Charles Oakley was a quintessential New York Knicks supporter until he was kicked out of the same house that saw his hard-nosed play and rugged defensive style shoo him away in the most embarrassing of ways. It has been two years since “Oak” was kicked out of Madison Square Garden by owner Jim Dolan, an emblematic moment that describes the level of dysfunction in the organization, going from the top down.
The iconic power forward noted it is situations of that kind that ultimately have contributed to the Knicks striking out on their star free-agent targets, as Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving slipped from their fingertips in a race with the Brooklyn Nets:
“You see the fire burning, you don’t drive into it,” Oakley told David Waldstein of The New York Times in a telephone interview this week. “It’s as simple as that. They know what’s going on. They have more awareness these days, and they can make up their minds on their own.”
Other longtime contemporaries like agent Warren LeGarie, who has represented former Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni for the last 30 years and is now the head of the Las Vegas Summer League for NBA teams, thinks it's not so much what the Knicks did wrong, but what the Nets did right in recruiting Durant and Irving this offseason:
“I don’t think it’s so much what the Knicks did wrong,” said LeGarie. “I think you have to look at all the things the Nets have done right.”
Both sides have a point, but the Knickerbockers have sure not done themselves a favor with the decades-long display of instability and dysfunction. To use Oakley's simile, if the Knicks keep on burning, most stars will keep away from that fire.
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