As I'm sure you know, the New York Knicks recently had a huge trade that jettisoned their best guard and a combo player. In return, they wound up with two forwards and a two-guard who's still undergoing tests for a heart condition. When you combine that with the fact that Knicks guard Nate Robinson tweaked his groin recently, the Knicks are desperately short on guards. Right now the team only has two healthy guards, Chris Duhon and Anthony Roberson. So for the second time in a week, Mike D'Antoni asked Stephon Marbury - who's been benched for the whole season because he's not deemed to be part of the team's long term plans - if he would start last night against the Pistons. Except that this time, D'Antoni wasn't just asking for a one-night stand from Marbury, as was the case in Milwaukee earlier this week. D'Antoni said he'd give Marbury his old starting job back for the remainder of the season.
And Marbury declined.
Now, the s*** has officially hit the fan, not just for D'Antoni, but also for Marbury's teammates. D'Antoni is looking to have Marbury suspended and barred from doing anything with the team, while Quentin Richardson, who was forced to play the two-guard for last night's game, had these harsh words to say about Marbury:
"He hasn't played with us all year. He doesn't want to play with us. He's expressed that a second time, so whatever. I don't look at him as a teammate, because teammates don't do that. Regardless of what you have going on with the organization or what you have going on with your coach or whatever, you're not going to allow your teammates to be left out there the way they were left out there. ... Regardless of how you're trying to stick it to whoever. At the end of the day, we're getting left out there and we're shorthanded. People are hurt, and people are still playing.
"Right now," Richardson said, "he's the furthest thing from my mind. ... He's not trying to be part of this team and he's voiced that. So why would I waste my time thinking about it?"
"Right now," Richardson said, "he's the furthest thing from my mind. ... He's not trying to be part of this team and he's voiced that. So why would I waste my time thinking about it?"
As of right now, it looks like this whole thing could be solved by the end of this weekend. Marbury, who is owed $21.9 million for the season, will likely finally have his contract bought out by owner James Dolan, who had previously refused to do so. Marbury had vowed publicly not to take a penny less of what was owed to him, leading to the current stalemate.
That's an awful lot of money to pay to get rid of a team cancer, but seriously, Marbury has to go before this thing fester's to a level that gets even more ridiculous.
Why did it take this long to do this? Especially since the Knicks could have just done this back in October and saved themselves a lot of hassle. Who knows. Maybe they thought they could somehow trade him or negotiate his buyout down to something a bit more reasonable. I mean, it's the Knicks anyway, nothing they ever do makes any sense.
But if they get rid of Marbury, regardless of the cost, they can at least free themselves of a team cancer and prepare for their run at LeBron in 2010 with a fresh clean slate free of the ridiculousness that has plagued this team for the past 5 years.
Stephon Marbury refuses to play again and the Knicks have finally had enough. [Fanhouse]
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