Waiter, Checks Please

This is how much fun the Knicks season has become... even on the very rare occurrence that they win, they lose. Starchild Marbury watched Sunday's game from the locker room with the Knicks' other inactive players, due to what the team first reported was a sore ankle, and is now starting to be More Than That.

First, I want to imagine the atmosphere around the Knicks' inactive players. Is it festive, since they are men of leisure, millionaires, relatively anonymous and living the high life in Funtown New York... or is it funereal and cutthroat, because not being good enough to play for this team has to be a grand and telling statement that you are Not Long for a career in professional basketball? I'm surprised someone hasn't written an excruciating ESPN teleplay about it, really.

Now, getting back to the Heart-Eating Bacteria that seems to be sapping the Knicks of their phenomenally expensive loser point guard... normally this would seem the kind of crap your kid would pull when they wanted out of school. But given how incompetent the Knicks are on and off the court, maybe it's more. After all, wouldn't Isiah hire medics of a like, um, for lack of better word, mind?

Finally, there's this: on most NBA teams, the veterans on bad NBA teams do not impress one with effort once they are out of contention. Injuries become chronic, day to day becomes week to week, and Gosh Darn It All, I want to get out there and help us finish the year strong, but this chronic condition is just making it impossible. But don't worry, I'm working out like a madman so that I'll be even better next year!

Now, even on the best of franchises that are not frequent visitors to the Seacaucus Bowl of Failure known as the Draft Lottery, this happens and no one much cares, because it's a nice way to see if the young players on the bench have anything to offer. But it usually happens in March and April... not mid-January, when a team is presumably still mathematically capable of making a run. But with this Knicks team, expertly engineered and managed to be heart-free on so many levels?

Well, let's just say that it's a good thing there's a development league. Because by the end of the year, I'm going to be surprised in the Knicks can field a team without it. (And no signing people from the stands. They won't be there either.)