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New York Knicks legend Charles Oakley will not let bygones be bygones when it comes to owner James Dolan and the Madison Square Garden incident during the latter months of the season.
In a recent episode of USA TODAY's “For the Win” podcast, Oakley claimed there should have been stiffer penalties for the Knicks boss after his actions, including a temporary ban on Oak and dropping it days later after a meeting with commissioner Adam Silver.
“The meeting we went to before the All-Star break, everybody was like, ‘OK, we're going to put the helping hand in,'” Oakley said, as transcribed by Ted Berg of USA Today Sports.
“They put the hand in, but they didn't do anything about the issue, what's going on. I'm still fighting it – three charges. I like my team, I like myself, and I know I didn't do anything wrong. We're going to fight it.”
The former defensive enforcer compared his situation with others around the league, pointing out Houston Rockets owner Les Alexander getting fined $100,000 by the league for yelling at a referee during game action.
“It hurt to see my mother really hurt behind that. She's been really stressed out. They know I'm not the type of guy they tried to plant me as. I don't think the commissioner took a good approach toward this. I think (Dolan) should have been fined or suspended, a month or ten games. (Silver) fined the owner of the Houston Rockets $100,000 for walking up to the official.”
Oak had purchased a ticket to the game and happened to be sitting close to Dolan. A little after, a group of security personnel approached him and attempted to remove him from the game.
This resulted in him wrestling with security until he was ultimately escorted out from the game, consequently facing charges, which Dolan has declined to drop.
The meeting between Dolan, Oakley, Silver, and Michael Jordan was seen as a publicity stunt to make the smoke go away from the situation and help get the grime off the NBA logo.
For Oakley, the charges and implications still remain. His name still dragged through the mud and tarnished after Dolan implied he was inebriated during the game, which he has vehemently denied since the event.
“They're going forward with it, so I don't have a choice,” Oakley said. “Three more charges – assault, harassment and trespassing. Really? Trespassing? You see what happens with this, you see why everything else (with the existentially disappointing Knicks franchise) is going wrong. They don't get it.”
