lol ugh what a rough 15 years it's been man. I, like most Knicks fans absolutely hate Dolan, but you gotta at least respect the fact that he is willing to pay a butt load of money of tax in order to 'improve' the team. The issue is that he has trusted the completely wrong people with that 'improvement' process. Literally I don't think the Knicks could have gotten any more wrong from 1999 to 2010. Those 11 years are still haunting the Knicks until today.
Scott Layden started a down whirl spiral that just seems to never end. He gave H20 his ridiculous contract which no one thought he was worth even before his injury, then he trades Patrick for scraps and awful contracts, all while drafting poorly and making awful trades. We give up Camby and Nene (might have not been 'our' pick) for fucking Antonio McDyess who was on a way too high of a contract and constantly injured. As a result of this mess we lose Van Gundy... Just thinking about all of this angers me man, it really does. There was so much potential for what was supposed to be the Patrick era. Signing Sprewell and Houston to way too long and way too expensive contracts really fucked us.
Then.. THEN we get fucking Isiah Thomas. People don't realize it but he was our GM and/or GM coach for almost 5 years. FIVE FUCKING YEARS of awful move after awful move. He drafted well, sure, but I don't think one trade worked in our favor. He could have drafted even better if he didn't give away all of our picks. What a fucking shit show man. If you look at those rosters you'll find quite a bunch of talented players but most of them were all on awful contracts. Not only that but there was zero leadership. Guys like Marbury who were expected to lead this team was the definition of a punk. We had a great set of players who in the right system would play their role perfectly, but we lacked vet leadership and the one or two 'star' players who commended that respect. The Houston contract made Isiah's job tough, I'll give him that. But trading for Curry, Marbury, Jerome fucking James, Jaffires (due to high contract) fucked us in the ass so fucking bad. Fuck Isiah Thomas man Those Knicks were full of individuals, they were far from being an actual team. Such a shame, so much potential after the 1999 finals and 2000 season. All of it went to waste bc of three individuals who clearly didn't know what they were doing.