Marbury's Olympic experience was humbling, he saw what team basketball is about...by playing first-hand against the Argentinians, Croats, Italians, etc. Run the offense, let the play get open shots and good looks at the hoop, team basketball wins. Larry Brown furthered this in practice with his disciplined approach.

A quote in today's post was really refreshing to see.. the team's best player, becoming it's leader, and calling for more discipline in the offense to get better shots. And Working on both ends of the floor.

"We weren't going all the way through our plays. I don't understand it, how you can break a play when you're scoring when you do run a play? We don't play to our third and fourth option."

"The best way to get out of a slump is to continue to play hard on both ends of the court. When you're out there playing hard and playing to exhaustion, it makes you get focused. Defense creates your offense."

The losses are hard. But I'd rather us go through this now.. to come together as a team. We have the talent to succeed.. is it ideal? No, but better than the pile of crap Layden left us with. Here's to hoping a true leader is born.

one problem. Last night was the first night I saw him come out and assert himself on D early in the game. Right now he's seems more like a player bitching about losing. Winning talks. Go out and abuse Ward and win us a game against Hou so we go home at least 3-5. Thats not to bad considering the next 8 games or so are pretty weak. Get us to 9-6 after the first 15 and I will call him a leader.

Posted by fishmike:

one problem. Last night was the first night I saw him come out and assert himself on D early in the game. Right now he's seems more like a player bitching about losing. Winning talks. Go out and abuse Ward and win us a game against Hou so we go home at least 3-5. Thats not to bad considering the next 8 games or so are pretty weak. Get us to 9-6 after the first 15 and I will call him a leader.

I must have seen a different game. It looked like Tony was doing what he wanted against Marb, and in a different way than plain quickness allows (quickness of Tony or AI I would excuse). I saw at least 2 backdoor plays that Parker scored easily on.

I would to see more D from Marbury.

It amazes me when ever Marbury speak people on the board or the media chalk it up as leadership. Man last game he got out played by Parker he was able to get into the lane very easily. It got so easy for him he stopped shooting from outside and took it to the rim almost anytime he wanted. If Marbury wants to be a leader then he needs to start mixing his game up because last game he was all to predictable.

Listen, I love Marbury and I agree he is maturing but he needs to take a look in the mirror before we say he is a true leader. If he is going to talk about D then he needs to give a consistent effort on D. Yes Parker is a good player, but last night was ridiculous. He got into the paint everytime he touched the ball. Plus I just watched the game again on Tivo. Two back door passes had nothing to do with double teaming. On one the foreign guy cut through the lane, Marbury followed him, jogging the whole way and never looked at the ball. Duncan simply tossed it right by his ear. If he had played defense like they teach you in rec league that pass never would have been attempted. The second one was Ginobli popping out on a screen and then performing a basic fundamental V-cut to the basket. Marbury skipped his way through it and it resulted in a lay-up. He needs to back up what he says.

"The best way to get out of a slump is to continue to play hard on both ends of the court. When you're out there playing hard and playing to exhaustion, it makes you get focused. Defense creates your offense."

it's not leadership when all you're doing is blowing hot air & not backing up your own words w/actions

Marbury's defense has been awful in every game so far, and I mean every game as a Knick. I never realized how bad he was on defense before he got here. Unless he starts trying on the D he can't talk and can't be a true leader.

As far as winning, the only game I regreat so far this year is the Boston game. 2-6 is what we are going to be, JVG will prolly pick Lenny apart once again.

We'll prolly get back to .500 during our easy strech.