http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/sports/basketball/16271847.htm?source=rss&channel=charlotte_basketball

If Mardy Collins had it all to do over again, he wouldn't change a thing.

He would still have taken down Denver's J.R. Smith with a hard foul. He would still have done anything to prevent another dunk against his floundering Knicks.

The NBA slapped Collins with a six-game suspension on Monday for his role in igniting Saturday night's brawl with the Nuggets at the Garden. The melee began with his two-hand tackle of a streaking Smith late in the fourth quarter of the blowout loss.

"I don't regret fouling him as hard as I did, I just regret the whole thing escalated the way it did," Collins said at Monday morning's shootaround. "I was out there competing. I didn't want the guy to get a layup. I was trying to stop him from going in the air and that's why I fouled him that hard - so he wouldn't get hurt.

"My job is to play hard. I felt the score - we were down 20 (actually 19). I didn't want the guy to do a dunk. I could have easily made the guy go in the air and it would have been a worse foul. I just tried to keep the guy from going up."

You know... I know Stern is on a hair trigger lately and it may not be the best thing to broadcast to him but I really don't have a problem with what Mardy's saying here. I know this is music to the ears of those of us who miss the Ewing Knicks.

Said it before and I'll say it again, Mardy did nothing wrong here. It was a hard foul be we've all seen worse. Wasn't Mardy's fault Nate acted like a hot-head afterwards.

Nate in all likelyhood did not fully grab the jest of what Isiah wanted.


Rainman was sent to a special school because he almost drowned his litle brother and was a danger to those around him.

Nate could be the next Curley Neal for the Globetrotters.

he did not drag him to the ground. He fouled him hard. and let up right away.

Let's try not to be too careless with the adjectives.

Posted by babyKnicks:

he did not drag him to the ground. He fouled him hard. and let up right away.

Let's try not to be too careless with the adjectives.

Okay, who friggin cares. Fouled him hard from behind, dragged him down from behind. It doesn't matter. It was a dangerous play. If you play ball and that's ever been done to you, you know you would not accept it. You only accept it because Mardy is a Knick.

Posted by Bippity10:

Posted by babyKnicks:

he did not drag him to the ground. He fouled him hard. and let up right away.

Let's try not to be too careless with the adjectives.

Okay, who friggin cares. Fouled him hard from behind, dragged him down from behind. It doesn't matter. It was a dangerous play. If you play ball and that's ever been done to you, you know you would not accept it. You only accept it because Mardy is a Knick.

Thank you Bip. That's the same reason I don't condone the play starks did on Pippen awhile ago. It may be part of the thug image, but it's also the type of play that can end a guys career OR WORSE! It had the potential to be a lot more dangerous than it was and Mardy handled it all wrong.

That is why I am totally understanding of why and how Smith got up in his face and started screaming the crap at Mardy. Nate escalated it.

Posted by bigbeast:

Posted by Bippity10:

Posted by babyKnicks:

he did not drag him to the ground. He fouled him hard. and let up right away.

Let's try not to be too careless with the adjectives.

Okay, who friggin cares. Fouled him hard from behind, dragged him down from behind. It doesn't matter. It was a dangerous play. If you play ball and that's ever been done to you, you know you would not accept it. You only accept it because Mardy is a Knick.

It wasn't that dangerous, Bip, JR barely left the ground. Had he been in full flight, then I would agree with. Has nothing to do with Mardy being a knick. As a knick fan, you and I have seen far more dangerous fouls that disn't escalate the way it did on Saturday.

Agree, it wasn't a dangerous foul. As Collins said, it would have been dangerous had it happened in the air. Collins sort of stopped him from getting up and it was definitely hard but not any where's enough to hurt a person (barring a freak accident). No Lay ups.

I have no problem with the no lay-up rule. As a matter of fact I condone it. I have no problem with hard fouls. I have no problem with any of that. I'm not blasting Mardy I'm just calling it the way I see it. I even understand his frustration. But on a play like that you let him go. You don't drag a guy down from behind. And anyone that comes on this site and says that they would turn around and shake the guys hand for committing a "nice clean foul" if that happened to them is either a liar or has not played before.

So although I agree with most of you guys that the media blows this crap out of proportion. And I agree that Mardy isn't the devil. I have to call this the way I see it, and it was a dirty play out of frustration in a game in which we played no defense and used false tough guyness to prove some point that is not obvious to me.

Posted by TheGame:

Posted by Masterplan:

i think what collins at least should have said was it would have been *more* dangerous if it happened in the air.

bball's a dangerous game even within the rules. mardy knows he crossed the line. he got suspended. i don't want to see more of those fouls if it means we lose guys for extended periods of time. physical D, yes, breaking the rules and putting players in danger, not so much.

But Mardy would not have gotten suspended (well maybe one game because it was his second flagrant 2) if Nate had not escalated the situation. If you are going give hard fouls, your players have to be smart enough to just walk away if the guy gets up to complain about the foul. If Nate had not jumped in and escalated the situation, it would have more than likely all been over.

yes i agree the 6 games is because of the fight.

but he totally would ahve gotten suspended for that foul. two arms around the head from behind? definitely. people are calling for more fouls like that. if key rotation players get suspended even for just 1 or 2 games at a time it won't help our chemistry issues. or any team.

[Edited by - Masterplan on 12-20-2006 11:17 AM]

Posted by VDesai:

Well this guy did play for John Chaney. Probably wasnt the first time he was asked to do that.

I'm with you on that.

Posted by TMS:

Posted by Bippity10:

Posted by bigbeast:

Said it before and I'll say it again, Mardy did nothing wrong here. It was a hard foul be we've all seen worse. Wasn't Mardy's fault Nate acted like a hot-head afterwards.

I disagree. I have no problem with a hard foul. But dragging someone down from behind is pretty friggin dangerous. Nobody on this site would accept that if it was done to them.

i've seen John Starks, Chris Childs & Charlie Ward do that countless times during games (including the playoffs) & it never escalated into an all out brawl... i don't have a problem w/Mardy's foul... what he said was true, if Mardy had let him go up in the air & then fouled him hard, chances are he'd have been hurt in the process... it's not as if Mardy went to try & hit JR in the head... he came down hard on JR's shoulders to prevent him from going up... & if he'd have done that to me, i'm sure i would've reacted the same way JR did & i don't fault JR for that either, but that's all in the heat of competition... it's only when Nate got into it w/JR & then everyone started to act like punks instead of basketball players.

I agree with what you said to a point. I'm not blasting Mardy for that foul. It's not a world ender and should not have turned into a fight. And with two more mature teams it probably would not have. But what I am differing with is when people say this was a "good hard foul". It was dirty. You don't "pull", "drag", "push" guys from behind on breakaways. It's an unwritten rule. Once your feet are set going for a layup it is so dangerous to have someone grab you from behind like that. It's just understood that when a guy beats you, you let it go. Foul the next guy.

I think winning teams look at this stuff differently than losing teams. A winning team would be mad at each other for allowing yet another breakaway. A losing team gets mad at the other team.