afternoon, with MLB.com’s Mark Sheldon later adding that the deal includes a $1 million base salary with up to $200K in bonuses.
The #Reds today agreed to terms on a one-year Major League contract, avoiding arbitration with IF/OF Oswaldo Cabrera.
Cabrera, a switch hitter, literally has played everywhere except behind the plate. If the bat can be anywhere as low as perhaps twice that of Ke’Bryan Hayes, that’s a valuable piece – especially since he typically plays pretty decently at most of those spots. As 26th men on the roster go, that’s a pretty solid piece, especially since he comes in with zero expectations of getting regular PA at this point of his career.
He even has one option remaining, per Roster Resource. So the Reds can option him back to AAA Louisville if, say, Juan Brito outplays him for the team’s utility role or if they want to carry a boppin’ thunderbat as last man on the bench instead of a glove-first guy.
It’s the sexiest move the Cincinnati Reds have made all offseason. It’s the only move the Cincinnati Reds have made all offseason.
HOUSTON, TEXAS - SEPTEMBER 29: MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred and Houston Astros Owner Jim Crane speak before Game One of the American League Wild Card Series presented by AbbVie between the Chicago White Sox and the Houston Astros at Daikin Park on Tuesday, September 29, 2026 in Houston, Texas. (Photo by Houston Astros/Getty Images) | Getty Images
As we near the conclusion of the 2026 major league baseball season, the powers that run the game and the players who play it are gearing up for another major confrontation this offseason. The new collective bargaining agreement is going to be an ugly and probably a painfully long process before the parties come to an agreement.
The league and owners are already doing a great job focusing the competitive balance issues in the game as an argument for a salary cap. The league has been using the Dodgers argument to push for a salary cap for a year already. They’re doing everything possible to define this in the public consciousness as a problem at the top of the sport, rather than one with the host of cheap, ineffective owners around the league who can’t compete the way the Milwaukee Brewers, Tampa Bay Rays, and Cleveland Guardians can. Don’t be suckered in. If there’s a competitive balance problem, it has a lot more to do with cheap, incompetent owners stuffing their pockets for years without making the slightest effort to try and win something. That’s not to say that the Dodgers situation hasn’t gotten out of hand, but that’s a unique problem to one team caused largely by the league itself rather than anything to do with the players’ union.
Obviously this is shaping up to be a public relations war as always. The league very much wants to paint the Dodgers back-to-back World Series titles as an existential crisis for the sport rather than the actual problem of owners who refuse to compete. Many fans would agree because the Dodgers side of the issue is more in the public eye, but they don’t want you to think about the fact that they created this monster themselves and are now asking the players to solve it for them. They don’t want you to think about this from the other side, which is that cheap owners are the real problem. And, rather insultingly, Commissioner Rob Manfred, the league and the owners are busy pretending that the fans are overwhelmingly calling for the Dodgers to be reined in, while they have no trouble ignoring fan complaints about ticket costs, concession prices, the endless flow of gambling and sexual performance pill advertisements, and the fact that you have to subscribe to numerous different streaming services just to watch the postseason. Their interest in being responsive to the fanbase is entirely dependent on whether it serves the owners as well.
The first thing we need to understand here is that MLB has never actually wanted real competitive balance, just enough of a semblance of it to keep fans interested. The league and owners want to make money. The same owners and league executives complaining about the Dodgers and how this is all so unfair turn right around late in the season and start rooting for a Dodgers-Yankees World Series. Right now they’re dreading a Brewers-Rays matchup. They want those ratings. They want that revenue. There’s a divide among owners there that is going to be a major stumbling block to any major changes even before we get to convincing the MLBPA. Everyone wants competitive balance until a Rays-Brewers World Series produces the lowest ratings of all time. Of course, to hardcore baseball fans, that matchup sounds awesome, but that is never the league’s concern. What they want, and what the players fear, is a cost controlled free agent market.
Second, the league and the owners created the Dodgers as an issue. They want the players to agree to solve it. The framing makes it pretty hard to trust that competitive balance is their motivation. The lack of balance comes much more from the fact that a lot of teams are poorly run by meddling owners, and others just don’t want to risk their profits to actually try and win in the postseason. The lack of balance comes because most of the lowest payroll teams in the league could spend 50 percent more on payroll than they normally do for a season or two and try and win. They just refuse to do it. Sure, there are some markets that are always going to be difficult, but those are exceptions rather than the rule, and one of those tough markets is in Tampa Bay, which continues to produce competitive teams despite their revenue/payroll issues.
The Tigers are probably a middle tier baseball market, and Chris Ilitch was able to spend $220M this year. Sure they can’t do that year in and year out without losing a fair amount of money, but any of these teams routinely spending around $90-110M a year could push in and take their shots when a window opens. They just don’t want to. Instead, they pocket their revenue sharing dollars and complain about the Dodgers.
The Dolans, owners of the Cleveland Guardians, are a perfect example. They have a great organization built up that is consistently competitive. They aren’t incompetent at all. Any time in the past five years, they could’ve tried to take advantage and spend bigger on some short term deals to actually do something in the postseason. They just refuse to risk any of their profits to do so. In their case, the dilution of the regular season and expansion of the postseason has allowed them to regularly compete and maintain a relevant team without ever really spending in free agency.
Major League Baseball has already made massive changes to the game over the last 50 years to give more teams a shot. They added the league championship series, then the divisional round with the addition of the wild card game, and eventually that kept expanding into two Wild Card series per league. Six teams per league now make the postseason, compared to one from each league originally. If that’s not enough opportunity added, I’m going to suggest that some teams and owners are just really bad at this and are using the Dodgers as an excuse. A salary cap would just be a reward for their mediocrity. The Brewers, the Rays, and the Guardians are all glaring examples that say you don’t need to spend like the Blue Jays or the Yankees or Dodgers in order to put a top team on the field. You just have to be really good at the job.
Third, the entire argument from the league basically comes down to the complaint that the Dodgers are gobbling up the top players in free agency and on the trade market. That’s certainly true, but again this is a specific problem created by the league itself. It was the league, in agreement with bankruptcy proceedings, that handed the Dodgers an exemption that saves them from a significant chunk of the revenue sharing payments other top payroll teams in major markets have to pay into the league’s revenue sharing system. That gives them a big edge even over the Yankees, Mets, Red Sox, and other major market clubs.
That exemption was granted to the Dodgers when the franchise went through bankruptcy proceedings back in 2012. The arrangement between MLB and the bankruptcy court capped their local TV revenue that would be included in the revenue sharing calculation at $85M originally, and now it’s $135M. Their yearly local television revenue is estimated at well over $300M, and all but that $135 million is exempt from revenue sharing. While other major market, revenue paying teams put 48 percent of their local tv revenue into the revenue sharing system, the Dodgers have a lot of that money protected by the bankruptcy arrangement 14 years ago. This saves them around $60M compared to the amount the Dodgers, Red Sox, and other major market teams have to pay into revenue sharing.
Between that exemption, and the Dodgers being allowed to defer a billion dollars in salary as of this writing, the league had a big hand in creating this monster. And the league’s bottom line loves the Dodgers dynasty. Now they say they want the players to agree to a salary cap, which the players union has always resisted, and bail the league out of its own mess.
There’s also a pretty good argument that the recent Dodgers run is a bit of an anomaly. Sure, they’ve won back-to-back World Series titles and three of the last seven, but now much of their money is tied up in players who are already past their prime and getting worse. Owner Mark Walter is currently accused of a widespread insurance fraud scheme, though not charged criminally with anything yet, and is being sued left and right.
That billion in deferred dollars is also owed to players who are moving into their mid-30’s. Should Shohei Ohtani never fully return to form, that roster suddenly looks like an extremely bloated 85-90 win team. They’re currently getting torched by a Brewers team with a $146M payroll in the NLCS, and it’s worth remembering that they only won the 2025 World Series by a half inch as Isaiah Kiner-Falefa was thrown out at the plate as the potential game winning run in the bottom of the ninth of Game 7. They haven’t exactly just shredded the competition in the postseason. Baseball has ways of balancing things out on its own.
The league would also like to avoid a full accounting of how we got here by convincing everyone that this is all just about the fans and giving them what they want. Manfred continues to spin the yarn that the league has conducted expansive polling as to whether fans want a salary cap or not. As far as any reporting out there can find, no such surveys have ever been conducted by the league. Instead they point to a small poll conducted by MLB Trade Rumors at one point to pretend this is all the fans’ idea. Fans do want something done to address payroll disparities, but the league has never shown much interest in asking them.
This is all self-serving lip service, and it’s setting a pretty poor tone for negotiations this offseason. The fans do want better competitive balance. That’s not a reach, but in pinning it on the fans, Manfred is avoiding conversations about how the league let things get this far in the first place and trying to position himself as a third party arbitor who just wants to give the fans what they want and reign in those terrible Dodgers. This posture isn’t great for convincing a naturally skeptical players’ union that this is all in good faith.
Fans also want more affordable tickets, no blackouts, and games to not be spread out across 27 different streaming services but #noticing there’s no “surveys” for that 🧐 https://t.co/nRFx5Ucwf6
Of course, leaving aside the comments from the Commissioner, the union still has the central problem to contend with as they make their own case. Why should fans care how much the players are making? If a salary cap curtails some of the top shelf salaries, so what? Their PR challenges here are extensive as well.
Fans who feel that way have a fair point. We don’t even really have that much of a dog in this fight. If the owners get a salary cap in place, they aren’t going to do nice things for us like lower prices or make the game more accessible. The players aren’t hurting for money while the rest of the economy continues to sputter and the average fan is under significant economic pressure. Few want to hear the players’ arguments for protecting their profits either. We just want baseball without all this drama, without a handful of teams just dominating the sport year after year.
However, it’s the league and the owners risking the 2027 season here, and Rob Manfred and the owners clearly want and need your support. This is why they’re everywhere trying to set the parameters of the debate as being about the Dodgers and a salary cap, rather than cheap owners and a strong salary floor. The players would probably sign essentially a renewal of the current CBA and go about their business. There’s just no way they’re going to agree to changes that potentially cut further into their share of revenue just to help rich owners make more under the guise of competitive balance.
Players have seen their share of the pie decrease little by little, year by year for two decades now. Sure, the top players can still go get their big contract in their late 20’s and early 30’s, but the number of teams willing to pay those contracts to older players continues to decline. The vast majority of major league players will spend a few years in the league, and never make more than the league minimum. That’s a really good wage at $780,000 for a full season. Even after taxes and agent fees, anyone playing full time is going to take home a half million dollars. But most players are not coming anywhere close to accruing generational wealth here either. There’s just no good argument that they should give up more of their share to the owners.
Ultimately, the league and owners probably know they’re going to fail here. They’re pushing the same narrative they’ve been selling for a quarter century now, and the players have always completely rebuffed any kind of hard salary cap. They gave in on the luxury tax threshold in the late 90’s, which is essentially a soft cap that hasn’t worked very well, and they learned the lesson as the number of free agent destinations who can and will pay out a big contract declined as most owners refuse to go anywhere near the luxury tax threshold. Tony Clark isn’t leading the MLBPA anymore. Instead they have a veteran labor lawyer and negotiator at the helm again for the first time since Michael Weiner died in 2013.
Personally, I don’t see any pressing need for things to change at this point either, except with regard to the deferred money. Clean up these specific Dodgers issues and this isn’t such a big issue. The problem with the Dodgers has much more to do with their special exemption and the amounts of money that are allowed to be deferred, and as that roster ages, some of the problem may just solve itself. If there’s a hard salary cap, then the Dodgers’ ownership group is just going to take home a lot more money, and while revenue sharing will spread the wealth, some of it won’t be accessible to the current revenue sharing protocols. They’re still going to be a good team for the foreseeable future because they draft, develop, and trade players as well as anyone in the league.
The other side of the equation is far more important. The real push should be for a salary floor, whereby cheap owners can no longer just pocket revenue sharing funds and continue to spend minimally on their team’s success. Chris Ilitch, despite his flaws, put $220M into the Detroit Tigers’ Opening Day payroll this season. The Tigers are hardly a big market team, and while they can’t spend like that every year without losing a significant amount of money, it does illustrate that teams at this level of market size can take their shot for a year or two before shedding payroll and getting back to yearly profitability.
The ultimate compromise, in theory, that is always floated heading into CBA negotiations is to institute a hard cap and floor system like other major sports have in place. The idea has been floated plenty of times, but to make it work there has to be trust, and a good faith effort on either side. The individual team owners have to be willing to fully open their books to the union, and all revenues current and future, accounted for. If they were willing? Sure, then the players’ share of yearly revenue is fixed at a certain percentage of league earnings, and that number is divided by the 30 teams to reach the general parameters of a reasonable salary cap and floor system. Within that structure, teams then spend as they will.
In the NFL, the current cap is $301.2 million per team, with the floor set at 89 percent of that cap, roughly $268 million, evaluated over multiple seasons to add some flexibility to the process.
The issue for getting to something like that, is that the wealthiest big market teams have to be willing to contribute more of their revenue to the system to make it work for all the small market teams. They also have to continue to spend right up to the cap. So far, most vague early proposals for an MLB cap/floor system contain a far wider disparity between the cap and floor than the NFL has, and it’s just impossible for the players to ever agree to a system with more than enough wiggle room to allow owners to simply cut the players share of the pie.
The league’s initial proposal for a salary cap and floor system beginning in 2027, sets a cap at $245.3 million, while a salary floor would be set at $171.2 million. The eight teams currently over the cap would be required to cut about $578 million in combined salary to comply, while the 12 teams under the floor would have to spend $617 million in additional salary to comply.
That sounds alright on the surface. Overall team payrolls would increase by $39 million, which would be good for the players. The problem is that you need those eight teams to continue spending the maximum amount. If over time they choose not to do so and all these teams are spending closer to the floor than the cap, then the players share of revenue actually declines. Moving those cap and floor levels much closer together is probably a must for something like this to ever work out. Otherwise the league is asking players to risk another major hit to their share of the money.
That point is key, because it reflects the split desires of Manfred and the owners. They still want the big spenders to exist and for the major markets to have that competitive advantage. At the same time, they want to bring the range closer together at least. And they want the players to buy into this idea and trust that they’re not going to end up hurting their own earnings in the process. They want a lot, and some of those desires remain at odds with others.
For now, it just feels like there are too many moving pieces to make this happen. We’ll have to see how much will actually exists behind the PR push. Do the big market ownership groups, who have a lot of sway in the room as it were, want to have to compete on a level playing ground? Are they willing to sacrifice more of their hugely outsized revenue streams compared to other teams to help pay even more of other teams’ payrolls and bring real parity to baseball? It’s hard to believe they wouldn’t put up a fight, splitting the owners.
Does the league even really want to go far enough for this to work? For all the fuss about competitive balance, the league knows that revenues in the postseason are far better when the big market teams with tons of history and star caliber players are in the mix.
There’s a ton to deal with just on the league and ownership side, before we even get to convincing the players union to go along with any of this and addressing all their concerns as well.
Is Rob Manfred the guy to pull this all together and leave this mark on the history of the game, as seems to be his goal? It’s hard to buy the idea that he is, and the fact that he continues to frame this as a problem of the big spenders and the Dodgers in particular, rather than all the ownership groups that simply pocket the cash and never try to win, isn’t a very good start in my opinion. There needs to be a lot of trust and open conversation to make a massive structural change to the game. Manfred has done nothing to earn the levels of trust and goodwill required to get this accomplished.
And perhaps the salary cap/floor isn’t even the goal this time around. Maybe they still view it as a long-term project. Scott Boras certainly is going about his business as though there’s no salary cap and floor system coming, and few in the game are better positioned to read the tea leaves. It’s entirely possible that Manfred and the owners are pushing this so hard in a public relations campaign just to set up some other set of fallback proposals that are the real goal here.
All we as baseball fans know for sure, is that this is going to be a pretty miserable offseason, and there’s nothing to do but try to read the tea leaves and see how it all shakes out in the end.
It took roughly two weeks for Phillies President of Baseball Operations Dave Dombrowski to address the media after Chris Sale and the Atlanta Braves ended their season. Dombrowski answered questions for slightly less than an hour on wide ranging issues between Trea Turner, the coaching staff, and the farm system. They really like Bryan Rincon.
It’s probably the path of least resistance given everything. Two of the Phillies’ best prospects, Aidan Miller and Bryan Rincon, play shortstop but it’s hard to imagine either of them being ready right away. Miller only played in 4 minor league games this year and needed to undergo a procedure in June for his recurring back issues.
Rincon took a big step forward in AA, more than doubling is isolated power from a year ago and would play a good shortstop in the majors on day one. However, it’s unclear how much the AA hitting environment inflated his power surge and he did not play in AAA yet.
Realistically, the Phillies would have to acquire someone outside the organization if Trea Turner wasn’t an option to open the season at shortstop. This path crosses that off, for now, and gives them flexibility for later. Will they actually go down that path in the middle of the season if they have to? Who knows.
Dombrowski sounded pretty confident in Justin Crawford and Derek Hill running the center field platoon again and that they think Crawford can improve out there defensively.
“I think Crawford and Hill are probably a really good combo as long as Crawford keeps growing”
While he was a rookie, Crawford graded out as one of the worst defensive center fielders in baseball. Among 29 players who played at least 500 innings in center field, Crawford ranked 24th in Outs Above Average and 27th in Defensive Runs Saved.
Both Dombrowski and Don Mattingly stressed improving the defense but if they’re not moving two of their biggest problems, how much better can they get?
Improving the lineup
Dave Dombrowski made it clear that they need to improve the offense and specifically said their only two above-average hitters were Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper. Some of that will come from additions and some of it could be from “better decisions from an offensive perspective”.
They’re also confident Turner can bounce back offensively but he needs to improve his swing.
Dombrowski also mentioned the possibility of Aidan Miller specifically:
“I’m not going to put it on his back but we think a guy like Aidan Miller is a really really good player”
When it comes to making bigger splashes, Dombrowski did not close the door on spending for high impact options but it’s probably not going to be the only way he addresses the offense.
“We have a lot of high-salaried guys at this point, so I think you have to figure out which way you go. I don’t think it necessarily means signing all high-salaried guys but I do think we have the flexibility”
The Phillies offense ranked 28th in wRC+ last season and they just fired hitting coach Kevin Long so there are going to have to be many different ways to address the issue. All of them might be in play.
Bullpen Infrastructure
They have Jhoan Duran as the set closer, that’s not changing. They know they need to address the bullpen but also like some of the players they have.
“We do like [Jonathan] Bowlan. We like [Alex] McFarlane a great deal. And [Caleb] Killian we like so we do have a good foundation with the closer that we have”
His answer about Orion Kerkering was less encouraging. It’s not hard to read between the lines here.
“He has the ability to turn it around. He’s got a good fastball, got a good sweeper, they’ve given him the splitter. He didn’t perform to those capabilities. Am I confident? I’m not going to go in there saying he’s going to be our setup guy or seventh inning guy. Do I think he can turn it around? I think he can but we’ll have to wait and see on that.”
Who could return
Tim Mayza agreed to a one-year deal worth $2.75 million to return to the club and maybe even started warming up in the bullpen to celebrate. The Phillies will have to rebuild their left handed relief depth and start that off by bringing back Mayza, who was Mattingly’s most stable southpaw over the entire season.
The only other internal free agent Dombrowski spoke glowingly about for a potential reunion was Luis Arraez.
“We like him. He did a good job. Second in the league in hitting… he’s a player that we like and did a nice job for us”
Arraez hit .310 with a .765 OPS overall as an everyday second baseman but he took a significant step back after the Phillies acquired him. You shouldn’t judge a player off only two months but he’s a tough player for this team to project.
Arraez turned himself into an everyday second baseman but was unplayable there prior to 2026. He played first base his entire stint with the Padres and for most of his career. If he cannot hold up defensively up the middle, the Philadelphia Phillies do not have the option of moving him over with Bryce Harper on the roster. Can’t DH him either with Kyle Schwarber.
The catcher situation
Stop me if you’ve heard this before but they want JT Realmuto to catch less games. I know, it’s crazy.
Dombrowski did mention creating more days off in general for veteran players and even wants Kyle Schwarber to play 30 games at first base next year.
For the catcher situation, they have to bet on JT Realmuto but need to play him less. They’re acknowledging why he hasn’t been afforded more days off. The backup options have not been good enough to justify it. They’re both great defensively, especially Rafael Marchán but they need more.
“We didn’t get enough offensive contributions from that spot and that’s something I need to look at”
“Could it be one of those guys? Perhaps but I also would look to see what other opportunities may be out there”
Dombrowski really liked the job Don Mattingly did and spoke about it multiple times. He gave a more in-depth answer about what Mattingly did to impact the squad later in the presser.
“It’s hard to find people more knowledgeable about baseball than Don Mattingly. He’s managed for a long time. He’s got a pulse for what takes place. I think he’s on top of issues. He’s a good communicator with the staff. Players respect him a great deal. He’s knows what it takes to be successful… He has a lot of fire in his belly too.”
The Phillies fired Bobby Dickerson and replaced him with former Mets manager Carlos Mendoza, who will also serve as the third-base coach. There was no announcement about what this meant for Anthony Contreras, who became the third base coach after Rob Thomson was fired and Dusty Wathan became Mattingly’s new bench coach.
While Long’s tenure was generally very successful, the Phillies had one of the worst lineups in baseball with significant steps back from several players. Trea Turner regressed hard, so did JT Realmuto. Brandon Marsh fell off a cliff in the second half of the season as one of Long’s best successes following a trade from the Los Angeles Angels at the 2022 trade deadline. The only hitter who was better from his 2025 season was Bryce Harper, everyone else took steps back.
Is that entirely on the hitting coach, especially for a veteran team? Almost certainly not, but a new voice and new ideas is something the players probably need. Both things can be true.
Farm System
Dave Dombrowski spoke highly of the Phillies’ farm system and the players they have coming. They already saw Andrew Painter take steps forward as the season went on and Justin Crawford never got demoted. He spoke glowingly about Aidan Miller and thinks he has the chance to be a “special” player.
Gage Wood and Bryan Rincon were other names he specifically mentioned in the presser. Francisco Renteria was also mentioned but he’s far away from the big leagues.
There was a lot covered in the presser and there are a lot of questions moving forward. They need a new hitting coach, need a new starting outfielder, need a starting infielder, need help in the bullpen. There is a lot that will be coming this winter.
HONOLULU, HI - OCTOBER 4: Keaton Wagler #1 of the LA Clippers shoots the ball during the game against the Golden State Warriors during the 2026 NBA Preseason game on October 4, 2026 at Bankoh Arena at Stan Sheriff Center in Honolulu, Hawaii. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this Photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2025 NBAE (Photo by Jay Metzger/NBAE via Getty Images) | NBAE via Getty Images
The events of the last twelve months in Los Angeles Clipper headquarters must have been brutally exhausting. In the past year, the Clippers have:
Been featured on Pablo Torre Finds Out at least ten times for the Aspiration saga
Due to that, they have been under NBA investigation for circumventing the salary cap
Traded away two mainstays of their team over the last couple years, James Harden and Ivica Zubac
Hosted NBA All-Star Weekend
Lucked into the fifth overall pick in the NBA Draft, used on Illinois guard Keaton Wagler
Traded away Kawhi Leonard
Docked five first round draft picks, Ballmer suspended for a year due to cap circumvention investigation
Suffice to say, there is a LOT that has happened in Inglewood recently, and I’m sure getting everything behind them from the previous era of Clippers basketball is best for everyone involved.
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA – OCTOBER 10: Keaton Wagler #1 of the LA Clippers looks on during the 2026-2027 NBA preseason game between Los Angeles Clippers and Toronto Raptors at Rogers Arena on October 10, 2026 in Vancouver, British Columbia. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Elizabeth Ruiz Ruiz/Getty Images) | Getty Images
Unlike most situations where you have a team that’s hitting a hard reset, the Clippers have no incentive to be terrible, as their future first round draft capital has been forcefully taken by the league office. So, where does that leave the Clippers? Let’s dive in.
Los Angeles Clippers: Last season 42-40, lost in Western Conference Play-In Game
Over/Under: 27.5 wins (-110/-115)
To win Pacific Division: 30/1
To win Western Conference: 600/1
To win NBA Finals: 1000/1
Key additions: Keaton Wagler (5th pick in Draft), Brandon Ingram and Gradey Dick (Kawhi deal), Max Strus (Cleveland), Rui Hachimura (LA Lakers)
Key losses: Kawhi Leonard (Aspirations of Toronto), John Collins (Detroit), Many draft picks
INGLEWOOD, CALIFORNIA – APRIL 07: Darius Garland #10 of the Los Angeles Clippers waits to enter the game as head coach Tyronn Lue looks on during the second quarter of an NBA game against the Dallas Mavericks at Intuit Dome on April 07, 2026 in Inglewood, California. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images) | Getty Images
I’m sort of buying the Clippers in the short term. Yes, rookie point guards taking a ton of minutes is typically a recipe to stink out loud as a team, but this entire thing isn’t on the shoulders of Wagler. Darius Garland, provided he’s healthy, should carry quite a bit of the burden. There are enough combo guards and wings to help get the offense going. I like Hachimura for this team, Brandon Ingram is solid and you’ve got plenty of bodies with Strus, Gradey Dick, old friend Derrick Jones Jr. and more to fill out the rotation. Ty Lue is a good coach, and the Clippers have no reason to be bad. They’re going to be better than the folks at Fanduel think.
Major League Baseball is a fastball league. Velocity is all the rage, and pitchers up and down a roster are throwing harder than ever.
Fastball variations (four-seam, sinker, cutter) accounted for 55% of all pitches thrown in baseball this season, and the average four-seam velocity was 94.7 mph, which is up from 93 mph just a decade ago. Going further, 46% of four-seamers reached 95 mph or higher this season. It was just 24% in 2015, and 9.3% of all fastballs this season were 98 mph or harder, up from 2.8% a decade ago.
So, with hitters gearing up to hit high velocity more and more, the changeup is having its moment as a natural counterpunch.
"I feel like every couple of years there's another pitch out there that is the next pitch to get hitters out," explained Royals starter Michael Wacha at this year's All-Star Game. "A couple of years ago, it was the sweeper, then the high fastball, but hitters make adjustments, and they start to cover those pitches, and it always trends into 'Hey, what's the next pitch?' You saw it last year in the World Series, that split fingers and changeups were big-time pitches in that series, so, yeah, it might be making a little comeback. I've always been a fastball-changeup guy, so I've always kind of relied on it."
The emphasis on the fastball from hitters is part of what makes the changeup so impactful.
"It's one of those things that looks like a heater coming out of the hand, and a lot of hitters want to hit a heater," explained Guardians ace Parker Messick. "It looks like a heater, and then the bottom falls out. It's a push-pull, change-of-speed type of pitch, so I think it creates a bit of swing-and-miss, a bit of weak contact."
Since the changeup is a natural counter to the fastball, we've seen its usage increase in 2026 more than any other pitch in the league, other than the sweeper, which is a lower-usage pitch overall.
Pitch
2025 usage %
2026 usage %
Change (%)
Four-seam
31.8
30.5
-4.1
Sinker
15.4
16.6
+7.8
Slider
14.3
13.1
-8.4
Changeup
10.3
11.2
+8.7
Cutter
7.5
8.0
+6.7
Sweeper
7.6
8.3
+9.2
Curveball
6.7
6.4
-4.5
Splitter
3.3
3.2
-3.0
Not only is changeup usage up, but it's proving to be one of the most impactful pitches in the league, both in terms of weak contact allowed and swinging strikes.
Pitch
OPS against
Barrel% against
Hard-Hit% against
SwStr%
Contact%
Splitter
0.576
5.6
32.6
16.7
67.5
Changeup
0.618
5.6
31.8
14.9
70.4
Sweeper
0.631
7.6
30.4
13.2
70.5
Curveball
0.635
7.4
36.2
11.7
71
Slider
0.671
8.1
36.6
15.3
68.4
Four-seam
0.768
9.7
44.3
9.1
81.4
Sinker
0.776
6.3
42.4
5.3
88.5
Cutter
0.805
8.1
37.2
10.1
79.5
League-wide, the change-up's 5.6% barrel rate allowed is tied for the lowest mark of any pitch, and its 31.8% hard-hit rate allowed is second-best, only trailing the sweeper. Its .618 OPS against is second only to the splitter, while the four-seamer has a mark of .768. The changeup also allowed the third-lowest contact rate at 70.4%, and had the third-highest swinging strike rate at 14.9%. The only pitches league-wide that got more swinging strikes in 2026 than the changeup were splitters and sliders (not sweepers).
That's a key part of the changeup's value. Not only does it induce weak contact, but it misses bats. Not only can pitchers pound the strike zone with it, but they can have it fall below the zone for whiffs. In fact, the in-zone swinging strike rate on changeups league-wide is 14.9%, which is the same as the swinging strike rate on changeups out of the zone. Unlike pitches like the four-seamer and sweeper, the changeup does not rely on being thrown out of the zone to induce whiffs.
"Also, a changeup is a pitch where there are so many different movement profiles," explained Tampa Bay Rays starter Nick Martinez. "There's just so many variables that play into what can be a good changeup, and so it's hard for hitters to adjust for that."
One of the newest movement profiles is the kick-change. When I wrote about the pitch back in May, I mentioned that a kick change is a variation of a changeup that uses a two-seam grip primarily and some spike from a bent finger to create more depth than a normal changeup. The “kick” in kick-change refers to “kicking the axis of the ball down,” through pressure from the ring finger. The added depth generated on the kick-change means that you’re creating splitter-like movement on a pitch that has a changeup-like grip and spin.
"I don't know [if it's a changeup]," laughed Wacha. "It's not really a splitter either. I would say it's more of a changeup than a splitter, but also you're just using physics in your favor there."
Another reason the kick-change has become more popular is that it’s easy for supinators to use. As detailed in this video, supination is when a pitcher releases a pitch with their thumb pointing up at the sky, while pronation is when the thumb turns over to point more towards the ground. Most pitchers identify as either “pronators” or “supinators” based on what feels natural or physically possible with their wrist movement. If a pitcher is a pronator by nature, then it may be hard for them to throw a pitch like a sweeper, which requires supination. Meanwhile, supinators are generally more comfortable gripping the outside of the baseball and are better at throwing breaking balls.
The popularity of the kick-change has meant that pitchers who may not have been able to find a changeup grip they liked before can now add a pitch to their arsenal. As most pitchers will tell you, adding any pitch into your mix can be a major benefit.
"If you can add to your repertoire, I think that's a good thing for sure," explained Wacha. "You see guys have success and see what makes them successful, like 'Hey, this is that sweeper, this is that cutter, this is that changeup, and it's like, 'Hey, I could add that to my repertoire to help it get better and help my other pitches get better."
Whether you want to call the kick-change a changeup or not, harder and flatter changeups are becoming more en vogue in Major League Baseball.
2025
2026
Change
Changeups thrown
73,260.00
79,838.00
+6,578.00
Average changeup speed (mph)
85.85
86.03
+0.18
Average changeup induced break (in)
4.47
4.15
-0.32
% of changeups over 85 mph
63.76
65.41
+1.65
% of changeups under 2 in break
30.75
33.42
+2.67
% of changeups over 85 mph AND under 2 in
22.28
24.13
+1.85
Across the league, the average changeup is getting harder and flatter. The increased velocity makes some sense because fastballs are also getting harder and pitchers want to throw their changeup with the same arm speed as their fastball to create that deception. The flatter movement profile could be a result of the increased velocity, but it also could make the pitch more impactful to same-handed hitters.
In the past, pitchers have been hesitant to throw changeups to same-handed hitters because the movement profile is more of a soft pitch that runs away from an opposite-handed hitter. You don't want to leave a changeup over the plate, so if you throw it to a same-handed hitter, you need to start it inside. If you have too much movement, you run the risk of having the pitch hit them. The harder changeup with less horizontal break makes that a little less likely, and we've seen many teams, like the Rays, increase their usage of same-handed changeups this year, adding another wrinkle to make the pitch more impactful.
"I just feel like it's such a feel pitch," said Red Sox rookie Jake Bennett. "If you don't have that good feel for it, you don't want to leave something up and have it run into their barrel. But if you've got the command for it, being able to throw it almost back foot [to same-handed hitters] is great."
This season, Bennett's 19.2% swinging-strike rate on his changeup was about five points above the league average for changeups and nearly double his four-seamer’s 11.2% swinging strike rate.
With the increased use of the kick-change, we're still parsing through data because it's hard to know which pitches that are classified as changeups use what grips, but we do know that changeups over 86 mph (the league average for a changeup) have led to more whiffs.
2026
% of changeups 86+ mph
55.15
SwStr% 86+ mph AND under 2 in break
15.96
SwStr% under 86 mph AND under 2 in break
14.64
SwStr% under 86 mph AND 2+ in break
15.11
Same-pitcher difference in SwStr% (86+ minus under 86 mph, pts)
1.10
Fast, flat changeups missed more bats this season. Changeups thrown at 86 mph or harder with less than two inches of break posted a 16% swinging-strike rate, compared with 14.6% for changeups under 86 mph with similar break. If a pitcher threw a slower changeup with more break, it missed a few more bats, but the 15.1% mark was still below that of the harder changeups. When you split it up between individual pitchers, the gap between the swinging strike rate on their harder changeups and slower changeups was over 1%.
Another big benefit to the changeup is that it tends to be count-agnostic. The swinging strike rate on a changeup is consistent whether the pitch was thrown ahead or behind in the count, to lefties or righties, in the zone or out of it: "Just being able to throw it any count, I feel like that's why it helps," explained Bennett. "For two strikes, I try to throw it on top of the plate, and then if I'm behind the count, and I try to steal a strike or something, I just shift the sights up a little bit and try and get it in zone."
Swinging Strike Rate by Count
Pitch
Pitcher ahead (more strikes)
Even count (0-0, 1-1, 2-2)
Pitcher behind (more balls)
Full count (3-2)
Changeup
14.69
14.72
15.61
15.90
Four-seam
11.47
8.56
7.47
9.40
Sinker
6.23
5.02
5.04
6.64
Slider
16.67
14.51
14.62
17.54
Sweeper
14.84
12.07
12.22
15.96
Curveball
14.79
10.00
9.74
13.95
The swinging-strike rate on the changeup when a pitcher is ahead in the count is almost identical to when the pitcher is behind in the count. Interestingly, the swinging strike rate on a changeup is highest when a pitcher is behind in the count or in a full count. Undoubtedly, this is because these are typical fastball counts, and when the hitter is sitting on a fastball, they're more likely to be early on a changeup and swing through the pitch.
Many pitchers made a good living in 2026 by getting swings and misses on their changeup. Parker Messick was tied with Angels' starter Walbert Ureña for the second-most strikeouts in baseball on his changeup at 71. Those names being together is a beautiful encapsulation of how varied the changeup can be. Messick's changeup is 86 mph with over 15 inches of horizontal movement and essentially no vertical movement. Ureña has a 91 mph changeup with almost 18 inches of horizontal movement and 5.1 inches of vertical break or rise.
Yet, changeup success by count is not limited to swinging strike rate. It's also an impactful pitch in terms of weak contact allowed, regardless of the count.
wOBA By Count
Pitch
Pitcher ahead (more strikes)
Even count (0-0, 1-1, 2-2)
Pitcher behind (more balls)
Full count (3-2)
Changeup
0.220
0.280
0.410
0.390
Four-seam
0.230
0.330
0.500
0.390
Sinker
0.260
0.340
0.440
0.380
Slider
0.230
0.300
0.470
0.360
Sweeper
0.210
0.290
0.470
0.370
Curveball
0.230
0.290
0.520
0.390
Now, when a pitcher is behind in the count, the wOBA against a changeup goes up considerably, but that's the case for every pitch. Hitter's counts tend to favor hitters. When a pitcher is behind, the wOBA against a changeup is .410, but that's better than .500 for four-seamers, .440 for sinkers, and .470 for sliders. It's not a perfectly like-for-like comparison, because pitchers throw more fastballs for strikes when behind, but it's an indication that the higher wOBA number on the changeup when a pitcher is behind is not a negative factor against the offering.
"Just the change in speeds and the movement profile that I have," said Martinez about why his changeup is so effective. "My ability to command it in and out of the zone, and having confidence to throw it in any count, working the fastball off the changeup, the curveball, the slider, whatever pitch I can mix and match to get to that changeup." Martínez's 15.5% swinging-strike rate on his changeup was just above the league average (14.3%), but his 23.2% hard-hit was almost 9% below the league average for changeup, and his wOBA allowed was .052 better.
Across the league, in an even count, the changeup has the lowest wOBA allowed of any pitch in baseball and has the second-lowest wOBA allowed when a pitcher is ahead in the count. Wacha has a .251 wOBA on his changeup, which is far better than the league’s average mark. His 15.4% swinging strike on the chanegup is slightly above the league’s 14.3% mark, but his 25.5% hard-hit rate allowed on it was elite.
"I personally feel the changeup is one of those pitches that is always going to be a successful pitch in the major leagues, simply because there's no pitching machine that throws a changeup," explained Martinez. "Nowadays, you have pitching machines that throw curveballs, cutters, and sliders, and you can get repetitions off those pitches. But throwing a changeup in batting practice, you really need that speed difference, you know, established with your fastball, especially in my case, to be able to make it effective."
Year
Avg four-seam (mph)
Four-seams 95+ mph (%)
Four-seams 98+ mph (%)
SwStr% on 95+ four-seams
Changeup SwStr% (all)
2015
92.96
24.2
2.8
9.91
9.87
2019
93.31
26.2
2.7
11.29
11.15
2023
94.06
35.9
5.2
10.81
14.43
2024
94.21
38.7
5.5
11.06
14.25
2025
94.40
41.8
7.2
10.42
14.33
2026
94.73
46.4
9.3
10.71
14.68
That relationship between the fastball and changeup is crucial. As fastball velocity has increased, the swinging strike rate on high-velocity four-seamers has stayed relatively flat; however, the swinging strike rate on changeups has increased as hitters gear up for the increased fastball velocity. Messick and Bennett are pitchers who thrive off playing their four-seamer off their changeup.
Messick throws his four-seamer and changeup over 65% of the time. Both those pitches are well above the league average, with his four-seamer posting a .252 wOBA against (the league average is .345) and his changeup registering a .241 mark (the league average was .284. His swinging strike rates on both pitches were also above league average. 11.2% and 18.7% swinging strikes vs. 9.2% and 14.9% league. Jake Bennett throws either a four-seamer or changeup 63% of the time and has not been shy about the fact that his changeup success is predicated on his fastball location.
"I feel like, at least for me, the changeup tunnels off my fastball very well. I have a good four-seamer that plays at the top of the zone, and then just to be able to throw the changeup off of that and throw it below the zone, I feel like that's where I get a lot of my success."
Funnily enough, that last idea Bennett mentions about tunnelling off the fastball might be the reason that the changeup continues to befuddle people who create pitching models, which may also impact why the value of the changeup is not properly accounted for.
"The changeup depends on deception maybe most of all the pitches," said Eno Sarris, who helped create the Stuff+ model used by FanGraphs. "It's supposed to look like a fastball. Unfortunately for stuff models, I think 'looking like a fastball' includes data that we don't have access to. Things like arm speed, in particular, would probably help stuff models capture a good changeup better."
"I think the speed differential and movement are key," described Wacha. "You know, hopefully I get it coming out looking like a fastball with the arm speed, keeping the same arm speed as a fastball. Hopefully that speed differential and the movement on it can fool them or get some weak contact."
Wacha is one of the pitchers who has a changeup Stuff+ likes. His 130 Stuff+ grade on his changeup was second best in baseball among pitchers with 100 innings. Martinez ranked 9th on that list with a 109 Stuff+, and Messick was down at 18th with a 103 Stuff+, which is slightly above the 100 score for a league-average offering. Ureña's changeup had a 98 Stuff+ despite its success, and Bennett's changeup had an 87 Stuff+ grade, which was 66th among 141 qualified pitchers.
"Often the stats and data are behind when there's this much disconnect with common sense and first principles," explained Sarris.
While it may take the data and pitch models a little bit longer to catch up, pitchers across the league are already seeing that the changeup might be the key to unlocking another level of success in a velocity-driven league.
NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 18: James Dolan, L, Executive Chairman of Madison Square Garden, stands with Phil Jackson during the press conference to announce Jackson as President of the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden on March 18, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images) | Getty Images
The home stretch is here. In less than a week, the Knicks will raise their long-awaited third championship banner on national television at Madison Square Garden. It’s a day 53 years in the making.
As we get closer, we continue to move along our chronicle of the 53-year championship drought. Today, we pick up after the Knicks’ failed pursuit of LeBron James in 2010 and into the Knickstape era that finally returned the Mecca to postseason basketball, only for a plethora of drama, incompetency, and humiliation rituals to sink the franchise as far into the doldrums as they ever had been by the time the COVID-19 pandemic rang in the start of the 2020s.
The previous iterations of this series had distinct identities. Part I was about transitioning from an aging Golden Age core; Part II was about the Ewing era and the revival of the Knicks brand; and Part III was the Isiah Thomas clown show. This part bridges eras, but also shows the broad range of emotion of a championship drought nearing 50 years and an identity of LolKnicks that would be hard to shed.
Unlike the previous parts, there will be more visually stupid, individual moments in here, rather than front office moves and playoff failures. Such is the case with things we remember more vividly.
This is a really long one, folks, but that’s mostly because, unlike the old ones, which I’ve had to hear about my entire life through the accounts of others, I lived through this. It’s just nice to know that after this, it’s first-world problems from here.
Getting Impatient And Trading For Melo (2011)
After missing out on LeBron, the Knicks quickly pivoted to Amar’e Stoudemire, who had a sensational first season in New York with a young, middling roster. It was clear he was going to need another big-time scorer by his side for this team to actually move forward as a contender.
Midway through the 2010-11 season, it was clear that the Nuggets were going to lose their young star, Carmelo Anthony, in free agency that offseason. Despite being one of the best teams in the Western Conference, they were open to moving him.
Enter the Knicks.
The New York native was considered extremely likely to head east in free agency. The Knicks, as the preeminent brand in the market, were heavy favorites to land him, but there was the threat of the Jay-Z-owned, soon-to-be Brooklyn Nets, who were planning on pursuing Melo as well.
Feeling the pressure and also being fearful of the upcoming CBA negotiations, the Knicks engaged in trade talks with the Nuggets, but Denver demanded an extremely steep package, one that general manager Donnie Walsh was balking at.
James Dolan, as always, meddled and forced the trade through.
Four of the Knicks’ best young players, Raymond Felton, Timofey Mozgov, Wilson Chandler, and Danilo Gallinari, along with two future first-round picks (one of which became Jamal Murray), would head off to the Nuggets for the prodigal son. Everyone rejoiced… except Walsh.
The trade would completely gut New York’s depth and have them completely reliant on the duo of Stoudemire and Anthony. They’d be swept by the Celtics in the first round after slipping into the playoffs, but the pairing had promise if they could continue to add talent… and as long as neither of them regressed.
The End Of Linsanity (2012)
Jeremy Lin was a second-year bench-warming point guard from Harvard, getting a rare opportunity to suit up on February 4, 2012. That night would go down in history as the start of an international phenomenon known as Linsanity.
Shortly after, an injury to Melo vaulted him into the starting lineup. In an 11-game span, Lin averaged 23.9 points, 9.2 assists, and 2.4 steals on 50% from the field and 36.1% from three, carrying a once-struggling Knicks team to a 9-2 stretch that saved their season.
After scoring 17 and 9 against Atlanta on February 22, the clock struck midnight on Lin. With Melo back, he was forced to take a backseat anyway, but he was still the team’s new starting point guard. The aura of Linsanity dissipated with an ugly 1-for-11, 8-turnover night against the Heat on February 23, the first such hardship he had experienced.
Some believe he turned back into a pumpkin after, but he actually still averaged 15 and 7 over the next 14 games as a complementary piece. He had seemed to find his place in the pecking order… until he suffered a season-ending knee injury on March 24.
After the season concluded, Lin hit restricted free agency. The Houston Rockets bit on his run as a superstar in the World’s Most Famous Arena and offered him a three-year, $25 million pact that the Knicks wouldn’t match due to a poison-pill provision that spiked his Year 3 salary. Initial reports of a four-year,$28 million deal would’ve reportedly been matched, but it didn’t.
The sharpest rise and fall ever.
Mike D’Antoni Resigns (March 2012)
The 2011-12 Knicks were a chaotic group. A midseason injury to Melo, regression from Amar’e, Linsanity, a dreadful start turning into an incredible 28-15 finish to get into the playoffs, and a coaching fiasco to put the cherry on top,
The worry when the Knicks acquired Melo was that his offensive playstyle, one of isolation offense, was a clash with D’Antoni’s mentality of pace and ball movement. That came to a head way quicker than anyone thought.
Lin’s rise seemed to be the last straw. He fit what D’Antoni wanted. When the great vibes from Linsanity wore off in March as these styles clashed, Melo gave the front office an ultimatum: it’s either me or him.
D’Antoni allegedly wanted to trade Melo to the Nets for Deron Williams, which, ironically, was something that Donnie Walsh wanted back in 2011. Of course, the man who overreached to get Melo wasn’t going to ditch him, since he was bringing the Knicks back to relevance for the first time in a decade, so D’Antoni was pushed out and resigned, and his assistant, Mike Woodson, replaced him.
Dating back to Rick Pitino, the Knicks had now had five full-time head coaches resign in 20 years. Not fired; resigned. Totally normal.
Amar’e Punches A Fire Extinguisher (2012 1st Round, Game 2)
A turbulent season ended with a 36-30 record, with the Knicks clinching the No. 7 seed. Unfortunately, that earned them a date with the Heatles.
Miami shellacked the Knicks by 33 points in Game 1 at American Airlines Arena before outlasting them by 10 in Game 2. Stoudemire, who was having a down season marred by injuries, was held to just 27 total points and 12 rebounds across the two games while being opposed by Chris Bosh. The vibes were low, and this circus of a season hit its peak after the game when he was walking back to the locker room.
Out of frustration, Stoudemire punched the glass case of a fire extinguisher, suffering severe lacerations in his left hand. A season that was already on the brink now saw the team’s second option take himself out of a crucial Game 3 at MSG because he couldn’t control his temper.
The Knicks scored just 70 points in Game 3 in a blowout loss, effectively ending the series. Amar’e returned for Game 4 and scored 20 in a close win, but the season ended in Miami just three days later.
Stoudemire’s Knicks tenure would be defined by these injuries. He missed the first 30 games of a great 2012-13 season and later the final month of the regular season due to recurring knee issues, not returning until Game 3 of the second round against the Pacers.
His injuries forced him to be load-managed and come off the bench. He would start just 35 games as a Knick after blasting that fire extinguisher, eventually being bought out in February 2015. For one year, Amar’e let us dream, but his body failed him after.
Roy Hibbert’s Block (2013 ECSF, Game 6)
The Knicks rebounded from that disappointing exit in 2012 by continuing to get stronger. They brought in Raymond Felton, J.R. Smith, and Jason Kidd; they got a full training camp with big trade acquisition Tyson Chandler, and the Knicks burst out to an 8-1 start, looking like a legitimate threat in the East.
The injuries to Stoudemire hung over the team, but they went on to win 54 games and clinch the No. 2 seed. They were determined to make the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time in 13 years and get revenge on the Heat… but they had to get there first.
The aging rival Celtics were first on the revenge calendar, as the Knicks took a quick 3-0 lead on them, looking for payback for a 2011 sweep, but those older Celts, playing their last games as a core before that infamous Brooklyn game, fought back and got all the way to Game 6 in Boston before New York put them out of their misery.
Those two extra games robbed them of some rest and recuperation that they could’ve used into a series with the feisty, up-and-coming Pacers.
Sure enough, the Knicks looked flat in Game 1 at the Garden and were immediately at a disadvantage. Even when they got Amar’e back for Game 3 in Indiana, he was a non-factor as they lost both at Bankers Life Fieldhouse. A win facing elimination at MSG set up a crucial Game 6. This couldn’t be how the best Knicks team of a generation goes out, right?
The Knicks trailed by double digits early in the second half, but stormed all the way back to tie it after three quarters. Leading by two with five minutes to go, the Knicks had the momentum as the veteran team that refused to die when Melo rose for a dunk on the baseline, but that momentum was stolen the second that Roy Hibbert got his big left hand on the ball.
Lance Stephenson tied the game on the ensuing position and the Knicks never led again. Indiana went on a quick 11-2 run that helped them pull away, and despite the best efforts of Melo and J.R., they never got enough stops to give themselves a chance after that.
While it was disheartening, many believed that the window was still open for 2013-14 and beyond. Nobody then knew this would be the last Knick playoff game for another eight years.
The Andrea Bargnani Trade (July 2013)
It’s no coincidence the second Dark Ages in Knicks history was brought on by the Harbinger of Death himself, Andrea Bargnani.
Glen Grunwald, who was really just a placeholder after Walsh resigned in 2011, was only two months away from being replaced as lead executive by Steve Mills, but he made his impact in the arguable worst trade in Knicks history, sending Marcus Camby, fan favorite Steve Novak, Quentin Richardson, a 2016 first, and two seconds for the former No. 1 pick.
Bargnani enjoyed some solid seasons as Chris Bosh’s second fiddle before becoming a 20-PPG scorer in 2010-11. The two seasons before the trade, he was limited to 65 games, while his stretch-four abilities waned and his three-point shooting regressed sharply. An elbow injury suffered the year before the trade seemed not to dissuade management.
The package they gave up wasn’t as inhibitive, but there were two key points. For one, they were taking on Bargnani’s remaining contract of two years and $23.5 million on an already expensive roster. Didn’t Dolan refuse to pay Lin because he was worried about the luxury tax?
Oh yeah, they also traded away the back end of a 2016 first-round pick swap that they got with Melo in the trade with Denver. The Knicks would be terrible by 2016 and could’ve used that swap that landed at No. 9.
As for Bargnani’s Knicks career, he sucked. He was the poster child of the team’s failure to maximize the rest of Melo’s prime, as Amar’e regressed hard, Chandler was traded, and this guy made eight figures to make boneheaded decision after boneheaded decision while battling injury. In two years, he played 71 total games and was awful.
For the next decade, Raptors fans took joy in clowning the Knicks for being scammed by Masai Ujiri. If only there was a way to pay them back…
The Chris Smith Saga (October 2013)
Steve Mills was now in charge, and boy did he have a doozy of a dilemma right when he took the gig.
J.R. Smith was coming off a Sixth Man of the Year campaign and was a beloved Knick, but he was quickly approaching free agency. The Knicks wanted him to extend, which he did for three years and $18 million that summer, so they did him and his family a little favor.
Chris Smith was J.R.’s younger, less-talented brother. He was still better than 99.9% of the world at basketball- don’t get me wrong- but after an okay career at Louisville that never stood out, he signed a training camp deal with the Knicks in 2012 and participated in Summer League. That’s no big deal; this happens all the time.
He was waived after an injury in 2012, but was back in camp the next year. Despite injuries making the roster a bit shallow entering the season, the Knicks decided that Chris was good enough to make the roster. Fans and the media, obviously, cried nepotism.
Whether it was or not, Smith played a grand total of two minutes as a Knick, spent much of his time in the D League, and was waived on New Year’s Eve. What the hell was the point of all that?
Phil Jackson Hired as President Of Basketball Operations (2014)
In 2005, James Dolan and Isiah Thomas went all-in on bringing one of the greatest coaches of all time to New York to lead a ragtag group back to Camelot. They failed, as he shockingly decided to stick with Kobe Bryant, and settled for the disastrous Larry Brown experience.
Jackson retired as a coach in 2011, but that wouldn’t stop Dolan’s quest to bring the Zen Master back to where he won a pair of titles as a player in 1970 and 1973. It took months of negotiating, but Dolan locked him in as POBO in March 2014, giving him a whopping $60 million contract.
Because of his pedigree, the move was universally celebrated. Those poor souls in March 2014 didn’t know that Jackson would attempt to be just as bad as Isiah was a decade earlier.
The Crawl Towards The Abyss (2013-15)
The Knicks, one season after winning 54 games, started 2013-14 with a 3-13 record. Amar’e was banged up, Chandler was banged up, Felton regressed, Bargnani sucked and got hurt, and the team became more and more reliant on Melo for scoring. Things just got worse and worse.
A seven-game losing streak sunk them to 21-40 on March 3. The season was completely cooked. Even worse, the team’s 2014 pick was in Denver. Because of that, the team probably found the extra gear to finish 16-5 and miss the playoffs by just one game. That strong finish must mean things will change, right?
Well, Jackson cleaned house in the coaching staff despite Woodson wanting to coach under Jackson and finishing strong. In keeping with the standard of bringing in “winners” who had no experience doing what they were doing, Jackson hired just-retired former Laker Derek Fisher as coach to run his triangle offense.
Jackson convinced Melo to re-sign on a $124 million supermax and traded Chandler and Felton to the Mavericks for a bunch of guys who didn’t amount to much and two seconds as his first two moves as executive. Well, if you don’t count signing Lamar Odom, Stephen A. can tell you about that.
The Knicks’ best pick in the 2014 draft was No. 34, used to select Cleanthony Early. Notably, still on the board? Spencer Dinwiddie, Jerami Grant, and Nikola Jokic.
After starting the season 2-1, the Knicks lost 34 of their next 37 games. They were an unbelievable 5-35 when the NBA sent them to London to face a young Giannis and the Bucks, which they lost en route to their 16th consecutive loss, a franchise record. A couple of small wins here and there did little to stop the runaway train of a 17-65 season, the worst in franchise history.
At least they had their pick this year…
Andrea Bargnani Being Dumb (2013-15)
I told you this part would also include in-game stupidity that didn’t have long-range effects. That’s what the Second Dark Ages were known for.
Here’s some stupid Bargnani moments. First, he made Clyde Frazier completely lose his mind when he shot a three with the shot clock off and the lead late in regulation on December 18, 2013.
He’s lucky the Knicks won in overtime. Now, here’s him trying to dunk from the damn free throw line for some reason against an equally bad Sixers team:
Good stuff.
The 2015 Draft Lottery
You would think with a 17-65 record, the Knicks would have the best lottery odds. Unfortunately, their futility was matched by the dreadful Timberwolves, who won just 16 games. The Knicks lost out at 25% odds after winning two of their last three games. Meaningless wins tanking lottery odds, you say…
That would come back to bite them. With still good odds (19.9%) of landing Kentucky superstar Karl-Anthony Towns, the Knicks felt good. Even if they didn’t get him, there was still star Ohio State guard D’Angelo Russell and Duke forward Jahlil Okafor, all considered Grade A talent. There was a 55.8% chance the Knicks would stay in the top 3.
They fell to No. 4, the first of many lottery disasters for the late-2010s Knicks.
Now, they’d be pretty fortunate to have Kristaps Porzingis fall into their laps, but this was a deeply unpopular pick that even drove a young fan to tears. This moment was the peak of Jackson’s executive tenure: the one thing he did right.
Cleanthony Early Gets Shot (December 2015)
Early was never a big part of the Knicks’ plans, but he was at least a young player that had a moderate amount of investment put into him as the team’s top player from the 2014 draft class. While his tenure is very forgettable, one thing wasn’t.
On December 30, 2015, Early was shot in the leg and robbed by an unknown assailant after exiting a Queens strip club. This, one day after he logged 26 seconds in garbage time against the Pistons, would keep him out until late March. He’d play his last game as a Knick, and in the NBA, three weeks later.
It was also incredibly ironic timing, as recent signing Derrick Williams had $600,000 worth of jewelry stolen by two women he took home from a club in Manhattan 10 days earlier. Nice culture you’ve got here, Mr. Fisher.
Midseason Collapse 1.0 (2015-16)
While the Knicks still had Carmelo Anthony, they still had eyes on winning. Despite coming off a 17-win season in 2014-15, nobody was capitulating.
The Knicks had an active offseason, signing Robin Lopez to a four-year, $54 million deal, Arron Afflalo to a two-year, $16 million deal, Kyle O’Quinn to a four-year, $16 million deal, and drafting Jerian Grant at No. 19 by trading away the underwhelming Tim Hardaway Jr.
Their intention to compete translated into wins early. Despite some ebbs and flows, the Knicks matched their previous season’s win total on January 5 and won consecutive overtime games at the Garden to improve to 22-22 on January 20. When they woke up two days later to face the Clippers, they were ninth in the East, but also just two games back of fifth. This was what they wanted.
The Clippers destroyed them that night in MSG. After a loss to Charlotte, they pushed an incredible Thunder team to the brink at home, but lost in OT. They split their next two games, but tumbled further with losses to the Warriors, Celtics, Pistons, Grizzlies, and Nuggets. Nine losses in 10 games to drop to 23-31.
That cost Derek Fisher his job, as he was fired by Jackson. His job was already tedious entering the season after he struggled to acclimate to it. His spat with Matt Barnes in October probably didn’t help either. The ESPN article about his firing, mentioning more former Lakers who could replace him, embodies how dumb this franchise was.
Under interim head coach Kurt Rambis, the Knicks lost two more games before finally ending the losing streak. That wouldn’t make things any better in a 9-19 finish that saw the team finish with 50 losses for the second straight season.
“They’re Saying Us And Golden State Are The Super Teams” (2016)
The entire 2016 offseason, looking back, was a humiliation ritual.
That 44-game start before things went off the rails allowed management to double down on believing this team, now focused around an aging Anthony and a young phenom in Porzingis,
Jackson, who could not stop looking at his old Bulls and Lakers, decided to poach two Bulls icons who were past their prime because, why not?
A stunning trade for Chicago’s favorite son, Derrick Rose, shipped out Lopez, Jerian Grant, and Jose Calderon for an uber-talented guard who could not stay on the court. Who cares that he was making $22 million and hadn’t been the star he was once in four years? It’s Derrick Rose!
Two weeks later, as part of the league-wide stupidity that resulted from the cap spiking, Jackson signed Courtney Lee to a four-year, $48 million contract, but that paled in comparison to the real prize.
Joakim Noah was signed to a four-year, $72 million contract, the largest free agent signing in franchise history. As a former Defensive Player of the Year, Noah was supposed to make up for the roster’s defensive deficiencies, but I think the team forgot he was now 31, several years removed from his impactful prime, and coming off an injury-laden season.
The roster looked good on paper. Derrick Rose, Courtney Lee, Carmelo Anthony, Kristaps Porzingis, and Joakim Noah, with a bench group of Justin Holiday, former Bucks star Brandon Jennings, Lance Thomas, and Kyle O’Quinn. It prompted some bold words from D-Rose on Media Day:
I’m still not sure who said this, Derrick, but confidence is cool.
This offseason was a disaster, namely with the Lee and Noah contracts being extremely prohibitive to the salary cap going forward. In two disastrous seasons as a Knick, Noah tried his hardest to be the next Jerome James or Bargnani, playing 53 total games and averaging just 4.6 points and 7.9 rebounds before injuries, a PED suspension, and head coach Jeff Hornacek putting him in exile in January 2018, before he was finally bought out.
Charles Oakley Incident (February 2017)
The Knicks’ season was cooked by the time the Clippers came to town for their annual trip to MSG on February 8, 2017, as the Knicks entered at 22-31 amidst another collapse.
A close loss to a very good Lob City Clippers team isn’t really a story. What was a story? Franchise legend Charles Oakley, a symbol of the team’s grit and physicality in the 90s, was caught on camera getting into a fight with security just six minutes into the game, right behind the basket.
He had apparently purchased a seat a few rows behind Dolan and began jeering him. Security was then called to remove him; things got physical, and the Knicks legend was booked for assault after punching three different MSG security officers.
It’s maybe the defining moment of Dolan’s tenure. With all the off-court drama and absolutely baffling decisions, it’s his spat with a fan favorite from an era of joy in the midst of years of misery that stands out.
These two have been fighting it out for nine years, with a judge recently dismissing Oakley’s accusation of being assaulted himself in August. I was honestly shocked that this was still going on.
Midseason Collapse 2.0 (2016-17)
They were never Warriors good, obviously, but the 2016-17 Knicks were a solid bunch for a little while. They started 14-10 by feasting on a soft, early-season slate that was loaded with lower-level Western Conference teams. By the time they hosted the Boston Celtics on Christmas Day, they were 16-13 and fifth in the East.
Just like last year, despite having a new coach in Jeff Hornacek, the Knicks collapsed. After Melo tied the game at 112 on Christmas with 1:06 to go, Marcus Smart hit a go-ahead three that would ultimately give the Celtics the lead for good. Three days later, the Knicks lost in overtime against Atlanta. They’d lose 13 of 16, including a back-breaking buzzer-beater loss to future foe TJ McConnell and Philly, to sink down to 19-26 by MLK Day.
The clown show around the organization also proceeded. D-Rose just disappeared on January 9 without notifying anyone due to a family issue. He did return, but wound up ending his season in familiar fashion with torn cartilage in his knee in late March.
Melo started to rebel against Jackson’s triangle system, leading to a very public spat between the two. Dolan didn’t learn his lesson on how to construct a roster. He wanted Melo so badly on his team he cast aside D’Antoni, but was foolish enough to think that Jackson, another personality with a very different offensive philosophy to Melo’s iso ball, was going to make a difference.
Jackson tried to trade Anthony, but his no-trade clause got in the way. The feeling of the 2016-17 season quickly turned into one that felt like the New York icon’s last in the city that embraced him from the start.
The Knicks sank to 30-51 and seemed fated for the sixth-best lottery odds, but a Game 82 game-winner by Maurice N’dour slipped them below the Timberwolves in the lottery standings and ultimately led to them falling to No. 8.
After this failure of a season, the 2017 offseason was going to be crucial, but it was just as bad as the last one.
Phil Jackson Sets The Franchise Ablaze On His Way Out (2017 Offseason)
After the season ended, the Knicks held customary exit meetings. Porzingis, in his first sign of discontent with the organizational dysfunction, skipped out, drawing public ire from Jackson, who began shopping the promising Latvian big man in the trade market.
Imagine that. The best young player the Knicks have had in generations is being shopped because he made the POBO mad. No trade occurred, but between this and him very publicly trying to push Melo out the door, it just seemed like Jackson was trying to torpedo the franchise and whatever good they had left.
There were rumblings that he wanted to ship Porzingis out in a bid to move up in the 2017 NBA Draft, but the Knicks stayed at No. 8. Despite having New York native Donovan Mitchell on the board, Jackson drafted French point guard Frank Ntilikina, another European guy who had potential, but also a tremendously low floor.
It’d be whatever if this was just a typical bad draft pick, but Jackson would depart from the organization literally five days later. Dolan allowed this guy to call the shots for two months through the NBA Draft, let him select the guy he wanted, and then kicked him out before free agency began. It was the right move to move on, but to let him stick around to publicly drag your young star and make a crucial lottery pick is malpractice.
The Tim Hardaway Jr. Offer Sheet (2017)
Steve Mills took over as the interim President of Basketball Operations after Jackson’s firing in his second stint with the club. A few months before his first stint in charge began in October 2013, the Knicks drafted Tim Hardaway Jr. Two years later, he was shipped out for Jerian Grant, who was later fodder for D-Rose.
Fast forward to 2017. Hardaway became a pretty solid player for the Hawks, averaging 14.5 points a night as a sixth man. One year after the catastrophic Lee and Noah contracts, the Knicks gave Hardaway a baffling $72 million offer sheet, one the Hawks didn’t even consider matching.
Hardaway played some of his best basketball over the next year and a half, first as a running mate to Porzingis and then as the team’s best scorer after he went down with an injury, but he wasn’t worth $72 million. His salary was dumped in a January 2019 trade as part of the never-ending churn.
The Rise And Steep Fall Of Kristaps Porzingis (2018)
Carmelo Anthony was traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder before the 2017-18 season, definitively ending one era of Knicks basketball. The team was now solely and unequivocally Porzingis’s.
In his first two seasons, the 7’3” unicorn averaged 16 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 1.9 blocks. He was a two-way savant who could shoot the lights out from three and do everything a wing could do while being the tallest player in basketball. It was the Victor Wembanyama prototype.
With Melo out the door, there was nobody to take touches away from him. Hornacek configured the offense around his 22-year-old budding star. In his first 11 games as the No. 1, he averaged a staggering 30.4 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 2.3 blocks on 51.3% from the field and 41.8% from deep. It was around this time in mid-November that a much younger me was bragging about my new star to classmates who were buzzing about Joel Embiid and the process down in South Jersey.
My younger delusional self believed Porzingis was an MVP in the making. As much as I loved watching Carmelo Anthony as a Knick, Porzingis was the new gold standard of Knicks basketball for me. As the months went on and he went from this MVP form to just being a certified star in this league, it didn’t matter what happened on the court.
Sure, the Knicks weren’t good. Sure, the Knicks had not much promising talent around him. Sure, there was plenty of skepticism whether many of the players, coaches, or executives could be part of the next great Knicks team, but there was one thing for certain as the calendar turned to 2018.
The Knicks were back in the late 1980s. They had their new Patrick Ewing. As long as Porzingis stayed upright and happy, the Knicks had a foundational piece that they had lacked in the many years of wandering the abyss. They didn’t have the pressure to win like they had with Melo or Phil or Isiah, they had a young star and the ability to dream.
Then came February 6, 2018.
It’s a day etched in my memory forever. Maybe I’ll be able to forget it one day now that the ghosts can’t hurt me anymore after that championship, but the simple fact was this. Starting with that day and over the next 18 months, a young me was traumatized by what would be the darkest year in Knicks history.
The game started fine. It was a blockbuster battle between two freaks of nature, Porzingis and Giannis Antetokounmpo. While the Greek Freak was on a team destined for greatness and thus way ahead of the Knicks in their ascension, the Knicks had their first homegrown All-Star since David Lee, but surely there would be a lot more than just one All-Star appearance in the Unicorn’s career.
With just under nine minutes to play in the second quarter, Kyle O’Quinn held the ball on the right elbow, closely guarded by Tyler Zeller. Porzingis, involved in an off-ball action with Lance Thomas, cut to the rim, received the pass from O’Quinn, and posterized Giannis.
In another life, this is an all-time highlight in a career tape that has seen the budding superstar do this to plenty of household names. Unfortunately, he landed awkwardly on his left knee. He fell to the floor, writhing in pain.
I was walking out of basketball practice when I grabbed my phone from the locker and saw a Bleacher Report notification that spoke of Porzingis leaving the game with a knee injury. I frantically clicked the notification and saw the clip. It wasn’t long after that the worst fears were realizd: a season-ending torn ACL.
The injury itself was brutal. While they don’t seem as harrowing long-term today, these were the injuries you feared could hurt a player’s long-term potential. While players come back quicker and quicker now from these injuries, it was clear that this would mean likely no Porzingis until the start of the 2019-20 season.
So, as much as the dread was the possibility of him never being the same, which did wind up being true, this moment was the beginning of what would be the most humiliating 18 months of being a Knicks fan ever.
Not long after this, Giannis literally jumped over Hardaway on an alley-oop. This game was the beginning of a humiliation ritual that never seemed to end.
A Grab Bag Of Humiliating Dark Ages On-Court Moments (2015-19)
The Giannis poster is just the tip of the iceberg.
None of these plays influenced the franchise at all, they’re just dumb and would be put in LolKnicks compilations.
In the midst of a December 2016 blowout against LeBron James and the defending champion Cavaliers, he and his teammates began performing the then-popular Bottle Flip Challenge on the sideline. LeBron flipped it too far and had to sprawl on the court to grab it. This is how serious teams took us.
Y’all remember Jarrett Jack? He’s most memorable as a Knick for me for this ridiculous heave attempt on November 1, 2017. Credit to him, before the recent rule change, nobody would be ballsy enough to sacrifice their shooting percentage to just chuck a ball like that.
There is so much going on here. First, this was the night the Knicks went on a historic 28-0 run against a very good Raptors team, so vibes were high. What the hell is Spike doing on the sideline? The ref eating it is funny, but why is Hardaway calling him safe like he’s an umpire? What the hell is going on?
I don’t remember many regular season games from this era. It’s a memory-hole situation. One of the ones I remember was when, for some reason, the Knicks were told to play the Wizards in London on January 17, 2019. A younger me was excited to watch when I came home from school.
Entering at 10-33, the Knicks were actually in a position to win this one. They led the entire game, but were stuck in a back-and-forth battle at the death. A go-ahead hook shot from Noah Vonleh gave the Knicks the lead, but they needed a stop.
With three seconds left, the Wizards inbounded and passed it to a cutting Thomas Bryant, who attempted a game-winning layup at the buzzer over Emmanuel Mudiay and Allonzo Trier. He missed, but the refs called a buzzer-beating goaltending. One in a million, this team was.
Finally, we’re going to right before the Porzingis trade. The Knicks were going to shed basically every veteran on that team, so it became apparent that the same was coming to Enes Kanter. It might be hard to remember given his current exploits, but this guy was a pretty good Knick given the circumstances.
While he was being shopped on the trade market, Kanter was being sat for much of January. Was it also likely for the development of guys like Mitchell Robinson and Luke Kornet? Sure, but we knew the reason.
After sitting four straight games, Kanter was given a chance in a blowout in the third quarter against the Mavs on January 30. He kissed the court, showing his love to a fanbase that chanted “We Want Kanter”. It’s a great gesture, but I wish he just didn’t airball.
That’d be the funny moment from that night’s latest loss, but there would be no smiles the very next day.
The Kristaps Porzingis Trade (2019)
There was a cloud over the entire 2018-19 season, one that the horrendous coaching of David Fizdale couldn’t help. The roster was a mess, reminiscent of the Island of Misfit Toys. It was one of the worst collections of talent in modern NBA history. The only goal in mind was tanking for Zion Williamson, which we’ll get to later.
The one glimmer of hope was Porzingis, still in street clothes, still on the bench. One day, he’d return and save us.
What nobody could’ve imagined when this injury happened was that when Porzingis was helped into the locker room, that was the last time we would ever see him wear No. 6 in orange and blue. What would things look like if he had just been able to stay upright? We’ll never know, but management used his injury and his frustration to prepare for their most ambitious quest yet.
I was walking home from school on January 31, 2019, when I saw notification after notification from Woj about Porzingis’ discontent with the franchise. Remember the saga with his brother agent? He wanted more control in the organization. When the Knicks balked, Porzingis decided he was done with this franchise, demanding a trade.
Instead of either calling his bluff ahead of restricted free agency (which would be muddied by the ACL tear) or waiting a few days and fielding calls, a scared and antsy front office traded him to the Mavericks immediately in a massive deal that partially served as a salary dump to get rid of Hardaway and Lee’s contracts.
It was the latest LolKnicks in a long line of ‘em. The only promise in the organization was gone.
What was left in its wake was a dream. A dream of a Big 3 that could be formed in about a week in the most ambitious offseason plan in NBA history.
The 2019 Draft Lottery
The Knicks tanked for this. They had avoided bottoming out many times, but for once, they were committed to it.
The worst franchise in the NBA in the 21st century was finally in the cellar and would get the spoils of a team that once again lost 65 games. 34 years after winning the lottery for Ewing and four months after trading their only talented young player in the decades since, they were all-in on Zion and the dream of pairing him with two max salaries in free agency.
One small problem. Adam Silver’s anti-tanking philosophy, which has been heavily ramped up recently, was sparked in the 2018 offseason. That year, he decided to do something bold and flatten the lottery odds. The worst team’s odds would shrink from 25 percent to just 14 percent. The one year the Knicks decided to bottom out, this happened. Of course.
And, as you might’ve expected, they fell in the lottery. After falling two spots in 2015 and one in 2018, they fell another two spots in 2019. The dream of Zion was dead, Jorge Sedano screamed with joy, and millions of Knicks fans’ hope began to dissipate.
RJ Barrett was cool, I guess. The Knicks actually probably won out here by not having to deal with Ja Morant and Zion’s off-court stuff, but this sucked in the moment. We dared not dread what would happen if free agency also went wrong…
The Most Disastrous Free Agency In NBA History (July 2019)
All this time. The entire 2018-19 season.
Amidst the depressing and dark season, after the team traded the team’s only proven young talent, after the failure of not being able to draft Zion, there was one hope.
Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving (among others, which included Kawhi Leonard and Kemba Walker) were free agents. Both had privately expressed a desire to team up. The Knicks were one of the only teams that had the space to do so.
At All-Star Weekend, someone caught them talking, where Irving seemed to gesture “two max spots”. All year, it was floated as more than a possibility. The savior complex that the media had, always trying to find someone to save the Knicks, put them in their crosshairs.
Leading into free agency, doubt was forming. The Knicks were a dumpster fire that didn’t have Zion and were run by idiots. Rumors started to buzz that Kyrie, an Elizabeth native who was the driving force in any talks of going to New York, was leaning toward the Nets. Irving posted on social media that he was going to the Nets, but the real horror came when Durant said he was following, leaving the Knicks empty-handed.
This was rock bottom. An offseason that was supposed to save the franchise reinforced its misery. Dolan didn’t offer Durant a max off his Achilles tear anyway. They didn’t even get a meeting with Kawhi. The organization literally had to issue a statement to a pissed-off fanbase.
In its wake, the team signed Julius Randle to a $63 million contract in an offseason that’d be defined by the team signing a billion power forwards, namely Taj Gibson, Bobby Portis, and Marcus Morris. The Knicks had $70 million in cap space and spent it on role players.
As far as we knew, this franchise was dead.
David Fizdale Fired (2019)
The 2019-20 season was, honestly, the most peaceful in this entire stretch. The team was really bad, sure, but there was nothing to even be excited about that could disappoint you. They personified the quote from Zendaya’s portrayal of MJ from the recent Spider-Man movies:
There was still one thing. The Knicks got off to a horrid start to the season, as none of the veterans they acquired were able to gel with the young and disappointing nucleus. Scott Perry and Steve Mills thought it was a good idea to address the press after 10 games. After getting obliterated by the Bucks (which gave us this gem) and Nuggets in consecutive games to drop to 4-18, the worst 22-game start in franchise history, Fizdale was fired.
He was a terrible coach, one whose failure in New York has likely cost him another opportunity, but he was viewed as a scapegoat. You rarely saw Woj have opinionated tweets, but you got one here. To them, this was the leader of the Grit and Grind Grizzlies, not the man who embarrassed himself and the Knicks on a nightly basis.
It would be the first of the mass organizational changes to follow. Mike Miller did an admirable job as interim head coach, but the search was on for a successor. Mills would not be the one making that decision, as Leon Rose was hired to head the franchise in early March 2020.
Wonder if that guy knows a thing or two…
Vince Carter Ends His Career In Style (2020)
Carter is an interesting figure in this story of Knicks basketball. His Dunk of Death permanently destroyed the reputation of the team’s chosen successor to Patrick Ewing and likely caused him to never come to America.
Exactly 20 years later, he ended his career in a meaningless game between two awful teams, as the world shut down due to a pandemic, with the Knicks letting him score to end on a high note.
The Knicks walked into the locker room for the final time under Mike Miller… and for the final time as a joke of a basketball team. Leon Rose would get to work not long after it was clear the Knicks wouldn’t return in 2019-20 and begin his six-year process toward raising the most incompetent franchise in history to the top of the mountain.
To the surprise of very few people now, Joel Hofer is off to a fantastic start for the St. Louis Blues.
In four games, he's posted two wins, a .921 save percentage, a 1.76 goals-against average, a shutout, and 2.5 goals saved above expected. Hofer outduelled Jordan Binnington for the No. 1 role last year and is showing no signs of giving it up.
Hofer has been praised by St. Louis fans for quite some time now, as since the 2023-24 NHL season, Hofer hasn't posted a save percentage below .900. That's serving as the backup, then a tandem and now the No. 1.
But finally, the 26-year-old is starting to receive the nationwide respect his game deserves.
On Wednesday, after the Blues' dominant 7-2 win over the Ottawa Senators, former NHL goaltender and current TSN analyst Jamie McLennan sang Hofer's praises.
“A little bit of recency bias, but I’ve liked this kid since last year; Joel Hofer is Canada’s next goaltender,” McLennan said on TSN's radio show, Overdrive. “I had the chance to visit with Jordan Binnington, who is Canada’s goaltender right now. So St. Louis has Canada’s goaltender of right now, and I think of the future. This kid’s a player.”
Hofer has represented Canada internationally a few times now. Notably, he won a gold medal at the 2020 World Junior Championship, posting a .946 SP in six games and taking home goaltender of the tournament and All-Star Team honors. He's also played for Canada at the World Championships, winning gold in 2023 despite playing just two games.
But Hofer has proved to be a star at every level. His international success is well known, and he was a star in the WHL and AHL before making his way to the NHL.
“This kid, I’m telling you, O (Jeff O’Neill), this kid's a player," McLennan continued. "6-foot-5, handles the puck like Hextall and makes great saves. I’m telling you, he’s a player."
Selected in the fourth round (107th overall) in 2018, Hofer has developed into an NHL star. Although the competition for Canada's international goaltending spot is notably weak right now, it's still nothing to scoff at. This is serious praise from a respected NHL analyst.
The next best-on-best events are the 2028 World Cup of Hockey and the 2030 Olympics. If Hofer shows he can consistently perform among the NHL's elite, he could very well find himself as one of the three goaltenders named to the rosters.
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He might be the one defender disappointed to miss Luka Doncic.
Warriors rookie Yaxel Lendeborg got a taste for how quickly things can change in the NBA ahead of his preseason game Tuesday night against the Lakers.
Golden State Warriors’ Yaxel Lendeborg (1) looks to pass the ball during a preseason game against the LA Clippers on Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, at Bankoh Arena at Stan Sheriff Center in Honolulu. NBAE via Getty Images
Doncic was given the night off by coach JJ Redick, but the Warriors didn’t know that when they were going over the defensive plan of attack leading up to tipoff. Lendeborg had held his own on offense, averaging 19 points per game over his previous three exhibitions, and the Warriors decided they wanted to put the No. 11 pick’s defensive versatility to the test.
Lendeborg did a double-take when assistant coach Frank Vogel informed him of his assignment. He was the two-time Defensive Player of the Year in the American Athletic Conference and a first-team defender last year in the Big Ten.
But this would be a new challenge.
“I’m on my phone chilling and [Vogel] comes up to me, ‘Hey, you’re guarding Luka tonight,’” Lendeborg recalled. “I said, ‘What the f–k? You’re just gonna throw me in the fire?’”
The rookie’s eyes widened as he shook his head retelling the story at his locker after the game.
“I tried to act all cool, but I was spooked,” he said. “That was crazy.”
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) reacts after a play during the first quarter against the Sacramento Kings at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento, California, Oct. 5, 2026. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect
Doncic led the NBA in scoring for the second time in his career last season, averaging 33.5 points per game on a league-high 22.8 shots from the field and 10.1 attempts at the foul line.
“I think [Vogel] said he averages like 30, 35. Nobody can stop him, so do your best,” Lendeborg said. “That was it. My mind was all over the place after that.”
A short while later, Lendeborg learned he wouldn’t have to try to stay in front of the 6-8, 230-pound Doncic. He’d instead be giving up 5 inches to the 7-2 Kessler.
In his first game in a Lakers uniform, Kessler scored 11 points and grabbed nine rebounds in 16 minutes. Lendeborg got to the line nine times and scored 17 points in 26 minutes.
It wasn’t exactly what he had in mind.
But he learned another lesson along the way.
In the NBA, change can come in a moment’s notice — he’d better be ready.
DETROIT, MI - SEPTEMBER 23: Harry Ford #17 of the Washington Nationals looks on while batting during the game against the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park on September 23, 2026 in Detroit, Michigan. The Nationals defeated the Tigers 4-2. (Photo by Mark Cunningham/MLB Photos via Getty Images) | MLB Photos via Getty Images
The first major trade Paul Toboni made as Nationals POBO was to acquire Harry Ford in exchange for Jose A. Ferrer. Ford was expected to emerge as the Nats catcher of the future without an elite backstop like Cal Raleigh blocking him. However, this season did not go according to plan for the 23 year old catcher.
It was a bit of a surprise when Ford did not make the team out of camp. Clearly, the Nats thought he needed more time in the minors. Despite that, I still expected Ford to quickly show he belonged in the big leagues. That did not happen though, as Ford struggled mightily in AAA to start the year.
This was very surprising given the fact that Ford posted an .868 OPS in AAA last year. To start this season, Ford looked rough at the plate. His power was not showing up and he was striking out more. On May 10th, Ford was hitting .188 with a .557 OPS.
That is not exactly an ideal start to life in a new organization. Outside of his usual plate discipline, Ford just did not look like the player the Nats thought they were getting. Meanwhile, Jose A. Ferrer looked like a borderline elite reliever at the start of the season.
Let’s actually talk a little bit about Ferrer because it provides some important context. Nats fans wondered a lot about what the bullpen would look like with Ferrer. That narrative made a lot of sense at the beginning of the year, but even as Ferrer struggled, fans did not adjust the way they talked about him.
Ferrer’s 4.18 ERA and 4.09 FIP in 73 outings would be an upgrade on most of the guys the Nats had. However, those numbers are mediocre. It is not like Ferrer proved to be some major loss for the Nats this season. Even if things stay the same, a backup catcher for a mediocre reliever is not some awful deal.
Getting back to Ford, he did start to turn the corner in AAA. His OPS rose each month he was in the minors and was over .800 in both June and July. Following Drew Millas’ injury around the All-Star Break, Ford finally got his chance.
— Nats Of The Future (@NatsOfTheFuture) July 11, 2026
When Ford got to the majors, the results were not amazing, but not totally awful either. He only hit .190, but his 14.4% walk rate led to a .664 OPS. Ford struggled with his blocking, but he was not a total disaster defensively with a -2 FRV and a -1 DRS. That is not good by any means, but for a backup catcher, you can do worse.
This will be a big offseason for Ford though. There are a lot of things for him to work on. The biggest point of emphasis needs to be finding his power. In 2025, Ford hit 16 homers and showed solid power. It was not just the homers. Ford’s 88.8 MPH average exit velocity and his 103.4 MPH 90th percentile EV were rock solid.
We did not see that sort of power from him in the minors or the big leagues. In AAA, Ford’s average EV was 85.2 MPH and his EV90 was 101.8. That only got worse when he faced better pitching in the big leagues, with Ford posting an 84.9 MPH average and a 101.2 MPH EV90. To become a starting caliber catcher, that power needs to come back. There were reports that Ford had some nagging shoulder problems this year, so maybe his power will come back with a healthy offseason.
Ford’s super power is his plate discipline. That translated to the big league level, with the Nats catcher only chasing 18.7% of the time. However, with his limited power and mediocre contact skills, it is tough to be a good hitter. We saw some flashes, including a homer against the A’s in one of his first games. However, there was not enough consistency.
With the lower offensive ceiling of the catcher position and Ford’s ability to draw walks, there is a path to success. There is a world where he can be around a league average hitter with solid defense as well. At catcher, that is very valuable. They have very different offensive profiles, but I could see Ford producing like Keibert Ruiz did this year, just with walks carrying his profile.
However, this year did not go as planned and it did lower my view of Ford’s potential. He should be a solid big league catcher, though I am not sure he has the juice to be an above average full time starter. I can see Ruiz and Ford splitting reps and becoming a solid tandem.
The biggest key to Ford’s success will be recapturing his power stroke. I think he needs to find a way to improve his bat speed this offseason. We saw a lot of Nats hitters swinging faster this year, and hopefully Ford is next. His average bat speed was 69.2 MPH and I thought his swing looked noticeably slow.
It was a sluggish campaign for Ford, but he still posted 0.4 fWAR and 0.3 bWAR. Even right now, Ford is a decent backup catcher, but we know he can be more than that. Hopefully he can return to form in 2027 and show why Paul Toboni invested heavily into him.
The Test stalwart on his surreal last stand at the Oval, his ‘shabby’ treatment by Rob Key and the vexed problem of cricket’s drinking culture
On a rainy October afternoon, after his 20th season as a professional cricketer, Chris Woakes sits down at Edgbaston’s indoor nets and thinks of the advice that helped him when he was 17 and about to start a career in this consuming sport. “The words came from my parents, particularly my dad, and it was to always be myself,” he says in his thoughtful way.
Woakes has just won his third County Championship with Warwickshire and he played 62 Tests for England, taking 192 wickets and scoring 2,034 runs. He also won two World Cups and experienced a range of England coaches, from Andy Flower to Brendon McCullum, and played for captains as different as Sir Alastair Cook, Eoin Morgan, Joe Root and Ben Stokes.
