Thoughts on James Dolan's rare sitdown interview

In an extremely rare sitdown interview with Mike Vaccaro of the New York Post, James Dolan talked about a lot of things, including his Knicks, Rangers, Isiah Thomas and music, but with our NBA focus and the Knicks in early disarray, let's dive into some of his basketball related comments...

After being asked about Mike Woodson and whether he is a patient owner:

"I really don’t compare myself with other owners. I’ll bet you I’m more patient than Mikhail [Prokhorov] is of his team. Mostly, I think it does not pay to be impatient, because you destabilize your team."

I find it amusing that Dolan brings up Prokhorov immediately without being asked about him (Although he does speak about him a little later on when actually asked), thus once again proving that the Knicks/Nets, Dolan/Prokhorov rivalry is very much alive. In terms of the 'patience' quotes, it's kind of ridiculous to read about Dolan preaching it. May I remind you that this an owner who has presided over eight different coaching tenures in his 14-year run as head of the Knicks and is notorious for his impatience.

And he's right about how it doesn't pay to be impatient, but the problem is that his Knicks don't build like they're aware of that fact. Again, in addition to the coaching carousel, may I remind you that this is a team that traded the little they had left in terms of future assets/draft picks (minus Shumpert) to bring in Andrea Bargnani in a misguided 'win-now' attempt, followed by Dolan reportedly telling the coaching staff that he expects a championship this season.

But the Knicks are all about patience.

On his surprising decision to change General Managers just before training camp:

"I’m surprised other folks were surprised about this. The general manager’s work doesn’t really occur at that time of year. If you’re going to change general managers that’s probably the right time to do it. The next available trade date is Dec. 15. You’ve just finished free agency and all that. It’s a lull period."

For the record, December 15th is the date teams can trade players that they traded for or signed in the off-season, but that doesn't mean no trades can occur before that date. In addition, as ESPN's Tom Haberstroh alludes to, just because it might be a slower time in terms of actual trades and trade talks, doesn't mean a General Manager doesn't have work to do. There is plenty of prep work that can be done during that time.

Dolan's assertion that right before training camp is "probably the right time" to make an organizational change of that magnitude is absolutely ludicrous. So you believe the perfect time to bring in a new General Manager who may have drastically different team building ideas is once the old General Manager that you are going to fire has completed his off-season of work? Okay...

Perhaps I shouldn't be criticizing Dolan, however. After all, as he puts it "My job is to know more than the writers."

It's bad enough when players and former players assume that media members can't know what they're talking about because they've never played at a high level, but Dolan assuming he knows best is even more ridiculous.

You're a wealthy businessman who was able to turn that into running professional sports teams - nothing about that makes you know better about the sports in question than the average fan in attendance.

Does Dolan believe he's a good owner? "Yes, I do."

I'm not going to rip on the guy for being confident, but I will let his record speak for itself.

Since making the NBA Finals in 1999 (the year Dolan took over), the Knicks have made the East Final just once in 14 seasons, have advanced past the first round of the playoffs just twice, have only made the post-season six times and have won just 45 percent of their games.

Over that stretch of futility, Dolan hired Isiah Thomas to run the team in one of the worst management gaffes in NBA history, signed Allan Houston to a $100 million contract, was a defendant in an employment discrimination lawsuit (that stemmed from alleged sexual harassment within the company), and decided against keeping 'Linsanity' in New York by instead opting for Raymond Felton and Jason Kidd, who has since retired and now coaches the aforementioned Nets.

And after all of that, he now heads a disappointing, aging team with no cap space, no draft picks and no more than one legitimately valuable young asset.

Let me rephrase the question. Does anyone in the basketball universe outside of James Dolan believe James Dolan is a good owner?

In his explanation for why he believes he's a good owner, Dolan says:

"I think an owner needs to be present. When an owner is not present that’s when things tend to go awry. The players, the coaches, the fans know there’s somebody in charge. They may not like what I’m doing but it’s much better than having nobody there. Nobody there just leaves you in despair."

I suppose if simply being physically present was the only qualification of being a good owner, then Dolan would have as great a chance as anyone at being the best, but unfortunately, actual basketball things go into it, too.

And on that note, my only comment here is, ask most NBA fans who the owner of the San Antonio Spurs is. I had to google it to remember (Peter Holt), as Holt's presence has never seemed to loom over the franchise. The point is that I don't think fans care about how present an owner is if the team is winning. 'Presence' only matters when a team is lousy, especially when they are perennially so, in order to convince fans there is accountability somewhere.

On Isiah Thomas and a possible return to the Knicks:

"I don’t know that he’ll ever be able to work in New York. I just don’t know that he’ll ever get a fair shake, going forward in New York?"

More on Isiah:

"...I don’t see him coming back to New York. I couldn’t do that to him, and I couldn’t do that to the organization. He would probably do it as my friend but I couldn’t do it to him or his family. And you know what the press would do here. We’re interested in getting better and that situation would be such a distraction that it would actually hinder our ability to get better."

So the fact that Thomas was one of the worst executives in league history (and was involved in the aforementioned harrassment case) wouldn't be the problem with bringing him back, but rather the press would make it such a distraction that the people paid to make the team better just wouldn't be able to go about doing their jobs competently enough.

Classic Dolan.

An interesting question posed by Vaccaro was whether or not Dolan would want to "take a mulligan" on the mammoth contract he gave Amar'e Stoudemire (Five years, just under $100 million), to which Dolan simply replied "Nope."

Dolan expanded:

"We would not be where we are today without Amar’e. That summer, the summer of “The Decision,” there were a whole bunch of free agents, and the guys put their thing together in Miami, and Amar’e agreed to come to the Knicks, gave us a launch pad by which we could convince the other guys like Tyson [Chandler] to come, and ultimately Carmelo to come play with us."

In a vacuum, giving a soon to be 28-year-old with a horrible history of knee issues approximately $20 million a year for five years is incredibly short-sighted, and it's even easier to mock the decision three years later, now that we know the ceiling of the team Amar'e 'launched' the Knicks to was probably just the second round of the playoffs, but don't forget that Stoudemire was playing some of the best basketball of his career at an MVP level in that first season in The Big Apple.

Stoudemire averaged 26.1 points, 8.6 rebounds, 2.7 assists, 2.2 blocks, and 1.0 steals per game in his first 53 games with the Knicks as the team's franchise player and go-to scorer before the trade for Anthony came about in late February 2011. He also averaged 22.4 points, 8.0 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 1.6 assists over his first two seasons with the Knicks, which included a season-and-a-half with 'Melo in the fold. Basically, while his defense usually left much to be desired, Stoudemire gave the team a couple of max-level years before his body failed him, and they wouldn't have been able to secure his services without offering him anything less than the max, so this is one deal where I can't actually blame Dolan.

Having said that, the argument can be made that with what was known to the world about Stoudemire's knees, the Knicks would have been wise to save their amnesty provision for a time when they could use it on Amar'e instead of using it immediately after the new CBA came into effect, on Chauncey Billups.

And finally, here are a few of Dolan's quotes when asked if he really believes this Knicks team can a title:

"I think this team can win a championship."

"I think there are a lot of teams that could win the championship this year. I think the Clippers can win. Are they going to? I hope not. I hope we win the championship. I think we have the pieces in place to do it. The skill level is there but there’s so much more to the game than that, and it’s really in the hands of the players."

"Can they win the championship? Yes. They definitely can win the championship. There have been other championship teams that weren’t nearly as talented as this one. But they had something that this team needs to develop."

Coming into the season, myself and most sensible NBA observers could see that the Knicks were due for a regression. When you consider the Heat, Pacers, Bulls, Spurs, Thunder, Clippers, Rockets, Warriors, Grizzlies and even the Nets (remember we're talking pre-season), the best case scenario I could come up was that New York could be the 10th or 11th-best team in the NBA, and maybe a four-seed in the East, but more likely a five or six-seed.

A 3-8 start and being without Tyson Chandler for 4-6 weeks has helped confirm this, but the truth is that the skill level, even when fully healthy, is not there. The pieces are not there. They definitely cannot win a championship as presently constructed. And remember, they have virtually no logical path to improvement over the next year or so.

Only a delusional observer with limited basketball knowledge would think otherwise. Enter James Dolan.

But what do I know, after all I'm just a writer, and Dolan's job is apparently to know more than I do.

For the full interview, check out nypost.com.