Last week's expose in Sports Illustrated outed James Dolan as a hypersensitive control freak who lords over the New York Knicks like a kindergartener who doesn't like to share his legos. He runs an organization that bears more resemblance to a regime about to be overthrown in a banana republic than it does a professional basketball team. As Howard Beck reiterates in today's Times, Dolan's team goes so far as having someone from the team write down everything Isiah Thomas says at one of his media coffee klatches.
In general, Knicks players and coaches are ordered not to make negative comments about one another, or the organization. They are strongly discouraged from even granting interviews without a public-relations person present.
Whenever the coach and team president Isiah Thomas speaks, a staff member is perched nearby, typing his comments into a mobile device — with the comments to be sent later to officials at Madison Square Garden.
There's no word on just who is the minister of protocol for Commandante Dolan but whoever is filling that role could be part of the reason that Phil Jackson was coaching the opposition yesterday. Beck's article discusses how Jackson's penchant for honesty stands in stark contrast to the Knicks insane need to spin every message to the positive, no matter how unrealistic that viewpoint may be. For example,
After the Knicks were routed by Charlotte last month — they allowed the Bobcats to score 126 points and shoot 59.3 percent from the field — Thomas refused to acknowledge any defensive flaws on the Knicks’ part.
"They were hot," Thomas said of the Bobcats. “They did everything right.”
Jackson, on the other hand, finds no reason to spare his players feelings nor any reason to ignore the truth.
After Kwame Brown had three turnovers down the stretch of a triple-overtime loss to Charlotte, Jackson said, "We’re going to feed him Butterfingers on the flight home just so he can feel the effects of it."
In addressing the struggles of Radmanovic, who signed a $30.2 million deal with the Lakers last summer, Jackson said: "He’s a space cadet. He could be on Mars. I know it’s not on Venus, but he could be on Mars."
Jackson spoke about his interviews with the Knicks before he returned to the Laker fold and said that he had heard nothing about such a strict belief in misdirection. He did mention that someone told him the team liked for all the members of the coaching staff to dress alike, at practice and at games, and when he said he liked to wear jeans while most of his staff wore warmups he was told that everyone would wear jeans. Jackson's response?
"I kind of like individuality at some level."
Not that the life under Dolan's thumb was the sole factor in Jackson's choice. He is banging Jeannie Buss, daughter of Laker owner Jerry Buss, of course. It's hard to ignore the differences between the two organizations, though. Jackson regularly questions Kobe Bryant, a true star player, while Thomas wastes energy hyping Eddy Curry to the heavens. His latest scheme is getting Curry named an alternate to this summer's Olympic qualifying team, an honor he can put right next to his honorable mention in the fourth grade spelling bee.
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