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http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/story/330020p-282044c.html
Larry's breaking point
BY FRANK ISOLA
DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER
Thursday, July 21st, 2005
Stephon Marbury has a history with Larry Brown, one that is neither peaceful nor successful.
Less than one week before the Olympics began last August in Athens, Larry Brown met with officials from USA Basketball and lobbied to have Marbury cut and sent home, along with another unidentified player, prior to the Opening Ceremonies.
Several sources with knowledge of the meeting confirmed the account, which ended, of course, with Marbury remaining on the team as its only true point guard and the U.S. finishing a disappointing third in the basketball tournament.
The Olympic experience was a regrettable one for Brown and Marbury but it is also one that is worth keeping in mind if Brown decides to become Marbury's 11th NBA coach in 10 seasons and his fourth with the Knicks in 19 months.
Does their six-week test run last summer suggest that Brown and Marbury cannot peacefully coexist and even thrive together? No. But based solely on the recent history between the demanding coach and the headstrong point guard, the possibility of a rocky relationship exists.
Brown wants to do things, as he often says, "the right way." And Marbury does things his way.
"It can work," says former Knick Mark Jackson. "If everyone is all about winning it will work. With Larry Brown, you will find out a lot about players pretty quickly. Either you want to work with him and get better or you don't."
Jackson played under Brown with the Clippers and Pacers and knows firsthand how difficult it can be as the point guard in Brown's system.
"You've got to be willing to learn and you've got to be willing to listen," Jackson said yesterday. "You have to take some of the things he says and use them to make yourself better. And you have to take some of the things he says and let it go in one ear and out the other."
"Look at what happened with Chauncey Billups in Detroit. He was a guy who struggled at first. He and Larry didn't always see eye-to-eye. But then he was the MVP of the Finals and had another great year. Coach Brown helped him become a better player. He can do the same with Steph."
In fairness, Brown coached Marbury for less than two months last summer. And even Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich, who was Brown's Olympic assistant, acknowledged that Marbury had the toughest assignment because he had to learn Brown's system on the fly.
In five opening-round games, Marbury made just six of 30 shots from the floor but did have 17 assists and only three turnovers. In a quarterfinal victory over Spain, Marbury broke the single-game scoring record for the United States with 31 points. The day before the breakout performance, Marbury had expressed frustration about playing in Brown's system.
"If I was on a different team I would play totally different," Marbury said. "If I was on Puerto Rico I would be totally different from how I play on this team. We have so many guys on this team who are talented, you pretty much aren't looking to score."
Marbury is a scoring point guard who has a tendency to dominate the ball. Brown wants his point guards to keep the ball moving. Because Brown had so much success switching Allen Iverson to shooting guard, there is a possibility that he would try the same experiment with Marbury.
Knicks president Isiah Thomas has vehemently denied that he would trade Marbury. Of course, Thomas may have to revise those feelings if Brown feels he cannot get through to Marbury.
"There's got to be a give and take," Jackson added. "They are going to butt heads because when you are the point guard with Larry Brown that happens. But I think Steph should also realize the type of impact coach Brown can have."
"The Knicks will be getting a coach who is a great teacher. He's very demanding and he's never satisfied, especially with his point guard. But he's also a winner and what I like about him is that he can walk into a situation where he clearly doesn't have the best team and get the most out of everybody. Nobody can do that any better than coach Brown."
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http://www.nypost.com/sports/knicks/51442.htm
MARBURY EYES 2-GUARD SPOT
By FRED KERBER
August 4, 2005 -- Stephon Marbury may not get a chance to defend his claim he's the best point guard in the NBA. Because he may end up at shooting guard.
Such a move would be fine with Marbury, who says he is open to change and willing to do anything new coach Larry Brown requires. In fact, Marbury said, Brown urged him to shoot more in the Olympics and once told him the two-guard spot is where he is best suited. And to Marbury, more shooting means more scoring, and he'll take that.
"[In Athens last summer], he was telling me to shoot the ball. The game I had like 30 points (31), he was telling me, 'Son you've got to shoot. You're out there passing the ball, acting like you're scared to shoot,' " Marbury recalled yesterday before a kids camp at Basketball City. "When he said that to me, it's over with."
"The name of the game is put the ball in the hole. I don't see them paying people for rebounds. They don't max people out for just rebounding the ball. I want to play the two, then you can't say I'm shooting the ball too much."
When Brown was ushered in as Knicks coach last week, he indicated he'd like to see Jamal Crawford bringing the ball up more, thereby freeing Marbury for other duties. Fine, Marbury claimed.
"I'll make whatever adjustments he wants me to make, [including] if he wants me to play the two," Marbury said. "He told me a long time ago, 'If I ever coach you, I'd put you at the two.' "
Reports of the rift between he and Brown were overblown and erroneous, he insisted. He hasn't had a sit-down with Brown since the coaching move was made, but the two had numerous chats during the Olympics.
"We'd sit down and we talked to each other like men. I treat him with respect and I think he understands I want respect," he said.
When trade rumors surfaced earlier this summer, rumors that were quickly squashed by team president Isiah Thomas, Marbury said he wasn't worried. He talks to Thomas every day and has a great relationship with him — a closeness he feels some resent.
"I'm still here. I ain't going nowhere. They want me to get traded because things are getting good," Marbury said. "But I got somebody on my side now, and people can't deal with that, knowing Isiah and I are close."
"Isiah and I have a close relationship. I didn't need to hear it. I already knew."
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November 10, 2005
Method to the Madness
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/chris_mannix/11/10/knicks/1.html
Take a breath, Knicks fans. Take a deep breath, count to 10 and repeat after me, because I'm going to give you the only four words you will ever need to hear.
In Larry we trust.
I understand your frustrations. For the better part of this decade the Knicks have been the floor mat on the NBA hybrid, a joke of a franchise that contending teams routinely stepped on en route to bigger and better things. Madison Square Garden hasn't seen a playoff series in two seasons and hasn't hosted a winner since 2000.
In between fans have seen a once-proud franchise become a watered down version of the Yankees, a reckless-spending conglomerate without the hardware to validate its loose purse string policy. Year after year the front office attempted to buy its way out of the basement with ridiculous acquisitions, beginning with Allan Houston and Howard Eisley (courtesy of Scott Layden) and continuing with Isiah Thomas' acquisitions of Stephon Marbury, Jamal Crawford, Jerome James and Penny Hardaway). The results have all been the same: a losing record, for four consecutive seasons.
So there's no cause for optimism, right? Well ...
In Larry we trust.
It's hard to put blind faith in one man and it's even harder when that man has your team sputtering to an 0-4 start while staring into the teeth of a six-game West Coast road trip. But look at his history. Brown has coached eight professional teams in 23 seasons. Setting aside the ready-made contender he inherited in Detroit (as well as his foray in the ABA), Brown has had little success in his opening weeks with each of his new teams. The 1981-82 Nets opened 1-7; the '88-89 Spurs, 2-6, the '92-93 Clippers, 0-3, the '93-94 Pacers, 1-6, and the '97-98 Sixers, 2-6.
All five of those teams, however, improved after Brown arrived. In fact, three made the playoffs in his opening season and the other two in his second year. But until he started working his magic, they stunk. Which is exactly the situation the Knicks are in.
On the court Brown's players are a confused bunch, frequently botching plays as they struggle to learn his system. Players are tentative and nervous, fearful that one missed shot or ugly turnover will earn them a seat on the bench. In Wednesday night's loss in Portland, Crawford, an early target of Brown's ire, passed up several open looks from beyond the 3-point line. Crawford? Passing up a 3? Last year Crawford wouldn't have passed up a shot from the parking lot.
This will be a struggle, and it should be. Brown runs his team like a Marine unit, and this one looks like a bunch of out-of-shape stiffs too lazy to go to Fat Camp. The Knicks and their fans need to brace themselves because it's going to get worse before it gets better, but it will get better. Brown's eight previous NBA teams improved by 8.9 wins in his first season with the club. Think about that. As bad as the Knicks were last season (33 wins), simply by adding Brown to the equation would have put them in a dogfight with Philadelphia (42 wins) for a playoff berth. He's that good.
For argument's sake, let's say the Knicks sink faster than the Titanic on their Western swing. Let's assume they return to New York 0-9, and Stephon Marbury is reciting Allen Iverson's rant on practice almost verbatim. Let's say they go into the All-Star break with 15 or 16 wins. But come April, the bet here is that this team will be fighting for a playoff spot.
This Knicks squad will "get it" because Brown won't let up until they do. Marbury will resign himself into becoming a souped up version of Chauncey Billups and the frontcourt of Eddy Curry, Antonio Davis and Channing Frye will develop into an intimidating presence that frees up the guards to be more aggressive defensively. They will play the right way. Why?
Because in Brown I trust.
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Chris Sheridan Blog
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Marbury: 'It's personal now'
The Larry Brown vs. Stephon Marbury feud escalated this morning at the Knicks' shootaround, the hate-hate relationship sinking to new depths of discord.
First, Marbury stood before reporters, called Brown insecure and vowed he'd keep striking back at Brown whenever he feels he's been publicly criticized.
Next, Brown castigated Marbury for having a selfish agenda and deflecting blame.
"I think it's personal now," Marbury said. "I don't think it's about basketball anymore. Now it's to the point where he's putting his 30-year career against my 10-year career. You know, coach is a great coach is what everyone says. We're supposed to be better than what we are. Did it happen now? No."
Brown was a portrait of disgust one day after asking people to compare his track record vs. his point guard's. Criticizing Marbury's "agenda," Brown also insinuated that Marbury hadn't accepted his share of the criticism for the Knicks having the NBA's worst record despite its highest payroll.
"So, you're the best guard in the league and the team is 17-45, yeah, it's the coach's fault," Brown said.
This was the fifth straight day of the two adversaries bickering at each other, and Wednesday's developments left the rest of the team staring in disbelief as first Marbury, then Brown, went through the ritual of airing their gripes through the team's beat writers.
"You've got to wonder whether both these guys own newspaper stocks," quipped Howard Beck of the Times.
A few more quotes from Marbury's diatribe and Brown's retort:
From Marbury:
"If coach is comparing his career to my career, he's got like a 20-year edge on me. To me that sounds like a lot of insecurity is going on. … He's speaking on things he's done, and I think people in New York want to know what he's going to do, you know, as far as us winning. What happened in the past is the past. I think New Yorkers can relate [to] what's going to happen now. We live more in the present."
On whether Brown had crossed the line by comparing his own track record of improving the teams he has coached to Marbury's history of failing to make better any of the teams he's been traded to:
"He always crosses the line. That's not nothing new. Certain coaches deal with certain things certain ways, and he handles his things through the media as opposed to sitting down and talking with people. And still, if you sit down and you talk with coach, it's liable to get back to everybody, so you're really not safe there either."
On whether he wants to play for Brown:
"I want to play basketball in New York. I love New York, and I believe New York loves me. … I'm at the point where I just want to win, and I want to play in New York more than anything in this world. But if that's not happening next year, I can't cry about it. I've been in this situation before and I understand, I know it's a business."
On whether Isiah Thomas should step in and try to resolve the feud:
"We don't have to have another grown man come and mediate two grown men. What's that about? He's the boss, but if there's a problem, come to me like a man. I don't have no problem. I'm comfortable with myself. I know who I am as a person."
On their future:
"I can coexist. I can't speak for another person. I'm cool. I'm fine. I can deal with it. But I'm no longer going to allow him to say things about me and I'm not going to say anything back. I mean that's just not going to happen. That's not going to happen. I allowed him to drag me the first three or four months in the paper, and I didn't say one word. I just sat back and just took it. But I'm not taking it no more. If something's going to be said, I'm going to defend myself. My mother taught me that: Somebody hits you, you hit them back."
On what the solution might be:
"I don't know. If I was a chemistry teacher, I'd probably have an answer, but I don't. … I don't need no new start. My start is right here in New York unless they say otherwise."
A few snippets from Brown:
Upon being informed that Marbury planned to continue answering perceived slights through the media:
"That's great, that's great. Again, I'm the coach of a basketball team, and the only thing that matters to me is that we play the right way, share the ball, try to guard and care about our teammates. I'm going to focus on that. I'm not going to focus on things that have nothing to do with being a good teammate. I've been coaching the same way my whole life. Things that really matter, I've said over and over and over again. It's amazing to me. I've never had a problem getting people to understand that before, and it's mind boggling to me after we win two games that it becomes an issue. So I want to focus on guys that are trying to do the right things to help our team win, and that's what I'm going to do."
Ever deal with anything like this before?
"Never. Never."
Does it raise doubts in Brown's mind about whether he and Marbury are a good pairing going forward?
"Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. No coach, no coach, would enjoy this situation. Because every coach that coaches this sport, it's about team. And when you hear players talk about team, you get real excited. When you don't hear players talk about team, it's not a lot of fun."
Would he walk away in frustration?
"No, no. No, no."
Is the best solution to trade Marbury over the summer?
"I'm not even thinking about that. I'm just trying to coach our team and make guys better. I want guys that care about the team that want to win games that understand what our problems are and try to correct them."
Is Marbury one of those guys?
"Well, we'll see. We're 17-45, and I'll take full responsibility for us winning 17 games and losing 45. So, you're the best guard in the league and the team is 17-45, yeah, it's the coach's fault."
"I don't know why you play a team sport and not be concerned about making your teammates better and helping your team win games. That's the only thing that really matters, and if you're the best player, surely you're going to have some effect on the game's outcome. And I've said this from day one, I've never given anybody in my career more free rein. In my career. And I went to the conference finals with Haywoode Workman as the point guard. Eric Snow was the fourth-string point guard in Seattle, and we went to the NBA Finals [with Snow in Philadelphia].
"I've been around guys, and every good team, it's all about team, and that's what we're going to try and get. You want to come and join that? That's fine. That's the only message that needs to be sent. You want to be part of the team and make your teammates better, you want to care about the right things and playing the right way, this is a pretty good place to be. You don't have that on your agenda, then this is probably a bad place to be."
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KNICKS SHOULD SUSPEND STEPH
By GEORGE WILLIS
March 16, 2006 -- FINALLY the Knicks are entertaining again; not for anything they've done on the court, mind you, but for becoming a reality show the likes of which television executives only can envy.
Perhaps we should call this the "Surreal World of the Knicks," "Desperate Hoopsters," "American Idiots," or maybe, simply, "Lost," a continuing drama starring Larry Brown and Stephon Marbury with occasional guest appearances by Isiah Thomas and James Dolan.
Who knew the Knicks would grab our attention with a verbal feud between Brown, the 65-year-old coach, and Marbury, the Me-generation point guard, while Thomas shows zero leadership by allowing this war to reach a boiling point.
Hours after publicly dissing his coach and calling their feud "personal," Marbury was in the Knicks' starting lineup for last night's game against the Hawks at the Garden. But he did not play the last 23 minutes.
If the Knicks had any backbone, he would have been suspended for one game, maybe two, for insubordination.
When you talk about your coach the way Marbury did yesterday, saying, "He always crosses the line," and "I don't think it's about basketball anymore," and "If somebody hits me you hit them back," that's insubordination.
Marbury questioned Brown's integrity yesterday when he said, "If you sit down and talk to coach, it's liable to get back to everybody," and earlier this week Marbury promised rebellion by saying he would play like "Starbury" instead of following Brown's direction.
Maybe Thomas suspends Marbury for tomorrow's game against Detroit. If Thomas doesn't, if he allows Marbury to get away with ripping his coach, then Brown might as well leave at season's end and find a GM who will protect his back. No amount of money is worth having a player challenge your authority, much less the integrity you've built during a 30-year career.
I'm not saying Brown is innocent in all this. He didn't need to rile Marbury by suggesting reporters compare their track records. That's what miffed Marbury yesterday. But a player can't publicly rip a coach and everybody act like it never happened. Not if Brown ever wants to be taken seriously around here again.
If Marbury is indeed suspended for one game or two, it should be announced by Thomas, not through some release from the public relations department. Marbury yesterday said Thomas didn't need to intervene.
"We don't have to have another man come mediate two grown men," Marbury said.
But that's Thomas' job, especially when it threatens to rip apart an already unstable franchise.
If Marbury isn't disciplined, then don't look for Brown to stay around long. Marbury's contract makes him virtually impossible to trade. He'll be a loose cannon and Brown's worst nightmare. Thus far, it seems impossible the two can coexist.
Either one could have avoided this with the kind of conversation coaches or players have throughout sports. They clear the air in private, and put their egos aside for the betterment of the team.
Instead, Marbury and Brown have taken to ripping each other in print with Marbury suggesting Brown has "a lot of insecurity going on," and Brown accusing Marbury of being selfish.
"I'm going to focus on guys who are about team," Brown said.
A team that's making reality TV seem dull.
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March 17, 2006
http://www.newsday.com/sports/basketball/ny-spbarb174665691mar17,0,5017632.column
There are many differences between the Pistons and Knicks, most of which boil down to talent. Another key difference, however, is that it is hard to see a battle like this playing out for an entire week in Detroit, hard to see it getting so personal that a player thinks he can actually call his coach insecure. The biggest reason is that someone, either in the front office or on the team, would have stopped it from going so far.
"I think if something had blown up, for instance, between me and Larry, I know the guys would have turned to me and said, 'Man, it ain't that serious. Look at the big picture.' And, I'm sure [general manager] Joe Dumars would have said something."
Knicks president Isiah Thomas, who made Marbury the linchpin of his rebuilding effort, has remained publicly quiet this week. Because Marbury has long been the favored son, the Knicks don't have anyone on the team with the stature to challenge him - or even make him think twice - before he takes on Brown.
Flip Saunders, who replaced Brown on the Pistons, coached Marbury for three seasons in Minnesota. He believes that Brown and Marbury eventually will be on the same page, but it won't happen as quickly as it did with Billups.
"Steph is one of the most competitive guys I've ever coached, and he can be very stubborn from that," Saunders said. "Chauncey is not that stubborn. You can sit down and talk with him. Steph, with your sitdowns, you're going to have to have a few of them to convince him. Once he believes in it, he goes overboard."
Though no one on the Pistons wanted to give Marbury advice, it's clear that for all the mixed feelings they have about the way Brown left them, they respect him as a coach.
"When he was here, everybody grew under him," Rip Hamilton said. "He made everyone a more complete player."
No one benefited more than Billups, who went from journeyman to All-Star under Brown. At the beginning of this season, Billups predicted that Brown would also do great things for Marbury. Instead, Billups is stunned by what's transpired.
"I'm really saddened by it," Billups said. "I know I couldn't play with that [feud]. I think it's taking its toll on everybody."
You don't have to be one of the best point guards in the NBA to see that.
------------------------------
IT'S EMBARRASSING'
By MICHAEL MORRISSEY
March 25, 2006 -- Before last night's game, Larry Brown said he hoped that every position would be up for grabs in the next Knicks training camp.
A few hours later, the Knicks proved they are pretty much unredeemable at every spot.
Scoring a season-low 31 points in the first half while being booed off the court, they were routed by Memphis, 91-75, during a mistake-plagued train wreck. The Knickerbotchers committed 13 turnovers in the first half, which led to 19 Memphis points. For the first time this season, the Knicks are 30 games below .500 (19-49), and they'll play 14 more games before escaping this bottomless pit.
"We've been rock bottom for a long time," Brown conceded, although he added that he doesn't see guys giving up.
Malik Rose, who played with a sprained right ankle, was one of many hapless defenders against Memphis power forward Pau Gasol, who effortlessly poured in 36 points.
Rose, Maurice Taylor and Jerome James looked helpless/foolish trying to guard a player who was unstoppable from the rim to the 3-point line.
"It's extremely frustrating and disappointing," Rose said about the season. "I'm really kind of embarrassed to be part of what's going on - and I'm a big part of it."
"I'm not pointing any fingers at anybody. This is embarrassing for the franchise, it's embarrassing for each and every one of us in this locker room.
"And I'm sorry that I couldn't do more to avoid this."
One of the questions was whether Jalen Rose and Steve Francis would again be benched for three quarters, as they were Wednesday night in Orlando.
Jalen Rose began 0-for-8 before two third-quarter buckets, and he and Stephon Marbury sat out the entire fourth quarter. Marbury put a towel over his head on the bench.
Francis played 3:27 of the fourth, as a starting five of David Lee, Taylor, Eddy Curry (a semi-bright spot with 19 points and 10 rebounds), Nate Robinson and Jamal Crawford cut a lead of 22 down to 13 with under five minutes left. That was the moral victory of the night.
"We don't play consistent enough," Marbury said. "We are not doing the same things we need to be doing all of the time."
At yesterday's shootaround, Brown reiterated that the end of the season is an audition, and he not only wants good game performances but also good practice habits and players who keep their mouths shut instead of popping off to the press.
"Anybody who's around this game long enough, you know who wants to be part of what you're doing and who really has no interest in it," Brown said. "We can see that."
"It's not me; I've got five coaches who are reminding me of that every day. Isiah [Thomas is] aware."
-----------------------------------
Knicks 96, Cavaliers 94
Tuned-Out Knicks Finally Turn It On
By HOWARD BECK
April 6, 2006
In what little is left of a historically bad season, the Knicks may be gauged not so much by their play but by the imaginary dial that controls their attention spans. That dial may determine who stays and who goes when the season mercifully ends in 13 days.
Coach Larry Brown admitted yesterday that some players have tuned him out — a description that qualifies as an understatement — and that those who have could be relocated in the off-season.
For one night, however, the Knicks appeared moderately unified and focused, and it was enough to hold off the Cleveland Cavaliers, 96-94, at Madison Square Garden.
Jamal Crawford, one of the few Knicks to earn Brown's praise consistently, scored the winning basket, a 15-foot fadeaway over Larry Hughes, with 6.4 seconds left. Hughes missed a 3-pointer at the final buzzer, and Crawford was lifted off the court by his teammate Quentin Richardson. The Knicks simultaneously snapped their nine-game losing streak and the Cavaliers' nine-game winning streak.
A night earlier, Brown had again called his players to task in a postgame team meeting. It would seem that some of the words finally sank in.
"I just want effort right now," Brown said. "And from that perspective, I'm really pleased."
Although the Knicks (20-54) let Cleveland erase a 19-point fourth-quarter lead, there was much for Brown to like. Crawford scored a season-high 37 points. Steve Francis, in his second game as the starting point guard, had seven assists. Qyntel Woods held the superstar LeBron James to 8 points in the first half and blocked his driving layup with 32.9 seconds left.
The Knicks are 2-0 against the playoff-bound Cavaliers.
"If that team plays like they played tonight, they can be a much better team," said James, who scored 21 points in the fourth quarter. "For some reason, their record isn't that good, but they play like an over-.500 team against us."
That sort of effort has been generally lacking, and Brown made a rather frank admission before the game.
"I think there are some that probably are tuning us out," he said. "And I think there are some that are making progress."
Progress had been virtually undetectable for most of the season, particularly in the last few weeks. Not even the potential shame of finishing with the worst record in team history has moved the Knicks.
Brown's comments came one night after he lamented that he was "begging guys" to compete. By all indications, the divide between Brown and the majority of his players is much deeper than those rather tame assessments.
After the postgame team meeting in Washington on Tuesday, Richardson, Francis and Malik Rose pleaded for a better effort. But among the Knicks' regulars, only a handful — those three, Crawford, Eddy Curry and the rookies David Lee and Channing Frye — have made it through the season without some sort of public grousing or public spat with Brown. That is not to say that any of them are happy with their roles, or with Brown, only that they have yet to broadcast their discontent or openly defy the coach.
"I was trying to figure out what's been different about this year," Brown said. "I think one of the obvious things is I find myself repeating myself over and over again, more than I ever have before. The second thing I find myself doing is pleading with guys to play with effort. I've always maintained that a coach's responsibility is to coach execution. You just assume and expect you're going to get effort."
If Brown's players are not listening, the obvious solution is to replace them, and all indications are that Knicks management intends to back Brown. The team's president, Isiah Thomas, has said he will side with Brown in any dispute with players, and James L. Dolan, the Garden chairman, told the team last month that the jobs of Brown and Thomas were secure.
"It depends on Isiah and Mr. Dolan, what they think of me," Brown said.
"But if they don't want to do what you ask them to do, and you're going to be the coach, why would you have them around?"
If the Knicks cannot overhaul the roster — they are handicapped by large contracts — the divide between Brown and his players could wreck another season, ultimately forcing the franchise to consider Brown's fate. Brown is under contract for four more seasons and about $40 million.
"If they think I can't do it, I understand," Brown said. "But I'm not giving up."
Asked if he has to consider whether he is not the best fit here, Brown said: "You've got to always examine that. But again, I'm not jumping ship here. I've been doing this forever. I haven't had trouble getting guys to respond. Never. You bang heads for a little while, but eventually, they know you care and you want to make them better."
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TAYLOR'S BIG APPLE STAY MAY BE OVER
By MARC BERMAN
April 19, 2006 -- When the Knicks' season ends tonight, Maurice Taylor switches from power forward to "expiring contract." Or, as the blunt Taylor called it, "A piece of meat."
Entering the offseason, Taylor becomes instant trade bait for Isiah Thomas, whose only pawns the past two years have been players entering the last year of their contracts. Squads looking to get under the cap vie to collect expiring contracts.
Taylor has one year at $9 million left - a more manageable, easier-to-trade sum than the maximum expiring contracts Thomas dealt this season in Antonio Davis (for Jalen Rose) and Penny Hardaway (for Steve Francis).
"I know when you have an expiring contract, it's like a piece of meat, piece of property," Taylor told The Post. "That's not the way you want to go into the summer. That's the way [Thomas] is with all of us. Some teams do that. Some teams look at you as a piece of meat."
On the day Thomas acquired Taylor 14 months ago, he referred to Taylor's contract as an asset after the current season - a strange thing to bring up on the player's first day as a Knick and given that the 2004-2005 season wasn't even over.
Taylor no longer cares if he gets moved; he and a half-dozen teammates could be playing their final game as Knicks at the Meadowlands tonight. "Either way," Taylor said, "doesn't matter."
If coach Larry Brown is back, he'll campaign for the Knicks to package their two late first-round picks (probably 21st and 28th) because he feels the roster already includes too many youngsters. Taylor could be part of that package. Jalen Rose's maximum contract also enters its expiring year.
Brown believes the Knicks need a true point guard - free-agent Speedy Claxton is a possibility - and a defensive center such as on-the-block Theo Ratliff. Eddy Curry, who could be shopped for the Pacers' Jermaine O'Neal, has been a big disappointment, and Jerome James could be bought out because the Knicks want to re-sign Jackie Butler.
One intriguing free-agent shot-blocking defensive center is Dikembe Mutombo, but the Knicks' biggest interest is in rugged rebounding PF Reggie Evans.
*
Malik Rose summed up the disgraceful season poetically: "We have a lot of talent in this locker room, a lot of weapons that can help us, but we didn't come close to playing together as a unit," he said. "That's what made winning hard. We have all kinds of ammunition - blue ones, green ones, red ones and black ones - and couldn't get our rainbow together. We didn't play together all year."
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6/22/2006 12:31 AM