On Vacation

We're 48 games into the Knicks' season, and I'm proud of both them and myself. I've managed to pump out enough vitriol to fill a coffee table book. More importantly, New York is 14-34 and currently on a six-game losing streak.

Ahh, that's the good stuff.

Moreover, the Knicks have constantly embarrassed themselves with off-court controversy, often verging on sheer pathos and insanity.

Sadly, I'll be taking a leave from it all. I go on vacation today and won't return until Feb. 29. During the interim, Isiah-in-Wonderland will be on hiatus. I'll be monitoring as much as I can from overseas, but in the meantime you'll have to supply your own Knicks bashing.

Hey Doc, I can't find Jerome's pulse

To tide you over, here are some fun predictions for the next three weeks:

1. Isiah will remain as coach and GM.
2. James Dolan will be arrested for participation in an internet pornography ring.
3. Stephon Marbury will begin living in the deep bowels of MSG like the Phantom of the Opera.
4. The Knicks will win against Indiana on Wednesday then drop their next three.
5. Quentin Richardson will start a fight on the court and get bitch slapped.
6. Jerome James will quietly die while riding the bench, but no one will realize for a week.
7. The Knicks will still suck when I get back.
   

Super Tuesday Endorsement

James Dolan, left, and Steve Mills, right, have both donated money to Hillary Clinton. That means my endorsement goes to Barack Obama.

Isiah-in-Wonderland is a strictly non-political endeavor. But sometimes politics and the Knicks conspire to force your hand. And so, this blog's endorsement goes to Barack Obama.

Just take a moment to assess that and change all your opinions accordingly.

This decision was based solely on one set of data that had nothing to do with the candidates or their issues. Of the four current members of the New York Knicks who have donated money to political candidates, three gave to Hillary Clinton. That's reason enough to vote for Obama, in my mind.

Steve Mills, who fulfills some sort of executive function for MSG, gave $2,000 to Clinton. Herb Williams gave her $1,000, though that was for her last senate campaign. And most egregiously of all, James Dolan (aka Fredo) has served up the maximum amount of $4,600. Stephon Marbury also gave $2,300 to Obama.

But when Dolan is letting the money fly, I'm always opposed. My only hope is that Clinton decides to use Dolan in her campaign. I'd love to see that two-bit ewok trying to give a speech and then getting pelted by venomous invective and perhaps some rotten fruit as well.

Give the Knicks an Asterisk

Seattle Sonics 86, New York Knicks 85

I don't know what Howard Beck is talking about over there at the Times. His latest article is either so tongue-in-cheek as to be completely disingenuous or he's actually buying the crap coming from the False Prophet. Knowing Beck, maybe he's just letting Isiah do his spin and reporting the results with something close to a straight face. Here's the gist of the article:

"If the Knicks had a campaign slogan for the final months of the season, it might be 'Losing with dignity.'"

Well, as long as it's losing, right? But then check out the follow-up:

"They found encouragement last month by going 5-2 after Stephon Marbury bowed out of the lineup to have ankle surgery. They have since gone 0-5, but with a string of shiny asterisks attached to the losses. The Knicks are encouraged because they held fourth-quarter leads in three of those games and also had chances to win the other two. That they repeatedly failed in crunch time was somewhat of an afterthought."

Now hold on there. Losing after holding a late lead, does not mean you get a "shiny asterisk." It means you folded in crunch time. It means you can't take the heat. It means that when it matters, you're still a shitty team. I think Beck knows this, so I guess this is all just fun for him.

The important thing, of course, is that the Knicks lost five straight and now stand at 14-33. By the way, do you remember the team's last extended West Coast trip? It was a 0-4 skid in November. Now a 0-5 streak. It seems the one thing the Knicks suck at more than basketball is basketball played far from home.

New York now has the fifth worst record in the NBA. I'd like it to get even lower, but losing to Seattle (12-35) was pretty nice. As Marc Berman put it so tersely in the Post, "The Knicks are in the toilet bowl."

Now that's good copy.

Next up: Clippers at Knicks at 7:30 p.m. Monday
Best-case scenario: Mike Dunleavy follows up his insult of the Knicks last week by taking out Isiah with a pregame judo kick to the temple.
Worst-case scenario: Isiah gets revenge by murdering Dunleavy in cold blood during the game, then standing over his lifeless corpse as the Garden goes nuts. Wow, I'm a bit bloodthirsty today.

Randolph Decides to Care

Portland Trail Blazers 94, New York Knicks 88, OT

It's hard to imagine that the Knicks managed to score only 88 points in 53 minutes of basketball. It's also hard to imagine that Zach Randolph played a good game. But there he was, all square head atop rotund body, knocking down shots all night. In other words, he can play pretty well when he gives two shits.

Randolph had 25 points and 13 rebounds. But he also made only 11 of 23 shots and tied Nate Robinson for the Knicks' worst plus/minus of the night with -14. (Interestingly, good old Channing Frye had the overall worst plus/minus of the night, going an incredible -18 in 14:31. He had only two points and four boards).

The Knicks shot 39.4 percent overall, and Howard Beck of the Times delivered a gem of a backhanded compliment in his lede:

"Seven months after leaving, Zach Randolph returned to his original N.B.A. home Friday night and turned in a vintage performance. He arrived late, shot a lot, scored in bunches and left the Rose Garden with a loss — much as he did for his last few years with the Portland Trail Blazers."

Jamal Crawford might be the goat for now,
but Isiah's still the all-time idiot

Then again, Jamal Crawford missed 21 shots to easily take Goat of the Night honors. Nice going, J-Craw.

Here's the most important thing - New York is now 18-32 and has lost four straight. Now that's Knicks basketball.

The most refreshing sight (other than the Knicks blowing a lead again and then wasting away in overtime) was David Lee back in the starting lineup, his seventh appearance there this season. Calmly efficient, he shot 5 for 6 and had 14 rebounds. During the past three games, he's averaged 39 minutes per night and made 20 of 29 shots. In other words, I can't freakin' believe he hasn't been starting regularly. Then again, of course, Isiah's an idiot.

Up next: Knicks at Sonics at 10 p.m. Saturday.
Best-case scenario: Kevin Durant follows up his mega-performance in the Sonics' win against the Knicks in December by exploding for a quadruple-double: 40 points, 15 rebounds, 12 dimes and 10 steals.
Worst-case scenario: I'm loving these terrible road trips. It would be sad to see one end in victory.

Tax Time

Utah Jazz 100, New York Knicks 89
Los Angeles Lakers 120, New York Knicks 109

Ostensibly, the Zach Randolph swap last summer between the Knicks and the Trailblazers was a steal. New York got Randolph, while Portland got Channing Frye and an overpaid, washed-up Steve Francis that it cut almost immediately. As someone one said, you don't just give away 17-10 guys. But the Trailblazers were desperate to get Randolph off their court and out of their books, wanting to begin the new Greg Oden era without even a whiff of the old Jailblazers days.

And yet, the news from the Times yesterday was that Portland had the upper hand in the trade so far. The Times just had to rub it in. But remember, anytime Isiah Thomas is involved in a trade, you can usually put down good odds that he's the one who'll be screwed in the end.

Speaking of duplicitous, incompetent, misleading, prevaricating and just plain crazy GMs, Thomas has finally fessed up and intimated interest in trading for Jason Kidd. This is the same guy who has been insisting since December that he likes the team he has and doesn't want to move any of the pieces on Team Titanic II, the magnum opus he spent four years putting together. Two months and hundreds of denial ready, he's conceded that Curry/Randolph isn't the answer and wants a point guard who actually, you know, doesn't blow donkey guts.

And finally, here was this great tidbit from a press conference a few days ago:

"Our guys are still trying to carve out their turf in the league," Thomas said. "They haven't really gotten to the point where they're superstars." Thomas then paused a second and his shoulders dropped. "Now, I hate that I said that because your headline writers will write, 'Knicks Have No Superstars; Isiah's Crazy,'" he said. One reporter playfully retorted, "We say that anyway."

Now this is brilliant stuff. It's never good when a coach or player starts reading the papers too closely, especially in a place as harsh as New York. Well, the False Prophet has obviously begun to do so, and I like this new little paranoid side of him that's envisioning negative headlines.

Of course, all of this stuff is good news. But nowhere near as good as watching the Knicks collapse down the stretch against the Lakers and then lose a yawner the next night in Salt Lake City.

You are about to see Kobe Bryant make Jamal Crawford his bitch

So overall a wonderful little two-day stretch. And then it just got about a thousand times better when I saw this article in the Times. The city has apparently lost about $300 million in tax revenue because of a weird exception granted the Garden of Hate over 30 years ago. Now that's going to end because the City council voted 40-3 to end the loophole. It's these sort of little changes that wave the stick at MSG management (who am I kidding, these guys are richer than kings and even more cruel). Less money for James "Fredo" Dolan and more for NYC? Sounds good to me.

The great thing is that this sort of decision must have been affected by the Knicks' putrefaction over the past several years. It might not be an official reason, but it's impossible to imagine that the utter shittiness on display at the Garden didn't influence some council members, just as it must have influence some of the decision-makers in the Anucha Browne Sanders trial last summer.

Next up: Knicks at Trailblazers at 10:30 p.m. Friday.
Best-case scenario: Frye posts 20 points and 20 boards and then bitch slaps Zach Randolph during pregame handshakes.
Worst-case scenario: Randolph scores 50 while leading the Knicks to a win, then runs through downtown Portland, destroying the cityscape like some overgrown Godzilla as Isiah runs behind him yelling, "No, Zach, no!"