Pistons 99, Knicks 91: Scenes from RJ Barrett, Alec Burks, and not much else

That was rough, y’all. The Knicks played like butt juice throughout most of the first half, rallied in the third quarter thanks to the inspired play of RJ Barrett and Alec Burks, then farted away the game soon thereafter due to some wretched stuff from most of the youngsters. Julius Randle was doing Randle things. It was ugly. 99-91 Pistons is your final.

Obi Toppin couldn’t built on his promising preseason debut, shooting an abysmal 1-8 (1-6 from three). And most of those misses were not close, friends.

Here is Obi’s one make of the game.

And Toppin wasn’t even the worst of the bunch. Kevin Knox (1-6) and Dennis Smith Jr. (1-5) gave Knicks fans flashbacks of 2019-20, when the pair rarely looked like NBA players.

The good news was the play of Barrett. RJ scored 25 points on 10-17 shooting and threw a couple of nice dimes.

Head coach Tom Thibodeau brought RJ in to close the game with the Knicks behind, and RJ provided a brief spark in transition.

The bad: RJ struggled from three (1-5), and he blew a wide-open layup late that could have close the gap further. That being said, we’ll take this kind of performance every day of the week, thank you very much.

Benny will have a recap later. Enjoy the last few hours of the weekend.