“We’ll keep moving in this direction”
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- December
- 31
Has it been two weeks already?
Almost.
Isiah Thomas sidestepped a tough question two weeks ago, noting it would be fair to ask whether something needed to be done to address his status as head coach if the Knicks did not improve over the next couple of weeks. They are 1-4 since then.
So the question was alertly raised yesterday after practice.
“We’ll keep moving in this direction,” Thomas said.
And what direction is that?
“Me as the coach,” Thomas said.
I know a lot of us were thinking south right before the actual answer was offered.
Really, it’s not a surprise to find out that Knicks president Isiah Thomas has no intentions of dumping Knicks coach Isiah Thomas, but it’s a good way to check the man’s resolve.
He isn’t walking away from the sidelines and heading back upstairs to orchestrate the rebuilding from the front office.
Knicks owner James Dolan is going to have to fire Thomas, who’s failed to inspire. And with an 8-21 record, the players know there are not a lot of alternatives left.
Maybe a blockbuster trade?
It seems like something needs to happen. Nothing else has worked.
“We’ve tried everything. We’re trying to get wins,” Zach Randolph said. “He’s doing the best he can. It’s up and down. It’s frustrating, but he’s doing the best he can.”
Eddy Curry believes the status of Thomas is in the back of everyone’s mind.
“It’s not in the back of my mind,” Randolph said. “It really ain’t. I don’t know. It might be on some guys’ minds, but I just want to win and do the best we can do. We can’t give in. It’s too early.”
Jamal Crawford acknowledged the questions about the future of Thomas are unavoidable.
“When you hear it everywhere you go that’s difficult,” he said. “But me personally, seeing how he keeps us prepared, I know that it’s not him.”
On the injury front, Crawford believes he’ll be ready for Wednesday’s game against Sacramento. He did not scrimmage yesterday, but was shooting with a padded glove on a bruised right hand. Crawford swears he connected on 42 of 45 attempts.
Layups?
“No,” he said. “Mid-range. Just inside the arc.”
Curry was defending.
Bad joke. Sorry.
Stephon Marbury went the distance in practice. He still isn’t allowed to speak with the media. That might happen on Wendesday postgame. Thomas is letting Marbury decide whether to play or not, depending on his emotional state.
The conditioning is still a work in progress.
“He looked good,” Thomas said. “He got winded a couple of times. But the good thing about these kinds of athletes is they’re able to bounce back quickly.”
Curry was on the receiving end of a verbal shot from Thomas, who responded to the centerpiece saying there’s nothing he can do about the decision to bring him off the bench.
“If anything, I’ve shown I’m going to try to play the best people,” Thomas said. “The people who play the best, that’s who you want to play. Now to his credit, he did come in and have a good game yesterday. He had 12 points and eight rebounds. It shows me, while he may not like the bench, it definitely had an effect on his rebounding effort. If he continues to rebound, then the minutes are there.
“From that position, we need rebounding and some shot blocking. And if you can’t get the shot blocking, then you definitely need the rebounding. But you can’t get 16 points and two rebounds. That doesn’t work.”
No argument here.











The problem I have with this is, Isiah knew Curry is not a rebounder and shot blocker why is he trying to get made at Eddy now? Curry does not have block shots but he does need to improve his help defense.
Curry was 22 or 23 when Isiah traded for him, I think he was justified in thinking he would improve on his rebounding and defense. Curry hasn’t and now Isiah looks bad for not getting a decent return on his investment. Curry should be ashamed of himself for his lack of effort and his comments about not starting. Big men who don’t rebound, block shots or play tough defense are bench players. Ask Corliss Williamson and Andre Miller. Curry has 20 times more offensive ability than Charles Oakley but who was more productive????
“We’ll keep moving in this direction”
Isn’t that what the captain of the Titanic said?
“What icebergs?”
This is nice to hear but we needed to hear this in the off season.
its the players not thomas
though he needs to man up and make serious change
we dont need to see curry with 16 abd 2 thats true
but we also dont need to see rose in the game either why not play randolph morris this kid could be a stud but we’ll never know huh?
qbrick needs to be placed on ir let chandler play
he is automaticly 100 time better by defualt
Happy new year Mike,
Enough is enough Mike, get rid of the bum. Isiah has no clue what to do next. Lets start the new year fresh. Even the guys at MSG network are wondering when is there going to be a change, and the never say anything like that. He’s done, the guy has no answer when the reports ask him a question and he walks off with his head down.
Dolan give him his 24M and let him go. He is pathetic. Dolan is probably hoping he does something wrong so he doesn’t have to pay him the full amount, but Isiah isn’t that dum. Give him his money, no one told you to sign him to 4 more year after a 2 game winning streak. You idiot.
GO KNICKS!
As someone said this weekend, let him coach the team he built. He needs to be punished publicly for creating this mess.