It’s not easy to watch the Knicks right now. Almost as hard as sitting through a Dane Cook concert. It’s just not entertaining or interesting, and the losing is wearing on Knicks fans.
And they want to blame the coach. Mike D’Antoni. Right or wrong.
Knicks President Donnie Walsh tried to change that yesterday by throwing himself in front of the bus.
Walsh, the Knicks president, still believes his plan to rebuild the club through free agency was the prudent call even though there are no guarantees the team will sign one of the top pending free agents - LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh - this summer, or that Walsh will be around to see his plan come to fruition.
“I didn’t say in one summer we’re going to turn around and build a championship team,” Walsh said. “And I’m not asking for time. I won’t have that much time. But I know one thing: Now at least we have a flexible position, and whether it’s next summer or the summer after, we’re going to start adding players to this team that can lead you in that direction.”
Got to love the New York media, saying Walsh “still believes” in his plan. As if there was another plan other than two years of pain to clear out what Thomas hath wrought on that roster. It had to be done. I get it, Knicks fans are impatient. Owner James Dolan may be getting impatient. It’s been a couple years of the Walsh/D’Antoni era and things are not better on the court. And LeBron isn’t coming. And losing sucks.
But this isn’t on D’Antoni -- Phil Jackson could coach this roster with John Wooden as his assistant and they wouldn’t win two more games than D’Antoni has. The old coaching axiom is, “It’s not the Xs and Os, it’s the Jimmy and Joes.” You have to have the talent. Was Doc Rivers a much better coach in 2008 than in 2007? No. He just had Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen added to his team, and that makes any coach look smart.
The thing is, things are better now in New York because there is cap space. There is flexibility now to start building a team that fits D’Antoni’s system rather than the square pegs that are there now.
Fans are right to be pissed that the players are not hustling night in and night out, but at the NBA level that is on the players more than the coach. These are professionals, and college rah-rah speeches have limited effect. The teams that bust it hard every night do so because a player leads that charge. Did the Celtics hustle because of Doc or Garnett? The Lakers because of Jackson or Kobe?
None of this makes it any fun to watch the Knicks right now, even with Tracy McGrady back. And nothing is changing that until the season ends.
