As a rookie in 2012-13 with Minnesota, Alexey Shved started 16 games, averaging 11.2 points and 5.9 assists with the first unit. Not bad.
“I played well,” said Shved, a guard currently in the employ of the Knicks.
Shved has not started a single game since, not with the T-Wolves, not with the Sixers, not with the Rockets and not with the Knicks, his third team this season.
“I played a lot and then one moment, I’m just not playing. I have no idea why it happened,” Shved said. “Personally, you should ask them, not me, because I have no idea what happened, and this is true.”
In Minnesota at the time, the Timberwolves sought more size in the backcourt. Ricky Rubio was hurt for a while and they tried 6-foot Jose Barea and 6-2 Luke Ridnour. Shved, at 6-6, made sense, but they were using him more off the ball, unlike the role he had with his teams in Russia. Rubio made it back and Shved went back to the bench. The following year, some speculated Shved missed the presence of fellow Russian Andrei Kirilenko, who went to the Nets after mentoring the guard in Minnesota.
Now, Shved is in the process of finding a new opportunity in New York. Coach Derek Fisher labeled Shved a key guy as the Knicks try to withstand the injury absence of Jose Calderon. In his fourth game as a Knick — first at home — Shved had 15 points and five assists in the 103-98 victory over Toronto on Saturday.
Better to be known for things like that, other than being an Internet sensation for his shot/toss/no one really knows what in the fourth quarter in Detroit on Friday, when he flung the ball well over the backboard, causing TV analyst Clyde Frazier to note, “He just threw the ball into oblivion.”
Shved atoned.
“Alexey, he’s showing you some of the things that we mentioned that we thought he might have in terms of the potential to handle the ball, to make plays, to make shots,” Fisher said. “His size and his feel for the game are things that are a good combination to have with this offense.”
Oh, yeah, this offense. That would be the triangle, which on some levels is described as only slightly more confusing than the Riddle of the Sphinx uttered in ancient Greek.
“It’s a great offense, everybody around plays the ball, passing. It’s not really hard to learn. I know maybe 80 percent of the offense,” said Shved, who came to the Knicks with a couple second-round picks in the deadline deal that sent Pablo Prigioni to Houston.
“I just want to help our team win some games, play good, play for fans,” said Shved, who played the entire fourth quarter against the Raptors, collecting seven of his points and four of his assists in those final 12 minutes.
“Every time, I can play like I play first year, but second year I sit on bench, didn’t play a lot. I missed that,” Shved said. “I just want to show my best and help for the teammates.”
Shved is part of the in-season cast the Knicks have assembled along the way in what is the worst season in team history. But he is part of a group that plays loose and free, with nothing to lose. If they lose, hey, it’s not like they have perfection at stake.
“Alexey looks like he can be a solid player within our system,” Fisher said, “with Jose being out in the short term. … Alexey is a guy that we’ll have to continue to get up to speed as quickly as possible because he’s going to need to be able to handle the ball for us and make some decisions out there.”