Over his eight-year career, Shannon Brown has been on six teams. When he suits up for the New York Knicks as soon as Thursday against the Miami Heat, it will be his seventh team and second this season after signing a 10-day contract with the San Antonio Spurs earlier this month. One has to ask, what role will he play on the Knicks?
The 6-foot-4, 28-year-old shooting guard is known as a scoring guard, having never totaled more than 1.8 assists per game in any single season. If there is one thing the Knicks aren’t lacking this season, it is scoring shooting guards. Both J.R. Smith and rookie Tim Hardaway Jr. have already established themselves as better options than Brown. What they do lack are guards capable of handling the ball.
And for all that, Brown has earned the notion of being a sharpshooter. His numbers don’t really deserve such praise. During the 2011-12 NBA season, Brown put together his finest season as a pro with the Phoenix Suns. In 59 games, he compiled 11 PPG with 2.7 RPG while knocking down a career high 1.2 three-pointers per game.
Not only were the 1.2 three-pointers per game a career high, but the percentage in which he connected from beyond the arc was a career best as well, shooting 36.2 percent from downtown. Hardaway Jr., in his first year in the league, is knocking down 1.6 three-pointers at a clip of 38.4 percent. If Brown cuts into Hardaway Jr.’s minutes, the Knicks will have possibly stunted the growth of a potential All-Star.
While there wasn’t any free agent available that could actually make a difference on this Knicks team, it seems like a pointless move for many reasons, considering the Knicks really need to shore up their point guard position. Brown was only given a 10-day deal, so it’d be very surprising to see him last beyond mid-March.