Knicks Fanatics’ Mid-Season Housekeeping, Part I
Since the beginning of the year, when we had over 1000 visitors in one day and posting was fast, if not furious, things have slowed down a little. Real life has been a bit hectic so I have had to pare down my Knicks-viewing to watching games on DVR and highlights on NBATV. But, we are into the second half of the season and I am renewed, regenerated and looking forward to the Knicks stretch run at a playoff berth and towards resolution of the LeBron-Might-Be-In-Orange and Blue conundrum.
As we move forward, I am contemplating several issues regarding maintaining and enhancing our blogging experience regardless of what actually happens to the Knicks on or off the court. Amongst the issues I am considering is how to maximize the Live Blogging Event experience. Most recently we have not had many LBEs and not many commenters at the ones we've hosted. (I note that we always have a healthy number of stealth viewers who are not commenting. It's fun to keep up with the convo without saying a thing while watching the game. I've done it a couple of times).
I realize that there are many reasons for the low number of commenters, including last minute LBE posting and invitations, boring games and dislike-able hosts (not O&B of course). Unfortunately, there is not a lot I can do about the last minute postings - sometimes I don't know when I can set up until my 2 ½ year old gets tired or my wife gets home. As for O&B and late LBEs, his fiancé has him on FPT ("Fanatic People Time" or what some people call "Colored People Time" or what the New Rich (NR) call "Whenever I'm Ready Time."). I can't do shyte about the boring games either. And our personalities? Well before blogging I didn't have one, so I'm not changing that.
What I will do however is put out a schedule in advance to let folks know which LBEs I can lead. I hope that encourages you to join us as we watch this playoff run.
And "The Greatest Sports Moment" Contest Winner Is . . .
As you know, on January 1st, 2010 we started a competition to determine who was currently the most prescient Knicks Fanatics and who best understood the rhythm of this team. The prize for our first contest is a wonderful autographed copy of the best seller by Len Berman, The Greatest Moments In Sports .
The final score is
The winner is our very own Paul with a initial forecast of
4 wins 6 Losses, -18 Point Differential

Paul was off by 1 game and 24 points. His closest soothsayer was Post Up Prince (PUP) whose second guess was 6-4, +28. Thank goodness that wasn't PUP's first guess because then we would have had to decide if he was disqualified for not following the rules to the letter, by posting his second forecast in a second comment.
Anyway, congratulations to Paul. Paul, please send me your mailing address to my e-mail at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
Thank you all for participating. BTW, I am looking for Knicks Tickets for the next competition.
Previously Related Post:
LIVES' GAME NOTES: KNICKS v. LAKERS
Good weekend morning Gents. It is a pleasure to be e-seen and to e-see you. It's the half-way point of the Knicks' season and our heroes are 17-24, 2 1/2 games out of the 8th, and final, Eastern Conference playoff spot. We often say the Knicks are their record which is exactly the same as it was this time last year. Yet in yesterday's game, there were notable signs of improvement in individual and team play.
| Eastern Conference | |||||||||||||
| EASTERN | W | L | PCT | GB | HOME | ROAD | PF | PA | L10 | ||||
| Cleveland | 33 | 11 | .750 | - | 16-3 | 17-8 | 100.9 | 94.5 | 7-3 | ||||
| Boston | 28 | 13 | .683 | 3 ½ | 12-7 | 16-6 | 99.8 | 93.8 | 5-5 | ||||
| Atlanta | 28 | 14 | .667 | 4 | 18-5 | 10-9 | 103.0 | 97.2 | 7-3 | ||||
| Orlando | 28 | 15 | .651 | 4 ½ | 16-4 | 12-11 | 101.2 | 96.2 | 4-6 | ||||
| Miami | 22 | 20 | .524 | 10 | 12-10 | 10-10 | 97.2 | 97.2 | 5-5 | ||||
| Charlotte | 21 | 20 | .512 | 10 ½ | 18-4 | 3-16 | 94.2 | 92.5 | 8-2 | ||||
| Toronto | 22 | 22 | .500 | 11 | 14-6 | 8-16 | 103.6 | 104.9 | 6-4 | ||||
| Chicago | 19 | 22 | .463 | 12 ½ | 14-7 | 5-15 | 95.0 | 98.2 | 5-5 | ||||
| Milwaukee | 17 | 24 | .415 | 14 ½ | 12-7 | 5-17 | 98.0 | 99.4 | 4-6 | ||||
| New York | 17 | 25 | .405 | 15 | 10-12 | 7-13 | 100.8 | 102.4 | 5-5 | ||||
| Detroit | 15 | 27 | .357 | 17 | 11-10 | 4-17 | 92.2 | 97.0 | 4-6 | ||||
| Indiana | 15 | 28 | .349 | 17 ½ | 10-10 | 5-18 | 99.0 | 104.1 | 5-5 | ||||
| Washington | 14 | 28 | .333 | 18 | 8-13 | 6-15 | 98.8 | 102.7 | 3-7 | ||||
| Philadelphia | 14 | 28 | .333 | 18 | 7-14 | 7-14 | 97.7 | 100.5 | 5-5 | ||||
| New Jersey | 3 | 39 | .071 | 29 | 2-17 | 1-22 | 90.0 | 102.6 | 0-10 | ||||
Coaching:
This is not exactly meant to be a half-year review, but this year D'Antoni has finally abandoned all hope of running his fast break-no defense "system." He has realized that Duhon is not emotionally or physically capable of running that type of offense for an entire season. Except for the pick and roll, Duhon hasn't run the offense as D'Antoni had visualized it since the departure of Crawford and ZBo. However, now, as in the Lakers' loss, the offense runs much smoother through bigs such as Lee, Jeffries and Chandler increasing ball-handling duties. D'Antoni has also encouraged his players to play closer to the basket and not to shoot trey's just because they look like open shots. The most significant improvement is a greater emphasis on defense. In the Laker contest, he smartly doubled the bigs,
Kobe Puts Kibosh On Knicks In 4th Quarter
Lakers 115,
Knicks 105
Recap Box Score Play-By-Play Shot Chart Photos Conversation
Watch Replay
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | T | |
| LAL (33-10) | 36 | 27 | 21 | 31 | 115 |
| NYK (17-25) | 30 | 33 | 22 | 20 | 105 |
"I thought we played really, really, really well and then we lost the rhythm a little bit. You got to give them credit. They were hitting shots. I thought we played them pretty good. Kobe and Gasol at the end of the game, a little bit too much." -- Mike D'Antoni
"We didn't match their intensity. That's it. When we play aggressive and we play intense, we know what we can do, and everybody knows that we can beat everybody. We didn't do it in the fourth quarter." -- Danilo Gallinari"He's the best player in the world. I thought that really, when you look back at the game though, no one player for them killed us." -- David Lee
Eddy Curry Knees Knicks In Cap Space

Uh Oh. Looks like the only cap space the Knicks will get from Eddy Curry is around his knee cap where loose cartilage roams.
.
According to the Knicks, Curry was scheduled to have arthroscopic surgery on his left knee yesterday. He is expected begin rehabilitation next week, but be out for six weeks after the loose cartilage in his knee is removed.
Currently, the Eddy is worth about $11.3 million in cap space next year which is equivalent to his 2010 salary. Analysts have been suggesting for a couple of years that in order for the Knicks to take full advantage of the 2010 free agency opportunities, the Knicks will need to divest either Eddie Curry's or Jared Jeffrie's salary.
Eddy Curry's tenure, after one year of promise under Isiah Thomas, has turned into a total waste. Eddy balked and his game stalled when he was paired with ZBo who is showing All-Star form in Memphis. He has been perpetually fat until Walsh decided to put his watchful eye on his trade trip this past summer. The Knicks finally convinced Eddy to work his butt off, literally, with a promise of an opportunity to play. In Mike D'Antoni's non-communicative, let-me-guess-what-rotation-might-work style, he excluded him from the rotation. Now Eddy has hurt his knee while sitting on the bench.
This mess is everybody's fault.
What an amazing waste.Knicks Slap Pistons 99-91
Pistons 91,
Knicks 99
"He [Duhon] loses confidence easily. He just needs to get over it. . . . . We'll stick with him, and he'll be fine." -- Mike D'Antoni
"My teammates told me, I wasn't aggressive enough the prior couple of games." -- Nate Robinson
"Again, you have to have everything else from him [N8GR8], the defense and sound play, but he does give us something that we need. He's not a natural point guard, it's not easy for him, but as long as he keeps his energy and focus, we can kind of work around it. David Lee does a lot of the playmaking now out of certain sets. We can go with that." -- Mike D'Antoni
FREE NBA LEAGUE PASS TRIAL UNTIL 1/24
Fanatics, NBA TV is offering a free trial for NBA League Pass until 1/24/2010. You can view games on television or on your computer (up to three games at a time). No credit card is required for the free trial. Enjoy.

Knicks Beat Down By Pistons 94-90
Knicks 90,
Pistons 94
Recap Box Score Play-By-Play Shot Chart Photos Conversation
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | T | |
| NYK (16-24) | 24 | 13 | 23 | 30 | 90 |
| DET (14-25) | 23 | 28 | 26 | 17 | 94 |
"It's a joke, that's what it is. A joke." -- Larry Hughes
"We had a lack of energy, lack of focus and urgency, the main guys didn't come out with any kind of desire to win. Our playoffs are not in May. Our playoffs are now. We can't waste any games. We wasted one tonight."-- Mike D'Antoni
"For them to come out and have the start they did, it shows that they haven't given up on the season. I don't know what is different for us. Decent teams bounce back and turn things around in a game or two, as opposed to the teams that let it linger for five to 10 games." -- Jared Jeffries
Knicks Record Since January 1, 2010
W-L 4-4 Point Differential +13
Knicks Fanatics Offers Links To Haitian Relief

While we do not endorse organizations, we do encourage everyone interested and concerned to do what they can to lend assistance to the mass of people suffering tremendous losses in Haiti. Of course, we cannot help everyone in the world, but there are certainly times and events of such magnitude that they demand the immediate attention and care of the world. There is no time more obvious than now. You can investigate ways to help through the following links: Network for Good , NBA Cares and Better World Campaign. Be loving, but also be careful and look out for the Relief Request Scams. We offer no endorsements; we simply want to make it easier for you to help.






