gunsnewing wrote:

nyvector16 wrote:Layden was known for a lot more than the terrible Camby trade... He also gave huge money to Eisley and Shandon Anderson that hamstrung the organization for years. He is also the idiot behind the Patrick Ewing trade that got us stuck with Glen Rice.

The only reason Scott Layden even has a basketball job in the first place is nepotism. The guy should have absolutely nothing to do with Basketball but he keeps getting to run things only because of who his father was. He is a first rate loser and I will enjoy watching Minnesota's demise after they built up a good core...

Interim GM Ed Tapscott not Layden

This is what happens. Blame becomes nameless. GM's become the face of the franchise while owners get a pass.
Owners sets the directive. Dolan outed Checketts and this is the era post Earnie Grunfeld who wanted JVG out because he wanted to move on past Ewing and Run with Camby. Ewing had successfully run out Don Nelson three seasons before who didn't last as season and when JVG coached the knicks to a 8th seed in the strike shortened 1999 season he was on the hot seat. The improbable run to the finals got JVG his extension and further loyalty to ewing who he owed his job to. Grunfeld got fired and Ewing went into big regression with a huge contract. This was the back drop of the era where H20 was already in place, his awful contract and Dolan running the team with no vision or thought to style of play.

Laydens biggest mistake was taking the job. When your forced to make a deal, you have no leverage. Layden was given directives. DOn't forget either that Camby post 1999 was fragile in many ways and his career took off again AFTER he left the knicks. One has to remember Camby's value at the time of the trade. Antonio MCdyess was a superstar player and the thought was to have him, Vin Baker and Mutumbo all upfront. These guys at that time where pretty darn good. It was a long shot. This is Dolan also TELLING his GM to get big name stars to his Garden. At the moment of the trade Dice leg was healed and it was his other knee that blew out. He was playing amazing and as a star he wanted to keep playing. Of course he should have been held back, but who knows if it don't blow out the next day, or week. WE don't know.

Im not justifying any of his moves but you have consider the moment and timing of all the moves, not just pile them on as one big piece of crap. As we find out even Layden gets credit for Ed Tapscott blunder by some fans.

I blame the Era, not Layden. This permiated with Isiah, Larry, Walsh, MDA, Gruwald and Woodson........ Dolan kept at it until Phil arrived and now we are drafting players, developing them, have a plan and we blew it up. Never happened or was allowed to happen. Celebrate Phils cred that Dolan finally delegated to.

We have a plan. Praise the lord.

gunsnewing wrote:

nyvector16 wrote:Layden was known for a lot more than the terrible Camby trade... He also gave huge money to Eisley and Shandon Anderson that hamstrung the organization for years. He is also the idiot behind the Patrick Ewing trade that got us stuck with Glen Rice.

The only reason Scott Layden even has a basketball job in the first place is nepotism. The guy should have absolutely nothing to do with Basketball but he keeps getting to run things only because of who his father was. He is a first rate loser and I will enjoy watching Minnesota's demise after they built up a good core...

Interim GM Ed Tapscott not Layden

The only thing Tapscott did was the Artest draft screw up.

Layden was hired and brought in and made the Ewing trade.

Though I really think that was Dolan driving it. Dolan certainly drove Camby and Sprewell out of town because they skipped Knicks bowl and he thought they were bad for the family friendly losing environment Dolan was trying to build.

Nothing more family friendly than getting in the truck with Marbs and Isiah!

But I think it is silly to blame the GMs and coaches early in the Dolan years - he was very hands on in those years.

I didn't love Layden at all, he responded to Dolan's pressure horribly. But I doubt he had much latitude to do what he actually wanted to do here.

EnySpree wrote:Wow... I cant believe guys are giving Layden such a pass. Ed Tapscott and Dolan are to blame? Oh blame the era? I can't believe it.

Yeah, its about time fans wake up and understand the past instead of being emotional about it. Frank Layden was a big fat friendly happy former broadcaster guy who raised a really smart motivated kid who worked hard and made some great decisions in Utah as part of process that created a great franchise at the time. Dave Checketts a very respected man wanted him to be the basketball guy at MSG, and why not send your kid east for fame and fortune. Scott also had two kids with very rare diseases all the while and worked his ass off being a great father and a tireless worker. Sorry, the ignorance of "I hate him" just grates me! Why not "I Hate the decisions that were made"? We all know Dolan had some strong starphuch ideas and was awful. Layden has done nothing but work his way back to a great job by being assistant coach and as assistant GM by perhaps the best run organization. Think Pop goes off on him for the moves made 15 years ago? Again, you have to look at everything in place at the moment you make the trade to be fair. Now, we don't have to be fair, but we don't have to be ignorant either.

Lets discuss Ron Artest here for a moment, the knicks roster, and the draft. Knicks had a big need at center. Artest was a headcase and NOT bringing him to NY I think was good idea.

The Draft: http://www.basketball-reference.com/draft/NBA_1999.html

I don't have a problem with not drafting Artest (based on the moment), but obviously Weis was a god awful pick and Tapscott did not do his homework. He could have least drafted an NBA player!!!!
Tapscott doe not get a pass.

This is your team going into the 1999-2000 season: http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/NYK/2000.html

With Larry Johnson and Spree in place, where does Artest play? This was the 15th pick and in HINDSIGHT Artest was a surprise performer at that pick. What was the thought on John Wallace at that time? Where would Artest gotten the minutes? If buried on the bench, does artest even get a chance?

Why Weiss? Aging Ewing wants out and Tapscott thinks Weis might be a good stash or developing euro center on an uptempo roster to either play along side, or back up Camby. Obviously this was an awful evalution but this was the thinking. Good thought, awful execution. After artest, the proper pick would have been Jeff Forster, but thats in hindsight. At least he was an NBA player!!! He was a stiff, but serviceable.

So when you go back in time it gives you a better understanding to what was going on with the team, the needs, and what was available in the draft. Based on talent alone, Artest should have gone some where in the top 10 and with the benefit of hindsight a few teams would like a do-over.

Nobody wiffed more than the knicks that year. Oh, Manu Ginobli was picked at number 57 in the second round. Manu didn't come to the NBA for 3 more seasons after the draft. Patience, good scouting and increasing your statistical probability for opportunity is how you create good luck. Knicks just came from a visit from the finals in 1999. So did the Spurs. One thinks short term and another didn't.

I blame the Era of decision making that lead to those results. Different faces but similar short term thinking.

Bonn1997 wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:lol the fact that layden can get another job is pretty crazy. minnesota can't help themselves but always find a way to screw something good up.

He was a really bad GM, but being part of the Spurs organization is a get out of jail free card. Just going through the motions there and being a "yes man" in that organization was bound to get him a new opportunity at some point. If he's an assistant GM for any other team (maybe with exception to golden state) he never gets interviewed for a GM job again.

Other than the Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley contracts, I think a lot of what Layden gets blamed for in NY were actually Dolan's call. Camby trade. Ewing trade. Sprewell trade. All Dolan.

Yeah, I'd go so far as to say I don't think you can really judge any of the GMs/Presidents under Dolan. It's not an environment where anyone can thrive. If Phil has full authority, then the comment applies only to the ones before him, though.

if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.

foosballnick wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:lol the fact that layden can get another job is pretty crazy. minnesota can't help themselves but always find a way to screw something good up.

He was a really bad GM, but being part of the Spurs organization is a get out of jail free card. Just going through the motions there and being a "yes man" in that organization was bound to get him a new opportunity at some point. If he's an assistant GM for any other team (maybe with exception to golden state) he never gets interviewed for a GM job again.

Other than the Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley contracts, I think a lot of what Layden gets blamed for in NY were actually Dolan's call. Camby trade. Ewing trade. Sprewell trade. All Dolan.

Yeah, I'd go so far as to say I don't think you can really judge any of the GMs/Presidents under Dolan. It's not an environment where anyone can thrive. If Phil has full authority, then the comment applies only to the ones before him, though.

if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.

Bonn1997 wrote:

foosballnick wrote:
if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.
But he gave Melo a bigger contract than any of those four players have.
Regarding your comments about W-L, I realize that's what some here are saying now. But when the team he inherited was playing close to .500, I do not remember anyone saying we're probably going to be a .300 team for the next few years now that Phil is here. Also, even if you think Tyson was overrated, Phil actually added 2 years and $14 mil to our payroll just to have the privilege of putting Calderon in our backcourt.

You seem to have taken a myopic view of the previous situation (not sure if that is intentional or not).

Phil inherited a 36 Win Team that had reached it's peak the previous year and was down-trending with older guys, ineffective younger guys, no cap space and near term expiring contracts. Not sure what you felt would happen to that roster going forward, but a fairly educated guess is that it would have continued to trend downward. By comparison, this year's team won 32 Games (a 4 Game win differential) with (IMO) significantly less talent and is on an upward trend.

Regarding Tyson/Calderon - the impact of Calderon's contract on cap space needs to be offset by Felton's salary. I agree that Calderon turned out to be a bad acquisition for his salary. I also believe that most GMs makes mistakes.

Regarding Melo - Melo leveraged his FA status to achieve that contract. The Knicks could have let Melo go and essentially have been the Sixers - only without all the draft picks. Melo's contract signing 2 years ago will have no bearing on the contracts that will be signed by Top Tier players going forward. Guys like Conley will surpass Melo starting this year ...the Max is now at $29 Million.

martin wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

foosballnick wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:lol the fact that layden can get another job is pretty crazy. minnesota can't help themselves but always find a way to screw something good up.

He was a really bad GM, but being part of the Spurs organization is a get out of jail free card. Just going through the motions there and being a "yes man" in that organization was bound to get him a new opportunity at some point. If he's an assistant GM for any other team (maybe with exception to golden state) he never gets interviewed for a GM job again.

Other than the Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley contracts, I think a lot of what Layden gets blamed for in NY were actually Dolan's call. Camby trade. Ewing trade. Sprewell trade. All Dolan.

Yeah, I'd go so far as to say I don't think you can really judge any of the GMs/Presidents under Dolan. It's not an environment where anyone can thrive. If Phil has full authority, then the comment applies only to the ones before him, though.

if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.

But he gave Melo a bigger contract than any of those four players have.
Regarding your comments about W-L, I realize that's what some here are saying now. But when the team he inherited was playing close to .500, I do not remember anyone saying we're probably going to be a .300 team for the next few years now that Phil is here. Also, even if you think Tyson was overrated, Phil actually added 2 years and $14 mil to our payroll just to have the privilege of putting Calderon in our backcourt.

maybe I'm not following the context, but are you saying that Phil inherited a .500 team? I don't think that's the case. He inherited a team that only won a few more games (37) than the team did this past year, a team that was capped out for another year and was looking down the barrel of 1 first round pick over 3 years.

fishmike wrote:

martin wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

foosballnick wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:lol the fact that layden can get another job is pretty crazy. minnesota can't help themselves but always find a way to screw something good up.

He was a really bad GM, but being part of the Spurs organization is a get out of jail free card. Just going through the motions there and being a "yes man" in that organization was bound to get him a new opportunity at some point. If he's an assistant GM for any other team (maybe with exception to golden state) he never gets interviewed for a GM job again.

Other than the Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley contracts, I think a lot of what Layden gets blamed for in NY were actually Dolan's call. Camby trade. Ewing trade. Sprewell trade. All Dolan.

Yeah, I'd go so far as to say I don't think you can really judge any of the GMs/Presidents under Dolan. It's not an environment where anyone can thrive. If Phil has full authority, then the comment applies only to the ones before him, though.

if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.

But he gave Melo a bigger contract than any of those four players have.
Regarding your comments about W-L, I realize that's what some here are saying now. But when the team he inherited was playing close to .500, I do not remember anyone saying we're probably going to be a .300 team for the next few years now that Phil is here. Also, even if you think Tyson was overrated, Phil actually added 2 years and $14 mil to our payroll just to have the privilege of putting Calderon in our backcourt.

maybe I'm not following the context, but are you saying that Phil inherited a .500 team? I don't think that's the case. He inherited a team that only won a few more games (37) than the team did this past year, a team that was capped out for another year and was looking down the barrel of 1 first round pick over 3 years.

they are on a roll... your attempt at logic cant stop that train

martin wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

fishmike wrote:

martin wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

foosballnick wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

crzymdups wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:lol the fact that layden can get another job is pretty crazy. minnesota can't help themselves but always find a way to screw something good up.

He was a really bad GM, but being part of the Spurs organization is a get out of jail free card. Just going through the motions there and being a "yes man" in that organization was bound to get him a new opportunity at some point. If he's an assistant GM for any other team (maybe with exception to golden state) he never gets interviewed for a GM job again.

Other than the Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley contracts, I think a lot of what Layden gets blamed for in NY were actually Dolan's call. Camby trade. Ewing trade. Sprewell trade. All Dolan.

Yeah, I'd go so far as to say I don't think you can really judge any of the GMs/Presidents under Dolan. It's not an environment where anyone can thrive. If Phil has full authority, then the comment applies only to the ones before him, though.

if Phil had full authority Melo wouldn't be here for 5yrs $124,000,000 MILLION DOLLARS

Or maybe you're overrating his GM skills. When Phil signed here, I would have predicted
-He'd never go 49-115 in his first 2 full seasons
-He'd never trade Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon
-He'd never give 8 mil per year to Aaron Afflalo
-He'd never get turned down by all top tier FAs when we had huge cap space
-And much more that I'm not even going to list.

I would have predicted....

- The 2013-14 Knicks roster was old, capped out and at a transition needed a rebuild and were in for a tough road, bad couple of years regardless of the President/GM/Coach
- Tyson Chandler was old, injury prone and becoming a malcontent and he was overvalued by Knicks fans on the trade market.
- Aaron Afflalo would be mediocre at best but with a stop-gap type contract would only be a Knick for 1-2 years with no long term Cap impact
- The Knicks would not sign a Top Tier FA given their roster last year and that there were really not an abundance available and further that they only had enough cap space to sign one Max player.

Bottom line is that the chances of an overnight Turn-Around in the NBA are very slim. Knicks need to continue to build/improve their roster without tying up long term cap space and ignore fans/media who keep looking backwards to point out failures or who expect immediate significant results in terms of W/L. This means not trading First Rounders and tying up long term Max contract cap space on guys who are not LBJ, Curry, Durant, Westbrook etc.

But he gave Melo a bigger contract than any of those four players have.
Regarding your comments about W-L, I realize that's what some here are saying now. But when the team he inherited was playing close to .500, I do not remember anyone saying we're probably going to be a .300 team for the next few years now that Phil is here. Also, even if you think Tyson was overrated, Phil actually added 2 years and $14 mil to our payroll just to have the privilege of putting Calderon in our backcourt.

maybe I'm not following the context, but are you saying that Phil inherited a .500 team? I don't think that's the case. He inherited a team that only won a few more games (37) than the team did this past year, a team that was capped out for another year and was looking down the barrel of 1 first round pick over 3 years.

they are on a roll... your attempt at logic cant stop that train

No, he's actually just arguing about whether .451 should be considered close to .500. There isn't an objective cut off for "close." So there's nothing to even discuss. I've clarified that I was considering .451 close to .500. If you don't consider it close, then it's just opinion. It would be like arguing over whether green is a nice color.

across the whole of the 2013-14 season, the Knicks were very consistently 10-15 games under .500; for me, they were also closer to a .400 team in actual play. The team finished the season a very well, winning 15 of their last 20 games or something crazy like that. That's not a .500 team or even close.