Let's see, the Knicks fired a HOF coach in favor of a HOF player and exactly where has it gotten them. They are currently 2-5. At this rate they will win about 24 games this year and once again miss the playoffs. This is the team that Isiah built. He chose these guys, he brought in Steve Francis and kept Stephon Marbury. He also unloaded Jalen Rose to the unsuspecting Suns, (a horrible move by Phoenix, but I digress), which is the last good player personnel move he will make. I think Dolan will fire Isiah before the All-Star break, but then again, I would have fired him before lettting Larry Brown go. Just a few questions that need to be answered though;
Who will Dolan hire?From the current crop of coaches, I would probably hire Stu Van Gundy. No one else is really available.
How long before the franchise will turn around?At this rate, it will take at least 2 years if they are lucky enough to get the lottery pick at draft time. There should be some real talent this year in the draft and they Knicks need to go with a solid big man in my opinion unless a real star emerges.
Will it possibly get worse before it gets better?That all depends on how long Isiah stays. If he is allowed this entire year, it will only get worse. Be afraid, very afraid. I somehow think Isiah must have something that he is black mailing Dolan with or surely he would have been fired long ago with the sexual misconduct of an employee on top of his mismanagement of the team.
You cannot blame everything on Isiah. If this team wins 24 games, that's about the same as last season with Larry Brown, a Hall of Fame coach.
Maybe this team is just too bad for anyone to coach out of the slump. Isiah should be blame for putting this team together, but nobody can tell the future.
Cut this guy some slacks, maybe then the Knicks will play better!
Socal, I think reputaton will get Isiah at least a full season to prove his mettle.
But this team is still a disjointed mess. Frye needs mentoring badly. Eddy Curry is simply happy to be a millionaire. And, he too needs mentoring. Nate Robinson is just too small. And both Francis and Marbury are still major head cases, albeit with new dispositions early.
The Knicks are a volatile mix. To be honest, the only guy who could possibly get anything out of this motley assemblage is Isiah. I was actually encouraged that they played San Antonio so closely the other day. I thought the Spurs would run the Knicks out of the gym.
As for Stan Van Gundy, I hope the Heat have plans for him after Riley retires. That is, if he's not too prideful to take his old job back. After all, he will have a D-Wade in his prime to work with. If I'm the Heat, I don't want Van Gundy coaching in the Eastern Conference unless it's for us.
Last edited by MeanDovine on November 13th at 4:10 PM.
The acquisition of Francis was and is still rumored to have been approved by Brown.
If the Knicks do not show "significant" improvement this season I would bring in Kiki Vandeweghe to organize the rebuilding effort. He did a fabulous job in Denver.
Hoffman, the firing of Brown was a fiasco. THey lured him in with 50 million. If you are going to pay someone that much money, you need to listen to them. Brown did not want Jalen or Francis but Isiah was in love with Rose from the Pacers and dreamed of owning Francis.
Mean, no one can coach this Knicks team and win. That I am sure of, but Brown was and will always be a better coach than Zeke. Zeke will always be the better player.
As for Stu, I don't see him going back to the Heat anytime soon, but I like the guy and I think he handled his exit with real class. He deserves a chance somewhere. Ironically the last good coach the Knicks had was a Van Gundy, maybe another Van Gundy can straighten them out.
BBing, I am not cutting him any slack. He put this team together, it is his to take the fall upon. If he wins 24 games, that is not better than Brown. The point is to be better, much better not the same.
Last edited by socalsportsfan on November 13th at 3:25 PM.
socal, but don't you think all these negative critisicm isn't going to help the Knicks. Be patient and supportive, maybe they will start winning.
Plus all this attack on Zeke will just undermine his authority as the coach. If his players know he won't around much longer, why would they play hard for him.
So which one you want more? The Knicks have a better season or Zeke gets fired. If you want to Knicks to succeed, then support whoever is the coach. If you just want Zeke to get fired, maybe you should pick another team to root for!
BBing, the Knicks will not have a better season until Zeke goes.
With that logic, no coach should be fired mid season. If a coach is not winning, they are always fired and in this case the sooner the better. He should have never been hired. Just my opinion. I always liked Isiah on the court, but he has failed in every respect as a basketball manager.
Last edited by socalsportsfan on November 13th at 6:07 PM.
That damn fool, Isiah (and I don't care if I spelled his name wrong) does need to get out of basketball and not be allowed to come near another NBA arena. Put a restraining order on this #### and do not allow him within 1,000 yards of any NBA team. Please! This guy is the worse manager of any sports team in the history of sports.
Yeah, Isaiah is terrible and destroyed a once proud franchise and he should be fired. He should not have been given a chance to clean up his mess from the sidelines but firing Larry Brown was the right move. Neither of them were good hires for the team. Once they fire Isaiah, if they blow up the team, which they should, and rebuild then 2 years seems optimistic, but you never know.
First off the knicks were ruined before isiah got to town. Remember scott layden?
With that said he has been awful.the curry trade just might go down as the worst trade ever. And for your info even if they finish with 20 something wins the bulls have the option to flip flop picks with the knicks if they choose to. And we all know they will. So back to back lottery years will give the knicks a 20th something pick once again.
I say keep isiah for the year regardless. Why waist more money hiring another coach? After the year fire isiah and like some one previous mentioned hire kiki as a gm. Next year the knicks should hire a no-name coach maybe hook up herb again cause its really not going to make a difference. But we do have some good young pieces. And the organazation looks like they are going in the right direction by buying out mo taylor and jalen rose's contract instead of doing what they normaly do and trade expiring contracts for more expensive players.
Every rebuilding organazation gets worse before better that’s just the way its suppouse to be, and im willing to deal with it if I see them actually trying to rebuild instead of the norm.
If I had a choice id fire dolan the owner but we all know that wont happen!!!
Florida, I disagree. Brown was a great hire, they just paid him too much money, then let him go, then had to buy out his contract. Wasting money.
NY Ace, As for Knicks being ruined prior to Isiah arriving, I won't argue that point except to say he was brought in to rebuild and make it better. Sure he unloaded Jalen Rose's contract, but who gave him the contract to start with? Thomas! Who brought in Curry? Who brought in Marbury and Francis? Thomas has single handedly destroyed this franchise. Can they rebuild in two years. They can become respectable in that time, but no they will not win a championship in two years. That will take 5 at best.
Maybe I didn’t make myself clear when I said isiah has been AWFUL.
When thomas came in he said ny fans wouldn’t accept a rebuilding stage, and for the most part he was right. At the time we had the most expensive tickets we were selling out the garden even during a bad spell and we like to think of ourselves as the best and we want the best.
But after seeing how isiahs plan has panned out I would love for a rebuilding stage. His first move was bringing in marbury. Which might not have been the best move to make but in ny fans eyes it was a good move. Not only did you bring some excitement back but you brought one of ny's own to run the team. And it brought the fans back to the garden and there was a buzz.
Everything else after that has been complete garbage, including hiring brown last year.
2 year plan? Forget about it, ill be happy with a ten year plan at this point
First off, why was it a horrible move for the Suns to get Jalen Rose? They're paying him peanuts. He's a tremendous midrange jump shooter who can also play point. He doesn't hurt them at all (except for on the defensive side - but hey, who on Phoenix plays defense anyhow?). It was a bad move by the Knicks to just cut him loose.
Larry Brown was awful last year. Awful. I'd say last year's team could have won 30+ games if it weren't for Brown, his crying and his 37 different starting lineups. Educate yourself on LB. He is , hands-down, the most overrated coach ever.
You know who's killing the Knicks this season? Stephon Marbury. He's done. He was amazing in 2004-05. Brown locked him up last year. And everybody thought this year, the old Marbury would be back. Well, he's not. He's lost a step. He's not the same player anymore. And Eddy Curry is easily the worst starting big man in the NBA.
I don't hate Isiah or like him. But I do know that he inherited an awful situation when he arrived on scene. Former GM Scott Layden ruined the Knicks, and Isiah has had an almost impossible job since the start. Isiah didn't sign Allan Houston to $100 million. He didn't sign Howard Eisley and Shandon Anderson to mega deals. He didn't trade away Latrell. He didn't get Antonio McDyess on one knee.
Isiah walked into a situation that was already destroyed. He's had to do disaster clean-up since day one. But his moves weren't bad (Marbury, Crawford, 21-year-old center, rookie picks, etc..) consider the finances.
Last edited by billsimmonshater on November 14th at 11:26 AM.
Isiah definitely has to go, problem is he now needs to stay the entire season thanks to the drama that is the New York Knicks. My thing is I would have never allowed Isiah in my organization, let alone run it and then coach it. They made a committment to Larry Brown and then they chose the player over the coach.
MeanD is right about the team being a volatile mix. Wonder how volatile Marbury would be if he was benched, because he should not be starting on that team over either Robinson or Crawford. Marbury is turning into Rod Strickland.
socal ...... The Knicks will live and die by the decisions made by Isaiah this season. The team is a mess but he's not got much to work with beyond the scraps on the table. So it'll be up to him to muster everything that he can out of this rag tag bunch of misfits. I'd say he and the Dolans got off extremely lightly considering Brown got only $18.5m of the $40m that was due him. But then again that's $18.5m that they won't go out and waste on some none descript player.
The thing is Isiah is the one who acquired the scraps (plus giving away a potential top 3 pick two years in a row) and tried to convince all of NY that the problem was Larry Brown's negative attitude, not a lack of talent. Now that he's the coach he's constantly trying do lower expectations. He needs to go. This shouldn't even be a debate. But I'm also the same guy who's rooting against his own team this season so maybe I'm a little too negative.
Bill: Isiah didn't walk into a great situation but you know what? That team made the playoffs. He has made HORRIBLE moves. Big money contracts to Crawford, who isn't a bad player but is more overpaid than Houston ever was. At least Houston made some game winners in playoff games. He turned the team over to Maurbury. He traded for Francis. He gave away not one, but TWO lottery picks for a guy who is overweight with a heart condition when he had a servicable, affordable big man (Nazr Mohommaed) on the roster already. He traded for guys like Maurice Taylor and Rose only to buy out their contracts. He traded for friggin Penny Hardaway!!! Oh and I'm forgetting the Tim Thomas experience as well. And he changed coaches like he changed ties. The guy needs to go.
The Knicks problem in my opinion is not just Isiah false or Brown's.I will say Brown did not help his cause by calling players out and taking no blame for their failures.Nor did he help his cause with the changing of starting lineups every other day.As a die-hard knicks fan though I will say their failures go much deeper;it's like a culture now.The Knicks for the last 15+years have been obsessed with acquiring guard after guard after guard,shooting guards at that.This Franchise went completely down hill when they traded Ewing and thought they could clear the lane and run n gun their way to success.They have way too many of the same type players on the floor fighting for position.With that said I do think that they have a new core of young players that will only get better.We'll see.Isiah needs to be fired just because he has a miserable track record that just seems to keep going.
Last edited by lyrikell on November 14th at 1:49 PM.
Brown called out players. I like that. A good coach stands his ground as long as the owner backs him. Unfortunately Isiah backed the players.
The players he has brought in like Rose were grossly overpaid and then they buy out contracts like candy, putting them in worse financial situations.
As for why Rose was a bad move for Phoenix, he is a jynx, a dud, or anathema to any team. Mark my words, the Suns will lose in the first round this year with Rose as an integral part of the team.
You've completely skated around the fact that they've started off better then they did last year. Then of course brown's better right. Wrong. Anyone can have a playoff team if they walk into the right situation and for once he didn't and it showed his mettle. Did the knicks make a mistake on offering him so much money, yeah they did but what's the point of complaining. He wanted out, Knickerbockers wanted him gone it was a win win. I'd much rather have a coach who wants to coach the team then one who doesn't. As for Curry it's pointless to talk about him because in truth Chicago ruined a very good thing they had with him and Chandler. Having both in basiclly balanced the equation Curry scored like it was nobodies business and then Chandler cleaned the glass like he was born to do so. Having Isiah as the coach is the right thing because it lets him fix his own mistakes and if he can't he gets the boot. Even if he is succesful this season he's gone next year on his own accord. Can you seriously see him coaching more than one year.I honestly think you just really dislike Thomas which is if that's the reason for this post don't post it again it's pointless. That's like me posting long blogs on how and why I dislike Lebron James. That is all
Death, you are misinformed at best. Isiah destroyed this team with his own personnel moves. He brought in this motley crew and can not improve upon it. As for disliking Zeke, you don't know me. I loved Isiah the player. I cheered for him and Dumars for years. I dislike the way he has destroyed this franchise and it will take years to rebuild. Firing Brown was a mistake. Brown wanted out because he saw how incompetent Isiah was. How do you bring in Jalen Rose and give him 12 million a year. Now they cut him, but I bet they are paying part of his contract. They brought in Curry with his heart problem as well. Smart moves.
Lastly, don't tell me what to post or when to post because that doesn't work. I will post all I want on Zeke or anyone else I choose. If you don't want to read it, that is your choice.
Once again we disagree as to whether or not Brown had the option to approve trades and acquisitions. I believe he did. Brown is just as much or more responsible for the lack of success of last year's team. He completely obliterated their season with his inconsistent lineups and his constant whining to the press. The guy is a bum and New York and hopefully the entire NBA is better off without him.
On a sidenote Isiah was never in love with Jalen Rose from having coached him with the Pacers. Donnie Walsh from Indiana has gone on record as having said that Isiah wanted Rose traded from the Pacers.
Last edited by Hoffman on November 15th at 10:53 AM.
It sounds odd to say, but I think they miss Allen Houston. Too many of their players make their money going to the basket and a reliable outsider shooter would help. They should have gone after Stojacovic in the off season. Where is Bernard King when you need him?
Dudski, I would agree that they need some good outside shooting. Marbury and Francis create and are not pure spot up jumpshooters.
Hoffman, we do disagree then. Brown verbally said he did not want Francis and as far as changing lineups, he had to when they bring in a Francis and pay him huge money. He has to play as does Rose and every other person that Isiah brought in. Thomas is not doing so well now.
Socalsportsfan ........ Zeke and Dolan would rather suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune rather than admit they've ruined a once proud franchise. They've not exactly set the season alight so far and the players seem relatively disinterested in playng with any passion or pride. Somehow Zeke's not cut out for coaching but I do know he likes to eat at Red Lobster. I remember him discussing this a while back as to the reason for him turning up late for an interview on Jim Rome's syndicated radio talk show. Now I know what that rotting smell coming out of The Garden is . It's not Zeke's lunch but the play of the Knicks' team as it stinks to high heaven.
I agree with Hoffman and Dudski here. But the problem isn't missing Allan Houston, it was trading away Van Horn for another slasher when he was actually playing good ball for the Knicks. The Knicks were in contention up to that move but have been on a constant decline ever since.
billsimmonshater, Larry Brown - who you call the most overrated coach ever - is the only coach to ever win Championships in the NBA & Div. I. It takes a strong organization from the top down. Isiah didn't have a clue as a front office man. Brown mostly inherited your typical New Era ballplayers, who don't play defense, don't care about the team concept, and are much more likely to become Primadonnas than real basketball players.
SoCal: What say you now after a Zeke winning streak? Isiah seems to be getting the most out of his players and the Knickerbockers are in contention in the NBA Leastern Conference Craplantic Division.
