The Julius Randle Experience
Being a Knicks fan is hard, but I would like to imagine that, in many ways, being a Knicks player is harder. It's the nature of playing in the New York market; when you play well, everybody loves you, and when you play badly, everybody hates you.
A prime example of this would be the recently minted 2022 American League MVP, Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees. Throughout Judge's historic season that saw him bat .311 and slug an AL-record 62 home runs, Yankee fans deservingly showered Judge with cheers and love. However, when the postseason came around, it was a bit of a different energy among the Bronx faithful.
After the first game of the divisional series matchup against the Guardians, Yankee fans left happy with a 4-1 victory, but their MVP only contributed three strikeouts and went hitless. Game Two was where it all turned. Judge went to bat five times and struck out four times, the ole' golden sombrero. After that fourth strikeout, Judge was showered with boos as loud as the cheers were when Yankee fans watched him smack his 60th homer that tied Babe Ruth's highest single-season home run total.
What led to this quick turn were the expectations. Once the expectations are set high with elite performance, you must stay at that level, or you are dragged and rewarded with hate. Is this toxic? Yes. But this is New York for you.
Knicks forward Julius Randle is another example of this but, in my opinion, the most interesting example of being "the guy" in New York.
When Randle signed with the Knicks in 2019, nobody expected him to be a superstar by any means. However, Knick fans were already in a bad mood after losing out on the superstar pair of free agents Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, who were rumored for months to be headed to New York. Little did fans know that they were headed to the neighboring borough of Brooklyn instead.
But a 25-year-old Randle was still seen as a very solid addition coming off a season for the New Orleans Pelicans, where he put up a career-high in points per game with 21.4 while shooting an efficient 52 percent from the field and a respectable 34 percent from three-point range. However, Randle took it upon himself to dub himself as the team's superstar and became a ball-dominant liability offensively and an inconsistent defender.
Fans quickly turned on him, watching him "lead" the Knicks team to an abysmal 21-45 record, and began dreaming up ways to trade Randle off the team so they wouldn't have to watch another second of him in the blue and orange. Randle, throughout the season, was showered with boos.
The 2020 season came around, and the fans' wishes to drop Randle went unheard as he suited up and started game one against the Indiana Pacers. As the season progressed, it was evident that this was not the same Randle from a year ago. Instead, this was a physical specimen that improved every aspect of his game. When I say every aspect, I mean every aspect.
The two statistics that stood out the most were his assists per game, which almost doubled his previous career high to six per game, and his three-point shooting, where he had career highs in attempts at 5.5 per game while making 2.3 per game to set his percentage at an elite 41 percent clip from three. He seemed to be a true leader that led vocally on top of leading through his phenomenal play. His inspiring play helped the Knicks reach the playoffs for the first time in eight long years.
Although the Knicks would eventually fall to the Atlanta Hawks in their first-round matchup largely in part due to Randle's 2019-esque uninspiring play, fans still were able to say that the Knicks were back.
This career season for Randle did not go unrecognized as he received his first ever All-Star selection, was named the season's Most Improved Player, and also earned the honor of being selected to the All-NBA Second Team along with superstars Joel Embiid, Chris Paul, Damian Lillard, and perhaps the greatest of all-time LeBron James. Finally, it appeared that the Knicks had finally found their guy. Randle was showered with MVP chants throughout the season.
2021 for Randle was true deja vu in, unfortunately, all the worst ways possible. Understandably, the Knicks expected the 2020 Julius Randle to return for another year of All-NBA caliber play. Instead, the 2019 "Don Julio" decided to come to work every night.
Since he proved to be a valuable playmaker in the previous season, the offense ran through Randle for the season, which could have been the worst idea possible. Randle's playmaking ability was severely suppressed as defenses were tighter on him, and he forced up most of his shots at the rim or his signature baseline step-back jumper.
The shots just weren't falling the same way this season which saw his elite three-point clip from the prior season shrink to 30 percent from deep on essentially the same amount of threes taken per game. His points per game also dropped from 24.1 points per game to 20.1.
A lot was on the shoulders of number 30 and his disappointing season impacted the team's performance which had the Knicks back to a familiar spot at the bottom of the East as the 11th-best team in the Eastern Conference with a record of 37-45. Randle was once again showered with boos throughout the season.
We now arrive at the present day: the 2022-2023 season. To take the playmaking burden off Randle's shoulders, the Knicks signed former Mavericks point guard and playoff sensation Jalen Brunson. This move has proved to be wise so far, as Brunson is providing around six assists per game to pair Randle's four a game, which is still a solid number for a forward. But since Brunson has garnered a lot of attention from defenders with his savvy inside game and playmaking ability, it makes Randle's strengths seem much more valuable and apparent.
He was always a good playmaker, but he couldn't find an answer when defenses planned solely to stop him. His offensive production this season has him back to scoring 24 points a game while being a beast on the offensive (and defensive) boards.
To sum up Randle's season so far, I would say it has been good. He is deserving of another All-Star selection and is a net positive on the floor for the Knicks once again. I hesitate to give him all the flowers he may deserve, but that is just because of my understanding of what I like to call "The Julius Randle Experience."
If we look at Randle's four-year tenure with the Knicks, we've experienced a new version of the forward every single season, for better or worse. Peaks and valleys would describe the experience, and I, unfortunately, am almost waiting for the poor version of Randle to return. This pessimistic view feels like it's been hammered into my brain; perhaps I should just enjoy the success while it's here.
