Enough Already

All this Knicks hype is really starting to tick me off.

The other day AFOMG sent me a link to an article in the Daily News in which Eddy Curry -- E-City as the good people from 423 like to call him -- claimed he would demand a trade if Isiah Thomas was fired. This was followed by a week of Isiah coddling by the media.

Yes, the Knicks have won 22 games, thereby quickly approaching last year's win total of 23 under former coach Larry Brown.

And yes, Eddy Curry has grown into a solid contributor at the center spot, a goal of Zeke's at the beginning of the year.

Put two and two together and it is simple right? Isiah Thomas is a genius!

Well slow down people. Please! This is all the most overblown bunch of crap that I have heard in quite some time. Let's take a second here to think about what we are saying.

These are the Knicks and Isiah's Knicks for that matter.

They are 22-29 in the Eastern Conference, possibly the worst conference in the history of basketball.

They are in 3rd place in a division that has the Sixers, who just traded away their team; the Celtics, currently losers of 18 straight, whose one good player missed 30 games; the Raptors, a team fresh off of the #1 pick in the draft; and the Nets, 25-27, and widely considered the biggest disappointment in basketball.

They are in third place in this division. The only two teams they are ahead of are arguably the two worst teams in the NBA and they can't quite catch up with the league's biggest disappointment and last year's lottery winner. Did I mention that they were 2-5 against division opponents?

The Knicks are terrible! They just happen to play in an NBA that has a bunch of other really bad teams.

Yes, they have improved, but it really is impossible to get worse than last year's team.

There is much ballyhoo about the emergence of David Lee, one of Isiah's boys. If this guy is so good, why isn't he starting over Jerome James?

Then there is Eddy Curry. If this guy is such a star, why does he average 7 rebounds per game? He is practically the biggest man in the universe and yet he gets fewer rebounds per game (7.0) than Jason Kidd (8.0).

Here's the thing about the NBA. Anyone at any time can put up 15 PPG. Mike Miller is averaging almost 17 in Memphis and he is an average player. In this league, with so much 1 on 1, anyone can score like Eddy Curry is scoring, so that doesn't really impress me.

What amazes me is how much perspective everyone has lost when it comes to Isiah Thomas. I understand that he is coaching in his first year and that the Knicks are better than they were last year, but can I remind you people that he hired the last coach?

Isiah paid Larry Brown almost $30 million dollars to coach his team for one year. Sure, Brown didn't work out but how about passing a little of the blame to the man that hired him?

And how about the fact that Isiah has single-handedly ruined the Knicks' salary cap with his many boneheaded trades?

The Steve Francis deal is about the worst deal in the history of the game. Then there is the Malik Rose deal, the brilliant signings of Jerome James and Jared Jeffries and the list goes on and on.

And here is the worst part. Just as the Knicks approach medicority and appear to have a glimmer of hope, just because the Eastern Conference is as horrible as it is, Isiah, for basically no good reason, gave away the Knicks' most valuable asset earlier this fall, when he cut Jalen Rose.

Jalen Rose and his expriring $16.9 million dollar contract, along with Channing Frye could very easily land the Knicks Memphis' Pau Gasol. Right now the best offer appears to be from the Bulls with the injured Andres Nocioni and PJ Brown's expiring contract.

Isiah made a living taking on bad contracts. Yet somehow, he couldn't figure out how to hang on to his most valuable one, cutting what is the equivalent of gold in the NBA. Why not let Jalen Rose eat cheeseburgers for six months and then trade him when he would be of worth? Why Isiah? Why?

The Knicks, instead have very little room to maneuver.

And in spite of it all, the Knicks still have a shot at an 8th seed. Whoopy! All that does is save them the embarassment that would occur if they won the lottery and were forced to ship that pick to Chicago on account of the trade for E-City.

And as great as E-City is, is he even better than Tyrus Thomas, this year's #1 and 2 2nd rounders? The answer is very much a maybe.

Fact is, the Knicks still stink. If they played in the West, they'd have 15 wins. Tops.

I am happy to hate here because unfounded optimism is just silly. The Knicks' decision to rebuild happened 4 years too late, which is not fair to the smartest fan base in the league.

The person responible for that delay, Isiah Thomas, needs to go. Unfortunately, that probably won't happen.

This is because the only man dumber than Isiah is the man writing his paychecks: the saxaphone tooting egomaniac Jimmy Dolan, who fell into the world's greatest job because he had the right father.

Good thing for me, Sippy Sr. was a powerful blogger in the 60's. Those genes are paying off.

Vaya con dios,

Sip

(Images courtesy of sportspickle.com, silive.com, gamespot.com)