H1AND1 wrote:Of course he says this now because he wants to re-write history to change he perception that his tenure was an utter failure (which it was). Saying "hey look at all these great players I acquired/if only I'd had the chance to develop the core as I had envisioned" yadda yadda yadda makes it seem like outside forces were more at fault for his failure.

The reality is, Isiah's tenure was an unmitigated disaster and hindsight is most assuredly 20/20. What he sees as a great core that only he saw the potential in I see a GM who squandered the talent he had and made a series of moves that turned out to be horrendous. Not to mention that whole multimillion dollar sexual harassment embarrassment.

Isiah is a vain guy. It most assuredly drives him nuts that it's a stone cold fact that his Knicks tenure was the basketball management equivalent of a near decade long night terror. Him pointing out a couple
guys he knew were talented does nothing but lay down a bogus excuse meant to muddy the facts in a flaccid attempt to absolve himself.

I'm sure Dolan nods along whenever Isiah talks this bowlsheet. If there is one guy on Earth who buys it is Jimmy. That should tell ya something.

I couldn't have said it better. :)

Of course the Curry trade was by for the worse move he has made, costing us both Noah and LaMarcus Aldridge
In my opinion, our development staff and medical is one of the worse in the entire NBA
Isiah does have an eye for talent, he can be a scout but NOTHING more, especially in making basketball decisions
Sometimes they pay out, sometimes they do not, look at Renaldo Balkman, do not remember if he picked Channing Frye *who also turned out to be a decent stretch 4/5* over Bynum

A lot of what ifs but I think this possible team would have been much better than the team assembled today
However, our development staff just sucks, and not many players can take the pressure of playing in MSG
Look at how Ariza, Channing Frye, even Jordan Hill, Crawford, Nate Robinson have all gotten better AFTER they left the Knicks

Starting Lineup
=========================

Holiday (a deep PG draft that we used to draft Jordan Hill, could have been Holiday, Jeff Teague, Ty Lawson, Brandon Jennings, possibly trading down to get 2 players like a Taj Gibson and one of the PG's, at least Darren Collison)

Ariza, Iman Shumpert?? (not sure we would still draft Iman but he would be playing PG/SG and not SF and at times defending PF's on switches) Wilson Chandler/ or JR Smith

Gallo or Wilson Chandler

ZBO

Center?? Channing Frye or MozGov, Lee/ZBo at the 4/5

Now without Eddy Curry and both Noah and LaMarCus Aldridge at the 4/5, that is definitely a contending team for many years, also multiply our chances of adding Lebron in 2010 to that roster

Bench players
=====================
Nate Robinson
Crawford
Gallo/Wilson Chandler one of em to the bench or go small with ZBo or Channing Frye at C
Lee (could probably also play some point forward and some SF as well)
Matt Barnes??
JR Smith???
Eddy Curry *if we were able to get rid of him with a trade in 2010, even for a 2nd tier Star like Iggy, possibly even letting him expire and then signing a STAR or 2 solid players

TD, Jerome Jordan, Laundry Fields, Rautins replacements?

All the possible MLE and Bi Annual Exemptions we could have used (we used the Bi Annual Exemption to get JR Smith
vet min players
2nd round picks
undrafted talents
all the picks that we have traded starting with the Jared Jeffries trade to POSSIBLY get *2 ALL STAR's*, to the CA trade, and all the picks we have traded we acquired CA
With the right coach and these players, especially with Holiday, Ariza, Matt Barnes, ZBo, and Wilson Chandler/Gallo I think we could have attracted Lebron to reconsider

I don't know what went wrong while he was in NY...I remember reading that he wanted to create an East Coast version of the MDA/Nash Phenix Suns. I believe that's what he was trying to do and then Dolan got involved and the term Starphuck was born. Thomas became a "yes" man and thats probably way Dolan loves him so much.

Thats what I believe happened...

mreinman wrote:

TheGame wrote:

DrAlphaeus wrote:Hmm:

Zeke gets here Dec. 2003. Ariza picked up in 2004 draft. Jamal gets here in a trade from Chicago in Aug. 2004 for Mutumbo et al. Frye, Lee & Nate picked up in 2005 draft. Good start.

Eddy Curry and his heart defect gets here Oct. 2005 using picks that became Joakim Noah and LaMarcus Aldridge.

Anucha Browne Sanders is fired in January 2006.

Ariza was traded with Penny for Stevie Franchise in Feb. 2006.

Knicks finished 2005-06 second to last in the league with the league's highest payroll.

But then Stevie & Frye was traded for Zach in June 2007.

Isiah & MSG are found liable for sexual harassment in Oct. 2007.

Donnie Walsh is brought in April 2008 and Isiah looms in the shadows until… who knows when exactly.

Postscript: Zach and Jamal both traded Nov. 2008, with that date still a UK forum record.

So what I think is Isiah wants to be remembered as a savvy scout of talent, but wants us to forget about his massive failure Eddy Curry and his otherwise reprehensible behavior.

The Curry trade is what killed the team. If we never got Curry, this team would have been so much better. Noah, Aldridge, Lee, Frye, Crawford, and Nate would have been a solid team and we would have had our draft picks to continue adding talent. This is why it is time to take our time and build a team right.

Regarding Zeke, it was time for him to go, but I thought he did a slight above-average job of identifying talent. If we had left the team alone when we had Randolph and Crawford instead of chasing after LeBron, we would be in the playoffs right now. In fact, I think our team would be the second best team in the East right behind Miami. This is why the team needs to really take its time and build the team right and then have patience.

Who says the knicks would have drafted Noah? I say that chances are that we would not have

Noah was the second center taken. We needed a center. We would have taken either Noah or Spencer Hawes.

y2zipper wrote:Isiah's tenure didn't work basically out because he didn't luck into the superstar he needed to make the Knicks a good team.

He was good at finding players that make good cogs in the machine, but struck out big-time whenever he took chances on players that he thought could be real difference-makers. Brought in David Lee, but no Steph Curry, Crawford but no CP3 or Blake, Ariza but no John Wall, etc...

Walsh came in and saw that the team wasn't going anywhere long-term, so he gutted it to try and get LeBron. Then he missed when New York signed Amar'e.

Walsh made the pick in the year Steph Curry was drafted. Curry went one pick before the Knicks and Walsh took Jordan hill.

Isiah also drafted Lee in the low to mid 20's. That was more of a keen pick than an attempt to bring in a number 1 or 2 option PF. Lee becoming a 20/10 player was surprising to most of the "experts". He was not very coveted coming out of college.

arkrud wrote:Adolf Hitler was also a nice guy back then. He was trying to do arts but became a bloodiest dictator ever.
He was drafting good Nazis..

Huh?

Is this in the right thread? Was Hitler ever a "nice guy"? Did you read mein kampf?

arkrud wrote:Adolf Hitler was also a nice guy back then. He was trying to do arts but became a bloodiest dictator ever.
He was drafting good Nazis..

So let's clarify here: Isiah Thomas, an African American, is like Hitler/a Nazi because of a sexual harrassment suit but Donald Sterling, a Jew (like yourself), deserves a pass on his comments despite calling an entire group of people "the enemy" because of the color of their skin. Sterling went further by stating that not only are Black people treated like "dogs" in Isreal but that they SHOULD be dealt with in that manner...and this is benign but Isiah Thomas is the Nazi. People like you are exactly what is wrong with the world.