Don't let Dave Fizdale confuse you

Latrell Sprewell's workload is no model for today's young players

BY HENRY ABBOTT

Knicks coach David Fizdale doesn’t want to talk about resting players who are not injured. "We gotta get off this load management crap,” he said on Sunday. “Latrell Sprewell averaged 42 minutes for a season. This kid's 19 years old. Drop it."

It’s a dangerous line to take, and wrongheaded—not only because, in fact, Sprewell averaged 43 minutes in his second season. After declaring their offseason went according to plan, the Knicks have opened the season with one win in their first seven games. They aren’t awash in good players. An exception is rookie RJ Barrett. Fizdale’s answer was to a question about playing Barrett long minutes. The rookie has played 260 minutes already—meaning he has only sat on the bench, watching his teammates for 76 minutes. Barrett’s on track to play more than 3,000 minutes of a regular season that, depending on overtimes, is about 4,000 minutes. 

It’s a stupid projection I just did, because we all know almost nothing that happens for seven games …