Can Isiah fix the Knicks?

[hoosierboy]

Just wondering what everyone thinks of Isiah getting the Knicks GM job (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=1692143). Here's a quote from Chad Ford's article (http://insider.espn.go.com/insider/story?id=1692158) on espn.com.

"He would have been the last human being on earth that I thought would've gotten that job," one league executive told Insider. "That's the premiere GM job in the NBA, the team is a mess, and the Knicks need someone with experience to get them through this. Isiah Thomas isn't that guy."

I think I tend to agree with the league executive. TEN, your honest opinion?

[Sam Hill]

Putting Isiah Thomas in charge of your basketball operations is like asking Colonel Sanders to babysit your chicken.

[RonnieFan]

the man speaks the truth.

[Rocky]

As a life-long Knicks fan, I'm glad to see Layden out. But Isiah? He'll be the guy if he can talk management into REBUILDING, eating some of the contracts they're strapped with and resigning themselves to being a bad team with prospects for a few years, instead of an overpaid bad team with no prospects.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Isiah Thomas has won everywhere he has been. He had a winning idea for the CBA too...a simple formula several baseball minor leagues are currently using and minor league hockey is beginning to use:

Amenities! Build new (or rehab old) arenas throughtout the league to include fewer GA seats and more luxury skyboxes.

[Sam Hill]

What did they win in Indiana, actually?
41-41, 42-40 and 48-34 with a first-round flameout each time.

What did they win in Toronto, actually?
21-61, 30-52, 16-66 and 23-27.

How did the CBA experiment go?

"Said Ft. Wayne (Fury) general manager Rich Coffey: 'The league has been around for 55 years and it took him 12 months to ruin it. The responsibility lies with him. He had a lack of understanding for the minor league basketball culture." '

And

"He can hide behind the corporation, the blind trust or the Mother Mary for all I care," said Bill Bosshard, a LaCrosse banker and former Bobcats owner. "He convinced all the (CBA) owners of his vision. Then he realized he couldn’t turn over the profit he envisioned, he couldn’t get the corporate sponsors, his business plan was faulty, everything was going bankrupt, so he figured, ‘I better grab a coaching job’ and he abandoned us."

Building new arenas and rehabbing old ones wasn't Thomas' idea - and baseball teams only did it because the NAPBL decreed back in the mid-90's that they had to bring ballparks up to code or else. Hockey teams are benefitting from municipalities building new and rehabbing old arenas, but it wasn't exactly their idea, either. And outside of Gary, I can't think of too many new minor league basketball arenas.

And was there a worse business move than not selling the CBA to the NBA when the NBA offered? The whole mess wouldn't have happened. And if he took an NBA coaching job, in 2000, he had to be thinking about that even while he was running the CBA.

Isiah was a winning player everywhere he went (which was...I guess...Indiana University and the Pistons). As an executive, his record isn't exactly the best.

[SignGuyDino]

Dino shakes his magic 8-Ball and it says:

"Stop shaking me!" :o

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Sam,
I knew my comments about Isiah Thomas would get your attention. :)

...and yes, I think Isiah has received a bad rap. He won in Toronto too--of sorts, by the way. That Canadian NBA franchise is still there and thriving. We don't hear much from the "Vancouver" Grizzlies, do we?

You also reinforced my point about the lack of new and renovated arenas for minor league basketball. Take the Idaho Stampede of the CBA as a prime example. They play in the Idaho Center with no skyboxes, thus no additional revenue. The Idaho Steelheads (nice name) minor league hockey team on the other hand plays in a 5,000 seat arena with 16 skyboxes and naming rights.

I do not know what kind of financial arrangement the Idaho hockey franchise has in terms of skyboxes, but in Gary the new minor league baseball franchise keeps ALL skybox revenues. We're talking about a few hundred thousand annually in working capital right there.

Maybe it was not an original idea, but Isiah Thomas had the right idea for the CBA.

[SignGuyDino]

Even if that was a good idea, even if everyone agreed immediately that it was a great idea, it would take years to get those ideas implemented.

I think the NBDL and CBA (besides merging of course) should get together, work with some construction consultants and come up with a, well frankly, cookie cutter design for a minor league basketball arena. I'd like a raised floor of 3', with opera style boxes instead of luxury suites, and the lights only on the court during gametime. (Like at the All Star game in Atlanta last year, great effect. It's actually easier to get a crowd more excited when its' darker.)

[TEN]

Ken is probably the only CBA fan that I can think of who has something good to say about Isiah.

I have talked to quite a few people involved with the CBA and they have nothing good to say about the way he handled the CBA...It will be interesting to see what he does with the Knicks.

[JC]

I just wished the Knicks hadn't beaten my (Memphis) Grizzlies the other night. LOL

[lightning fan]

What I really think about Isiah Thomass, can not be printed.

Here is what can be printed. Using history as my guide, it will not take too long for him to ruin the Knicks.

You heard it here first. Knicks will never win with him, even if he stays interested and does not go off on some other of all his supposedly successfull business deals.

Maybe he could purchase slamball, I am sure his luxury suites idea could incorporate that game. I can see it now, suites in the tramp'ln pits, with players jumping in next to fans and then jumping out again.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

As Gene Hackman said in the movie A Bridge Too Far (with a thick polish accent), "If so, then I am a true minority..." because I don't think Isiah Thomas ruined the CBA as so many have implied/stated. Yes, I have only been interested in the CBA since Isiah helped found the Gary Steelheads nearly four years ago. However, I have done and STILL do my homework.

The CBA wasn't on solid ground before Isiah Thomas. The CBA isn't on solid ground now. Sure, attendance and sponsorship is up in Gary, but what about the rest of the Great Lakes region. I am reminded of my time as a member of the Jaycees. The Hammond, Indiana chapter always bragged about having the largest membership while neighboring Jaycees chapters folded left and right. What sense did that make? I see the same thing with Rockford, Gary, and Great Lakes. Great Lakes was able to increase their sponsorship, but DANG! You would think these people would bring the extra employees, family, friends, and girlfriends to a few games. Attendance is terrible there.

...and what's up with the Rockford Lightning? I'm not hatin', but WHAT'S UP with the Rockford Lightning? Just when I was starting to feel good about their attendance going up from last year (Ahhh, finally some CBA stability I thought), Rockford becomes the DeKalb, Illinois Lightning. Fans flocked away from DeKalb in droves--on a Saturday night! Is there a smaller venue within the Rockford city limits? If so, maybe it's time to let the Ice Hogs hockey team HAVE the MetroCenter (too large anyway). DeKalb (also too large) isn't the answer.

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah! My favorite movie of all time is A Bridge Too Far. No, I got trapped into defending Isiah Thomas again--that's it. Tim Floyd got a second chance. Isiah Thomas is even more deserving of a second chance. You are only as good as the people around you. At least the Pacers made it to the play-offs during his tenure.

[Sam Hill]

The CBA wasn't on solid ground before Isiah Thomas. The CBA isn't on solid ground now.

Ken, you do realize the CBA is in much better shape now than it was, right? The whole single-entity, we're-going-to-have-a-bunch-of-teams-and-a-WCBA concept didn't work? When Isiah threw in the towel, how bad off were the various teams of the CBA?

Great Lakes is in bad shape, obviously. But the other teams seem to be doing okay. In fact, Gary and Rockford are averaging more fans per game than they were when Isiah's CBA went under in 2001.


No, I got trapped into defending Isiah Thomas again--that's it. Tim Floyd got a second chance. Isiah Thomas is even more deserving of a second chance. You are only as good as the people around you. At least the Pacers made it to the play-offs during his tenure.

As 16 of the 29 NBA teams do. Yawn. They did a bit better than that under the guy he replaced, and they're doing a bit better than that under the guy who replaced him.

And Isiah's first brilliant personnel move is to go out and get Leon Smith. What, Chris Washburn wasn't available?

[lightning fan]

Isiah personally promised to pay all former cba owners the agreed upon purchase price for each team out of his personal wealth in event his cba idea went belly up.

The cba went belly up and Isiah refused to make good on his promise. Former owners tried to sue and could not go after him legally due to the way he setup the corporation. They could only go after the corporation. His two head cba ceos in fact had to pay Yakima(and maybe others) thousands out of thier own pockets while Isiah was sitting in Pacerland with a 6 million dollar a year salary leaving his ceos twist in the wind.

And Ken.....Steelheads payed $500,000 to Isiah for half a seasons worth of basketball then had to pay to join and operate in the IBL. If it was not for the unparrelled financial support Gary Mayor King garnered for the Steelheads they would have been belly up in lake michigan stinking like dead carp, and smelling just like whats left of Isiah Thomass's credibility, not to mention his "WORD".

That odor you sometimes smell in Gary near lake michigan shores is the remnants of Isiah's traveling medicine man show.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

I hope I am not coming across like a 'spin doctor' because I detest that spin doctoring stuff, but DANG! The former CBA owners took Isiah's personal word instead of getting a written agreement from his corporation? Corporations are established to protect individual shareholders from exactly the type of lawsuits described in Lightning fan's post. Hindsight is 20/20, but I don't know Isiah Thomas. If I'm going to hand over 51% of my business to his corporation and expect to get paid if things go sour, then I'm getting it signed and witnessed to that fact.

So I still don't get it, but then again I don't get a lot of things. Like I didn't get the movie The Hulk. Was the Hulk's dad really a good guy or a bad guy? When the Hulk tossed that M-1 tank about a mile, did he kill everyone inside or what? Was this movie really trying to pawn itself off as serious drama or as an action-adventure? I didn't get it.

True enough, the Steelheads would not exist without the cooperation of city government. That is true of most major league and 'successful' minor league operations in this country. Long-term cooperation between ownership and local government must exist if you ever hope to see a profit. The days of the barn-storming, handshake agreement, "sneak out of town before the bills are due", leagues are gone for good. Anything that even resembles that type of a league doesn't stand a snowball's chance for success. Today, sports ownership/management groups convince local governments that it is in EVERYONE'S best interest for local governing bodies to finance multi-million dollar stadium projects...lots of luxury suites, party decks, club seating, video scoreboards, and fewer general admission seats--the proven "cookie-cutter" design as Dino so aptly put it in a previous post. The payoff for the owners is obvious. More sources of revenue without added expenditures. The payoff for local government is a boost to the economy directly and indirectly from jobs teams provide, additional private investment as a result of the teams' mere presence, and the positive media coverage that one cannot put a price tag on.

There are two minor league franchises in Gary. City government is not going to allow either to go "belly up". It would not be in anyone's best interest for that to happen.

[Rocky]

The Knicks have put together a winning streak. I'm happy. :wink:

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Could there be a Isiah Thomas/Knicks/Steelheads/CBA relationship brewing here? I wondered why Leon Smith did not make the trip to Great Lakes for the December 29th game. Check out this story:

http://nwitimes.com/articles/2003/12/31/sports/top_sports/dedeb821920d2b8586256e0d00108195.txt

[Rocky]

There's news in the Post about this, too. I'd bet they won't be singing him until they can offer 10-day contracts. If then.

[lightning fan]

Ken you sound like a spinner. Buck would call you a ceiling spinner.

Seriously, you sound like a guy who understands things, is a great fan, great steelhead supporter, etc etc....... BUT, I think you miss the boat on Isiah Thomas.

EX: The world economy and business dealings are held together by the loosest rules which are only as good as the "WORD'S" given by business men and world economic dealers including countries.

EX: In trading on exchanges around the world men/women are down in a big pit or out on a open floor trading thousands $, hundreds of thousands $, and milions $, of stock, commodities, goods, futures, bonds, ect etc. Most of these deals are done by yelling at someone after making eye contact, flashing a hand signal, and scribbling the trade or purchase on a scrap of paper. Also in auctions this occurs. All these deals are held together by the promise or word given by each person in each deal. Some deals are done via phone, again only as good as the word of the parties involved.

As you can see if all business dealers could renege on a deal so as to prevent a loss, like Isiah Thomas did, all hell would break loose, economies would crumble, and chaos would ensue. Similar but much worse than the chaos Isiah caused the CBA.

So you can see, in this world you are only as good as your "WORD" when making a deal. Isiah is morally and business sense bankrupt. I would not trust him to give me change back from a dollar at McDonalds.

We will have to just agree to disagree on Isiah. I don't think either one of us will be changing our minds about the guy.

Take care and good luck the rest of the Steelheads season.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

No spinning this time--from the ceiling or on the floor like a break dancer. However, if the Knicks improve this year then I'm going to gloat for months to come. Funny thing is that I am not an Isiah Thomas fan. If you didn't play for the Bulls during the Michael Jordan era, then I am not a fan.

Is the CBA better off today than it was four years ago? The jury is still out on that one. The franchises can ALL stand to market their teams more aggressively. No way should Gary have fewer than 2,000 fans on a Friday night (like January 2nd). No way should Great Lakes have fewer than 500 fans every night (and a website that hasn't been updated since November). And no way should Rockford play ANY games in DeKalb, Illinois.

I checked my road atlas. Heck, DeKalb isn't all that close to Rockford. As a matter of fact, DeKalb is on a straight line between Rockford and Gary. NOW DON'T LAUGH! But I think the Rockford Lightning should have by-passed DeKalb altogether and scheduled their home games for Gary when the MetroCentre was not available. Just think, the schedule could have been arranged to allow for Saturday 'double hitters'...Rockford playing the afternoon session of course and Gary playing during prime-time (of course).

How's THAT for aggressive marketing? I would pay money to see Rockford play Idaho in Gary as part of some ticket package deal. Obviously, Rockford fans are willing to travel to see their team play. Scouts could observe four teams from one location in one day. The press can cover four teams from one location in one day (should they choose). The two home teams could share the cost of arena set-up and other misc. arena costs as a bonus.

[lightning fan]

You have good ideas Ken. I too would pay to see Steelheads play before Lightning. Don't think we have enough fans though to support 2 teams in 1 arena.

As for DeKalb. Metrocentre kicked Lightning out. Gave 22 fri sat nights to Icehogs hockey, also night before thanksgiving and others with holiday following so as to draw fri/sat type crowds. Gave lightning 1 fri/sat night. DeKalb aprox 40 min from rkf. Gary aprox 2to 3 hrs.

Icehogs avg aprox 1900 playing weekday nights and sat/sun afternoons like Lightning schedule metrocentre forced. Hog's avg aprox 4/5000 on fri sat nights. So you can see schedule is everything.

Big issue is Metrocentre is bankrupt. Owes 1.3 million+ on ice surface they purchased for Hogs. State grant paid for new lightning bb court baskets etc.. So you can see they will not let Icehogs fail. They even place large bb center-court "Centreevents" logo (metrocentre ticket selling arm). Also greeted at concessions by "Welcome Icehogs Fans" banners and ads in restrooms promoting Hogs. Surprised we don't have Hogs logo on court. It took metro at least 4 home games before they rehung lightning champ banners after painting arena. I am sure they have some good excuse, but I am not not buying whatever they say.

Lightning do seem to be lacking in self promotion department, either by design or lack of cooperation of rockford establishments. ex's: bar called Rue Marchea lightning promote before and after parties every tue game. If you go you will see large banner promoting Icehogs beer discounts after hog games and Icehog schedules. Nothing up or out for Lightning. Note: did not go last tue. When I did a good size group of fans and players showed. I previously mentioned Damons grill looks like Icehogs hall of fame. Hog's jerseys collectables wall items pocket schedules even a poster in restroom. Again no Lightning items up. Meet the player parties at hardhat grill greets us with a Icehog jersey framed on wall.

Here is some sound advice.....don't let hockey into genesis center, you will rue the day and steelheads may move to ft wayne. One of a very small number of minor cities that showed they would not abandon hoops when pucks came to town. Good luck.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Let's see...
Isiah Thomas hires the winningest coach in NBA history to guide the Knicks. Should I start my gloating now or should I wait a month or two?

[SignGuyDino]

He's the losingest coach of all time, too.


Amazed Isiah didn't hire Bill Laimbeer, guess he will after Lenny fails to make the playoffs? :roll:

[Sam Hill]

Let's see...
Isiah Thomas hires the winningest coach in NBA history to guide the Knicks. Should I start my gloating now or should I wait a month or two?

(Yawn)

Why don't you wait to see if he brings Kareem out of retirement, too?

[lightning fan]

If Isiah puts together a good team of players with a chance to actually win something.....he will fire whoever is coach, for whatever reason he can think of, and name himself head coach.

You heard it here first.

Of course odds of him putting together a good team are hard to estimate.

I am betting he fails just like Riley in Miami did.

[RonnieFan]

Winningest coach? Who cares?

If I coached for 60 years I could be the winningest coach too. This guy is a joke... he's never been a good coach and never will be. Look at his winning percentage, it's nothing special, nor even close.

Let's call him the Cal Ripken of NBA coaching. He came and did his job every day for a long time. That's what you're SUPPOSED to do... that's what you get paid to do. Wilkens would have been fired 20 times if he coached in today's win or go home atmosphere.

Go ahead and gloat if you want... but I'd say getting a marginal coach isn't anything to be TOO happy about.

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Excuse me for digressing (although this post somewhat relates to Isiah Thomas).

I'm well aware that the league sent out press releases prior to Tuesday's (today's) CBA all*star game, but what about the individual teams? You mean to tell me that only two teams (Gary and Idaho) bothered to send out press releases on the players selected from their teams?!? You mean to tell me no one anywhere is interested in the additional information these teams could provide? You mean to tell me no one in the various college towns is interested in knowing that a former college stand-out made the CBA all*star team? No interesting anecdotes to share with the rest of the world? No nothin'? :(

That is pitiful! The five teams in question showed contempt toward their fans AND players by not getting the word out about their all*star selections.

...and Isiah Thomas was bad for the CBA?!?

[Ken, Steelheads fan]

Can Isiah fix the Knicks?

I guess the answer is "yes". Time to put that puppy to rest now. The Knicks were not even a playoff contending team when Isiah Thomas took over.

As I said before--I am not a true Isiah Thomas fan (although I'm glad he helped bring CBA basketball to Gary), but I DO like to see people receive credit for their accomplishments on and off the court.