Saturday, January 08, 2005

Cleveland Steamer

Cleveland: Cavs ravage Knicks, 104-79
"The Cavs, right now, are embarrassing the Knicks."--Mike Breen, ABC/MSG commentator

Saturday's matinee in Cleveland was a debacle, it was a nationally televised debacle when the team desparately needed win. The Cavs won the opening tipoff, sprinted out to a 7-0 lead and never looked back. Although there were a few minutes of the first quarter where the Knicks threatened to make it a game--Houston hit an open three and Tim Thomas showed he could post up the shorter Lebron as easily as Lebron could blow by him--the outcome of this contest was never really contested. The Knicks defense was porous, their transition slow, and their offense stagnant. Lebron and the rest of the Cavs starters spent most of the afternoon as cheerleaders; watching as the back-ups mercilessly tore apart the Knicks. Second-stringers were ally-ooping, high-fiving and swishing threes as the Knicks starters jogged around the court in a fog. By halftime the Cavs had scored 67 points (on 74% shooting), and of those points 36 had been scored in the paint and 31 had come from the bench. It got so bad that Hubie Brown (really a top-notch play-by-play man) and Mike Breen spent most of the second half hyping the NFL Wildcard matchups that were airing later on ABC.

"This is the first time we've ever played this well."--Lebron James

And hopefully the last time the Knicks play this poorly. Enough said.

NY Knicker-Bloggers Player(s) of the Game:
Cavs bench, especially Anderson Varejao

.....and for those of you masochists out there....

ESPN
AP/Yahoo

Friday, January 07, 2005

Isiah to Lenny: "You're fired."

Now, who knows if this is for real or the Post is just declaring Gephardt with this story, but clearly the time has come to take a long look at what Lenny is doing with this team. Without a doubt, he deserves all the reverance due to the winningest coach of all-time, but surely the coach who has lost more games than anyone else alive cannot be beyond reproach. It seems that Isiah--like the rest of us--is not pleased with being a .500 team after 32 games. While it is clear that the Knicks are not world-beaters (and by "world" Imean any serious contender in the Western conference and/or the Miami Heat), but they have too much talent to be this mediocre
  • Steph has learned how to balance his innate ability to score at will with his equally devastating--and too oft underused--ability to spread the ball around the floor.
  • Nazr Mohammed is having a career year and looks more like the player he was at Kentucky.
  • Kurt Thomas seems to be the only forward in the game who read the fine print in the rule book that says a mid-range jump shot counts for as many points as a dunk
  • Tim Thomas has been.......mmm....getting much better, and anyway, you get the point.
Clearly, no one seems to be arguing that when the Knicks struggle that it is for lack of talent. All of their losses have two things in common: they can't rebound and they can't get a stop when they need one. For a Knicks team, these are virtually the only two unforgivable sins. This franchise, when it's been successful--has been defined by hustle and heart; whether it was Ewing and Oakley or Reed and DeBusschere, the New York Knicks always tried harder and dug deeper.
Rebounding and defense are the hallmarks of effort. The coach of a team that is not giving their all (especially if that team happens to play in NY or NJ) is a man not long for his job. In order to protect his job, Lenny Wilkens must inspire his players to protect the basket, to protect the paint, and most importantly to protect the pride that belongs to the city whose name is emblazoned across their chests.

We'll see how it goes Saturday, against the surging Cavs.....

psst...you two...look-up-here...psst...Trade Rumors and Ineundo

Please, can we stop trying to trade Kurt Thomas! Thomas--and his crazy eyes--is the most consistent player we've got. It is crime (of which Lenny is guilty) that we don't run the pick-and-role with him and Marbury ten times a night. The reason why teams are always interested in him is because he is REALLY GOOD; he is our best help defender, most consistent jump shooter, and the only big man on the team with a mean streak. Just look at what the eminently quotable Shaq had to say about Kurt after Wednesday's game:

"Kurt Thomas is probably the best shooting forward in the game right now, he don't miss from that spot at all."

1/5/05Chris Webber to the Knicks? Or not? Alright! another overpaid, injury-prone star. Does anyone know if Mo Vaughn has a jumpshot?

Thursday, January 06, 2005

Wednesday, January 05, 2005

Free Agency, the Home Opener, and the Second Coming of Charles Smith

The faithful have been waiting. They showed up on opening night ready to believe, to gasp, and to raise glasses as dribbles crossed-over. They were not discouraged by the team’s disastrous debut against the Celtics—the franchise’s worst defeat in a home opener—and did not give up in the face of maddening inconsistency. Yes, they have decried shot selection, derided the defense, and at the mere mention of Tim Thomas (who for the length of November must have felt like the second-coming of Charles Smith as the boos fell around him as thick as autumn leaves in Central Park) muttered unrepeatable things capable of making a Pistons’ fan blush. Still, they have been waiting.
Then, finally, it happened with 3 minutes and twenty seconds left in the first quarter of the 19th game of the season: at long last, the Knicks became whole again. When the long-ailing Allan Houston took the floor (his first time as a sub in 582 games with the Knicks) at the MCI Center in D.C. the New York Knickerbockers regained a confidence—albeit a tempered one—that has been missing since Patrick Ewing left town.
Houston's first trip down the court: he gets the ball on the right wing, lobs an entry pass into Kurt Thomas on the block, and Thomas faces up and drops in another mid-range jumper. Jogging back down the court, Thomas nods in Houston's direction; he's been back only for a matter of moments and the Knicks are already getting better. Thomas' shot might not fall if the entry pass doesn't come to him from Houston. If Penny or Crawford makes that pass, the defensive player on the wing immediately collapses on Thomas (because everyone else around the league is beginning to catch on to the fact that Kurt Thomas is as consistent as the trains below the Garden at Penn Station), but most defenders won't play help defense if it means having to leave Allan Houston open. His presence on the court and the respect his shot commands around the league will open up things for his teammates.
Even though they would lose on the night of Houston’s return, they find themselves—with the holiday season kicking into high gear—in the designated driver’s seat atop the inebriated Atlantic Division. The architect of the this castle-in-the-sand, Knicks president Isiah Thomas, has been watching this barely-legal first place team from his usual perch just behind the scorer’s table (seemingly close enough to coach Lenny Wilkens that Thomas could yank him off the court at any moment). Isiah can’t conceal his hall-of-fame smile whenever Marbury slashes through the paint and drops another impossible shot in off the glass. Thomas has spent every minute since he was hired shaping this team in his own meticulously maintained image. He spent the summer courting free agents, shaking the right hands despite being handcuffed by undesirable contracts, and splashing the city’s back pages with big names. The two goals for the summer were former Golden State center Erick Dampier and Jamal Crawford, late of the Chicago Bulls (Thomas also allegedly had a hankering for whatever it exactly is that the defensively-challenged Antoine Walker does). Alas, Dampier is grazing the greener pastures grazed by the Mark Cuban All-Stars; he may have been swayed by guarantees of inclusion in Cuban’s next reality show. Looking back, not being able to land Dampier was a blessing in disguise because he has been abysmal this season in Dallas. Although in Dampier's defense, he has certainly distinguished himself as one of the greatest contract year players of all-time (at some point, there'll need to be an All-Contract Year Team put together; they could play during All-Star Weekend, before the Rookies Game, for the chance to win a gift certificate the NBA store). The only way a player like Dampier should ever be allowed to put on a Knicks uniform--or any uniform for that matter--is if he is signed to a series of ten day contracts over the course of the season.

Nevertheless, Isiah, who woud not be denied twice, worked tirelessly to broker a deal with the Bulls. To get Crawford (and everyone's new favorite, Jerome "Junkyard Dog" Williams") the Knicks further complicated their already Euclidian budget. Still, Crawford gets the Garden "ooh"ing and "aah"ing ever time he takes the floor. Unfortunately, he also gets the Garden screaming words not fit for print every time he takes the floor because his shot selection is about as discriminating as your college roommate's choice of women at 3am.

Clearly, Crawford, with his dynamic slashing style, inimitable cross-over dribble and penchant for last-second heroics, was an infinitely better pickup, but it would seem that Isiah saw the acquisition of Dampier as the marquee move for the Knicks. Instead, Thomas is counting on Nazr (Na-zee) Mohammed and Michael Sweetney, the young buck from Georgetown with the thick frame and the silky game, to form a solid combination in the paint. So far, Nazr has been playing surprisingly well; he is good for a quite double-double every night. Still, if the pivot plan doesn’t pan out in the newly Diesel-powered Eastern Conference, inside sources claim the Knicks will send Croatian bench-warmer Bruno Sundov, 2 surly leftovers from persona non grata Shandon Anderson’s entourage, and Moochie Norris to General Mills for a Sea Monkey with advertised low-post moves.
Expectations are optimistic but necessarily muted because previous front office administrations couldn’t help but sign undeserving players to mammoth contracts. It seems like they’ll be good enough to keep us interested, but probably bad enough not to reward us in the end. Well, once again into the breach dear friends…. I’ll see you at the Garden, my seats are in section 302.

Coming Soon to a Home (or Office) Computer Near You....

the latest, the greatest, all-you-can-eat spot for all things related to the New York Knickerbockers (and eventually all things Mets, Yankees, Giants, Jets and Nets). We'll cover every angle of the orange and blue this season--from courtside to couchside.

Look forward to:
--coverage of every game w/ links to all Knicks news.
--coverage of the coverage of every game (nothing like complaining about the guys who actually get paid to do this sorta thing)
--breakdowns of the roster, the coaches and plenty of reasons why they could all be better
--Trade rumors will be spread and eventually we can start our own
--Knicks trivia questions to separate the obsessed from the pathological
--Shot Selection: the newest drinking game based on the shot selection of Jamal Crawford.


Burning Questions will be answered...
--what is a knickerbocker?
--can we win it all? or even just half?
--why doesn't Patrick Ewing get the respect he deserves? is it because of the sweating?
--does Allan Houston have a genetic disorder that prevents him from playing defense? Or is it the debilitating knee injuries?
--how many beers can one man drink over the course of 48 minute game?
--can we somehow retire the smock of Anthony Mason's barber?
--how many beers can one poor man afford over the course of a 48 minute game at the Garden?
--how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if he'd been out the night before drinking with Vin Baker?