Evan was initially on the side of Tom Thibodeau playing his starters heavy minutes as the Knicks look to manage their injury wave, but after watching Monday night’s loss to the Rockets, he has come to the side of Tiki.
Evan now agrees with the idea that Thibodeau is running his key players into the ground and exposing them to injury, like Donte DiVincenzo, who limped off the court with an apparent hamstring issue after logging 41 minutes.
“What I saw last night was malpractice,” Evan said. “A real discussion is the way Big Ragu was treated last night. He had played 40 minutes, and there were five minutes to go in the fourth quarter. It’s not healthy.
“Tiki was right. His hamstring is going because he’s playing an ungodly amount of minutes…it’s the regular season. If you want to claim you’re back and you’re good, start acting like teams that are like that. Don’t push this guy to play 41 minutes until there’s five minutes to go and his hamstring goes. Act like you’ve been there before.”
The Knicks are playing without the likes of Isaiah Hartenstein, Julius Randle, OG Anunoby, and Mitchell Robinson, and Evan says those injuries will keep piling up unless Thibodeau changes his ways and starts looking at the bigger picture.