NYK

   The New York Knicks are not good. Sorry. The word "good" is relative, so maybe they are when you compare them the travesty that was Isiah Thomas-era Knicks. But that's really the only silver lining, other than the trim on their new jerseys (which I particularly like). Before I bash the idiotic moves this team made this offseason, I will start off with the good. The Knicks did two things I liked this offseason; rid themselves of Jeremy Lin, and swap out Landry Fields for Ronnie Brewer. Anyone who actually watched the Knicks during Linsanity knows that Lin was not a good fit. He was strictly a pick-and-roll point guard. This worked for D'Antoni's system, but not as well with Woodson's. Also, he needs to have the ball in his hands, and that is simply not happening when Carmelo Anthony is on the floor. Lin will be the centerpiece of that group of scrubs called the Houston Rockets, but he will not come anywhere close to justifying that contract. In the case of Landry Fields, he was a waste of space. Plain and simple. He reminded me a little of former UConn forward Stanley Robinson, in the sense that he always either overestimated or underestimated his own abilities. He passed up too many good shots and took too many bad ones. Landry clearly had talent, but he was inconsistent, especially in critical moments. I believe the best thing that could have happened to him was going to the Raptors and getting out of the spotlight. Ronnie Brewer is no superstar, but he is a far better role player than Fields was.
   Ok, now to the bad. What the heck happened this offseason??? Someone please tell me, because I am confused. They added Jason Kidd, Marcus Camby, 35-year old rookie Pablo Prigioni, Kurt Thomas, and Rasheed Wallace. That's five players with a combined age of 190. Didn't the Lakers getting trounced by the Thunder in last year's playoffs show that this is a young man's game? Didn't they learn from last year's Baron Davis/Mike Bibby experiment? Do they think they are going to receive some kind of AARP senior citizen discount in the form of handicap points? The fact of the matter is, this front office has no clue what they are doing. This team has needed a point guard for as long as I can remember, and Raymond Felton is not the answer. The Knicks did not have a first round pick in what was a pretty deep draft this year because of the T-Mac trade from 2010. Seriously. Maybe I'm the only person who was sad to see Jared Jeffries go, but it was nice to have two dirty work guys as opposed to one (Tyson Chandler, obviously). And speaking of old people, Amar'e Stoudemire may only be 29 years old, but he looks 75 most of the time. I love Coach Woodson and his defensive minded approach, I love Iman Shumpert (not so much his new hairstyle), I love Tyson Chandler, and I love Carmelo's scoring ability. But this is not enough to build an elite team. They will probably still make the playoff because a team assembled of women in their seventies would likely make the playoffs in the East. But they will lose in the first round again. What else is new? I want to be optimistic, but looking at this new roster makes me laugh. I'm not saying that the Nets are better than the Knicks now, but they will be in a few years. I have way more faith in Mikhail Prokhorov and Jay-Z than I do in the Knicks front office. Dinosaurs are extinct, but the few that are left were signed by the Knicks this offseason. As a Knicks fan, all I can do is hang my head. That is all.
                                -P.S. Seeing Eddie Curry win a ring this year with Miami made me physically ill.