<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">The only person at Madison Square Garden who didn't want to find out how many points Kobe Bryant might score against the Knicks last night, when 50 was still in play, before 40 finally became the number, was the coach of the other team. The other team at the Garden last night was the Knicks. The coach is Larry Brown. Maybe he is starting to wonder how many technical fouls he needs to get himself thrown out of what is fast becoming not just the most disappointing season in the history of the Knicks, but the most embarrassing. In their own building last night, the Knicks were as much of a joke team as the Washington Generals. This season that we are watching is embarrassing to all of them now, as the Garden becomes more a second-rate venue by the night. It is embarrassing to James Dolan, nothing more than an overmatched, second-rate caretaker of the place, all this time into his reign as the big boss. It is embarrassing to Isiah Thomas, whose record with the Knicks is now 76-104. And it is embarrassing to this coach, who got himself thrown out last night, seemed to throw in the towel the way his team did against Kobe and the Lakers. "The Lakers came out and played much harder than we did," said Herb Williams, who finished up for Brown, like a mop-up relief pitcher in a blowout baseball game. Brown said nothing. He met with his assistant coaches for an hour after the game and then went home. It does not matter who the Knicks play now, or where they play. They were behind the Hawks by 30 points in Atlanta, in the fourth quarter Monday night. When an 18-year-old kid from Jersey named Andrew Bynum walked past all the Knicks big guys, an ice cream truck full of soft players, to dunk a ball with 9:21 left, the Lakers were ahead of the Knicks 104-74 on their way to 130-97. So this is what it has come to, halfway through a season during which the Knicks were supposed to turn a corner and have become a dead end instead. Dead end and dead arena. The world's most famous arena? It was famous last night because Kobe is famous. John Black, the Lakers' longtime P.R. man, was asked before the game what it has been like on the road since Bryant went for 81 against the Raptors and Black smiled. "We've only had two games since then," he said. "We're only now starting to find out." But the fact of things was this: The night wasn't special because it was at the Garden, or in New York, because this was Bryant's one appearance in the big city this season. There is nothing special now about the Garden, about the Knicks. It takes the other team, the other team's star attraction, to make the game worth watching. And you know what? Even Kobe couldn't save the night, since for most of it he was shooting free throws. He made seven baskets, total for the game. The rest of it was free throws. It wasn't exactly Michael Jordan's 55. If Isiah Thomas, who is in a world of trouble now, on and off the court, doesn't do something to improve this team before the trade deadline, why should anybody think that he will still have a job at the end of this season? Why should anybody think, after now watching the Knicks for half a season, that this current youth movement is anything more than the plan that will get Thomas to his next plan? Maybe he really will get as much time - and money - as Glen Sather did with the Rangers. Maybe Dolan thinks the Rangers finally turning things around is some sort of validation of his patience with Sather. If he does, he is a bigger fool about sports than anyone could have imagined. Think about it this way: If Dolan is a free agent owner today, is there a sports fan anywhere who wants him to come buy his team? If Isiah is a free agent, tell me which owner would let him come run his basketball operation off the job Thomas has done with the Knicks. Phil Jackson is making the same kind of money in Los Angeles that Brown is making in New York, and may never get to that 10th NBA championship that would move him past the great Red Auerbach. Jackson still has Kobe, and Lamar Odom. You see what we have, plain as day. </div> Source
