Please, Stern, give Isiah the axe
Posted: Friday, March 14, 2008 12:28 PM
Let’s hope it’s true, as Mark J. Miller reports in today’s edition of “Scuttlebutt,” that David Stern could order Knicks owner James Dolan to fire the heroically incompetent Isiah Thomas as coach and president of the franchise.
It’s something that should have been done long ago, something I’ve argued for before. Just look at the standings: The Knicks, in Year IV of Thomas’ Reign of Error, have already won 18 games, and they still have 15 to play. Why, at this rate, they could win as many as 23 for the season – 25 if they put a winning streak together. If they get 23, they would equal Larry Brown’s total in 2005-2006. That got Brown fired by Thomas for a performance unbecoming a Hall of Fame coach.
Thomas took over and boosted that victory total by 10 last year, piling up 33 wins against just 49 losses. That was the same record Lennie Wilkens and Herb Williams both got fired for the year before. But this year, despite Thomas’ uncanny eye for talent and shrewd trades, the team has slipped.
Call it bad luck. Or take a page from the Isiah Thomas/George Bush playbook and call it a sign of progress. You know, the economy’s looking real good, the dollar’s stronger than Booker’s Bourbon, and the Knicks are this close to going to the NBA Finals.
I know that Dolan’s a cable mogul who’s worth a bazillion dollars, which clearly makes him a man of superior discernment. But when it comes to running sports teams, he’s not the freshest clam in the chowder.
Whatever Thomas tells Dolan, the owner believes, whether it’s that he never messed with that woman, no matter what the jury said, or that there’s light at the other end of the tunnel and it’s not an onrushing locomotive.
It’s four years and it ain’t working. Never did and never will. And it’s not as if this is an obscure franchise in a Podunk town, where it doesn’t matter to the league if it soars or crashes. These are the New York Freakin’ Knicks, one of the league’s flagship franchises. If Phil Jackson and the Lakers can turn it around in one year, why can’t Thomas? Okay, he doesn’t have Kobe Bryant. But nobody’s asking him to lead the division. All they want is improvement. And there’s been none.
The Knicks aren’t just a blight on the New York sports calendar, they’re an embarrassment to the entire league and to Stern himself.
Since Dolan won’t do the right thing, Stern has to. He’s the commissioner, and he’s already shown he can tell players how to dress and referees to accept deep background checks. What’s he waiting for?
In 1979, Pete Rozelle, then the commissioner of the National Football League, called in Giants’ owner Wellington Mara and told him that the team had been lousy long enough. Rozelle told Mara to get a professional G.M. in and even gave him a man to interview for the job. Mara took the advice, hired George Young, and collected two Super Bowl Trophies during Young’s reign.
And if he’s going to do it, Stern should have that heart-to-heart with Dolan now, lest the Knicks somehow do the impossible – like win three in a row – and the world’s most gullible owner takes that as a sign of great things to come.
Tell Dolan to dump his president and coach, and give him suggestions as to who to hire to replace Thomas. The Knicks will thank him, New York will thank him, and basketball fans everywhere will thank him.
