Why Knicks Need Guerschon Yabusele

The New York Knicks are preparing for a season with a little more depth in hopes of getting over the hump in the Eastern Conference.

The team made sure it got better in the second unit by signing Guerschon Yabusele from the Philadelphia 76ers.

Yabusele should bring a much-needed threat off the bench for the Knicks when he takes the floor next season.

"While it turned out that their bench wasn’t as terrible as Tom Thibodeau’s Machiavellian treatment of the starters would suggest, they still didn’t have much bite once the starters left the floor," Forbes contributor Mat Issa wrote.

"Yabusele will step in and immediately become their bullpen’s best reliever. According to Estimated Plus-Minus (arguably the best one-number metric on the market because it incorporates tracking data), Yabusele placed in the 84th percentile in the entire league on the offensive side of the ball (per Dunks & Threes). That ranks higher than any non-starter from last year’s Knicks team. Heck, that ranks higher than everyone not named Jalen Brunson or Karl-Anthony Towns."

The Knicks ranked 30th in the league last season in bench points per game, which has more to do with the fact that New York didn't play the second unit all that much compared to the starters.

The Knicks averaged 21.6 points per game off the bench. The 29th-ranked team was the Los Angeles Lakers; they averaged 26.2 points per game from non-starters.

The scoring average in the second unit wasn't an indicator of the lack of talent off the bench, but adding Yabusele and Utah Jazz guard Jordan Clarkson should certainly help that number rise.

If the Knicks can increase their bench scoring output, they could make the jump towards being the team to represent the Eastern Conference in the NBA Finals.