The State of the City Teams Address

Welcome to the first annual State of the City Teams Address. And by city teams I mean no other than the teams that play in and around the biggest, best city in the world, New York City.
First I’ll take a look at the teams whose season is coming to an end, then I'll talk about the Giants and the Jets, and then I’ll analyze the teams whose seasons have just begun.
I’m going to make this a four-part series, since one blog entry would be too long to try to analyze the seasons of nine professional sports franchises.
I’ll begin with the two area teams that play on the hardwood, the Nets and the Knicks. These are two clubs that couldn’t be closer together geographically, and further apart in the standings.
For argument’s sake we’ll call the Nets a New York City team. In the NBA, there are only two cities that have two teams: New York and Los Angeles.
In L.A., there are the Lakers and the Clippers. The Clippers have been perennial doormats for the league, but even they are closer to their cross-city rivals than the Knicks are to the Nets.
New Jersey has been an Eastern Conference powerhouse ever since the acquisition of point guard Jason Kidd. Then they got Vince Carter and they became even stronger. They went to the NBA finals a couple of years ago, and are once again a strong playoff team with a chance of representing the East in the finals.
Then there are the Knicks. I ask, is there a team in the league that has less direction than the Knicks? It appears as if the Knicks don’t know which direction they’re headed or what they want to accomplish. Are they going for a youth movement or are they trying to win now?
By the looks of this team, they sure don’t look like they’re trying to win now. At least they don’t show it on the court. This club has been below .500 and has not made the playoffs for what will be the fifth consecutive year. Ironically enough, they’re neighbors across the Hudson River have been above .500 for five seasons now and have made the playoffs in those years.
If you’re trying to rebuild, you need veterans that are willing to teach the young players and aid in their development, not players that are more concerned with their own numbers rather than the wins and losses column.
The team looks lost on the court, Larry Brown looks as though he’s trying to direct traffic during a Chinese fire drill in downtown Hong Kong on New Year’s Day, and Isiah just smiles at the cameras and continues to bring in round pieces to this square puzzle.
The Knicks have a lot of time on their hands for Larry and Isiah to try to get on the same page while they’re on the golf course. Because it sure doesn’t look like they’ve even been in the same library this season.