Meyers Leonard Twitter-gizes for his late foul on Jimmer Fredette
Tuesday night’s drama at Madison Square Garden wasn’t limited to the pricey floor seats. Late in the Portland Trail Blazers’ 19-point win, 10-day contract signee Jimmer Fredette went up for a three-pointer in the waning second, and was denied a chance to do so by a hard foul from Blazer big man Meyers Leonard:
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Leonard was apparently holding up some staid and unwritten NBA rules that point out that losing teams on the wrong end of a blowout should commit to the same sort of stall-ball tactics that winning teams do, and pass on the chance to collect easy garbage time points.
Soon after the contest ended, though, Leonard appeared (via Hoopshype) to have a bit of remorse for his heavy-handed late game work:
Really soon after that tweet, Fredette responded:
The back and forth becomes all the more notable when you find out, mid-day on Thursday, that this might have been the last shot Jimmer Fredette will ever take in the NBA:
The Knicks appeared to be Fredette’s last major league hope. He’s a damn good shooter working in an offensive system that appreciates spacing while eschewing typical point guard duties in the framework of the triple post offense. The Knicks are terrible and have basically been hosting open auditions for two seasons now, so Fredette would seem like a natural fit.
Instead, he’s mostly stayed stuck to the bench. He nailed a three-pointer in his first game with the team against Toronto, but that was in just two minutes of action in a 27-point loss to Toronto. Fredette did not appear in the team’s next three games, two of which were losses, and only played for three minutes on Tuesday – scoring four points on free throws.
Sadly, as is often the case with fans that think these sorts of things are funny, the New York state-bred Fredette’s name was chanted by the wiseacres in the MSG audience on Tuesday. The New York Post’s Mike Vaccaro talked about as much with interim head coach Kurt Rambis:
“I don’t get distracted, I’m focused on the game,” Kurt Rambis said when this latest calamity, a 104-85 whitewash by the Blazers, was safely tucked away and the Knicks fell another game under .500, another few miles away from the playoffs. He had been asked about the boos that were the fans’ alternative melody, delivered in heaping portions as the night got away.
“I understand the crowd and the situation. They want to win. I understand that. Everyone in the organization wants to win.”
As for the object of the faithful’s affection …
“Jimmer is a hometown favorite and they would like to see him play,” Rambis said. “I get it.”
Actually, if Fredette were from Glen Cove and not Glens Falls, maybe this would be easier to accept. But Glens Falls is 200 miles away from Penn Plaza. Harrisburg, Pa., is closer. So is Wilmington, Del. The Garden has no attachment to Fredette other than the most important one:
He isn’t Jose Calderon.
Ouch.
Even if Fredette were working with the stability of, say, the same five-year contracts Carmelo Anthony and Phil Jackson have in the bank, Leonard’s reaction was a little silly. Even if Fredette was working on his second night in a row of plus-20 point games, the foul was unnecessary. It’s one thing to re-assign value to three-pointers in a (then) 21-point game when you’re the team that’s up 21-points, but it’s quite something else when you’re on the losin’ end.
Jimmer Fredette took an assured pay cut to join the D-League this year, and stay close to the NBA family. He could have made three or four times as much money working overseas, but the 27-year old wanted to stay a call away from the bigs.
His thwarted attempt at a trey may have been his last, literal, NBA shot. Perhaps it’s time we start to re-think these unwritten things. Meyers Leonard, apparently, is raising his arm and taking the lead on this one.
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Kelly Dwyer is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KDonhoops
