I HATE to be the one to pour cold water on all the warm feelings being generated now that it appears the Knicks will indeed qualify for the NBA playoffs. A win over the disappointing Celtics last night at the Garden would have clinched at least the eighth and final spot in the EasternConference. And if the Knicks managed to lose last night, a loss by the Hornets today against the Sixers or a Knicks win over the Heat tomorrow night in the regular-season finale would get them in.
While that would fulfill the mandate of “make the playoffs or else” given by Garden president Dave Checketts when he reassigned GM Ernie Grunfeld, it by no means makes this headache of a season any kind of success. Far from it.
Nobody should be off the hook just because the Knicks needed to exhaust every ounce of energy to barely make it into the final: not the players, not coach Jeff Van Gundy, not even Checketts, who will at least breathe easy when it’s certain that the Garden will have some kind of post-season payday awaiting.
When the season began, even with all the personnel changes, the lack of training camp and the shortened schedule, the Knicks were talking about winning a championship in this first year of Michael Jordan’s second retirement.
Meeting the Pacers or the Heat in the Eastern Conference finals was the objective. Playing either in the first round as the eighth seed wasn’t. From the bosses at Cablevision to the guy holding a cup outside Penn Station, everyone expected more out of these Knicks than the 25-23 record they entered with last night. To settle for less now would be an injustice to their $68 million payroll.
The Sixers, who are in the playoffs for the first time in eight years, can be happy with their year. So can the playoff-bound Hawks, Magic, Pistons and Bucks. They all had seasons close to – if not beyond – expectations. Even the Hornets, who won’t make it in if the Knicks do, can leave with some measure of satisfaction, having won 12 of their last 15 games, just to get into contention. But the Knicks? Please.
Making the playoffs is just the first step in salvaging these last three-plus months of chaos where Van Gundy admitted yesterday, “I haven’t always been proud of the way we’ve played this year.”
Checketts, whose hatchet is poised for off-season moves, has hinted he expects more than just a cameo in the playoffs.
“Frankly, it’s very possible this team could come together and get fully healthy, play very hard and make some noise in the playoffs,” he said last week. “There’s a lot left to do.”
That might be wishful thinking on his part or maybe he is raising the bar just in case anyone thinks Van Gundy or his players are safe by merely extending their season by a week.
You might be able to cut the Knicks some slack for backing in if it weren’t for the fact that many of their problems this year have been of their own doing. We’ve heard the words “division” and “distractions” more over the last month than we have “teamwork” and “focus.”
There have been so many different agendas on the Knicks this year, it’s actually amazing they haven’t self-destructed into the lottery. From the Charles Oakley trade, to Van Gundy’s unwillingness to play Marcus Camby early in the year, to both coach and player harboring on Latrell Sprewell’s role as the sixth man, to Charlie Ward’s stance that women shouldn’t be allowed in the locker room, to Patrick Ewing’s heath and status as the primary offensive option, to Grunfeld’s reassignment, to Larry Johnson allegedly exposing himself, the Knicks have been more of a soap opera than the proud organization it regards itself to be.
Blaming the Knicks’ mediocrity on the lack of an All-Star point guard or the departures of Oakley and John Starks, is a narrow-minded escape. Last I checked, Starks wasn’t exactly burning it up in Golden State, shooting a career-low 37.3 percent from the field, and Oakley has been less productive with the Raptors (6.8 points per game) than he was with the Knicks, which belies the theory that a player’s numbers are abnormally high on a bad team.
I admit I haven’t done a scientific study, but I would think any GM in the league would be hard-pressed to refuse the chance to have Houston, Sprewell, Ewing, Larry Johnson and Camby on his roster. Yet, somehow the Knicks, with those players, have managed to be offensively inefficient. That’s what happens when there’s division and distractions.
Accountability has been a problem all year. It was Ernie’s fault for trading Oakley; Jeff’s fault for not playing Camby; Spree’s fault for shooting too much; Allan’s fault for not being aggressive; Patrick fault for being old and creaky; Checketts’ fault for not paying close enough attention; and the league’s fault for having a lockout.
I guess Sunday’s meltdown in Indianapolis was the players’ fault. The coach said they didn’t follow his game plan.
“We continually forget who we are as a team,” Van Gundy said after the embarrassing 94-71 loss. Later he added, “We have a game plan and we have to stick to it. It’s a lot easier to go off on your own.”
Funny, that sounded a lot like Grunfeld talking about Van Gundy.