The Nobel Book

My thoughts on Stephon Marbury at this time…

Marbury is still young, yes, but also on the otherside, a cursed player.  Every team that traded him suddenly became good.  He’s making 21.9 million just to sit on the damn bench.  The Knicks have to get rid of him already.  It’s unfair for a talent like Marbury to just sit there when he’s perfectly healthy.  If the Knicks were that desperate to get rid of him, they should get rid of him like how the Nuggets got rid of Camby, find a team with a similar exception so the Knicks can get the minimum amount in return (ie. 2nd round draft picks).  Marbury is a talent that should not get wasted, send him to a decent team so maybe he can get a real of reality of being a role-player.

Marbury has had a negative impact on the Knicks, D’Antoni interviewed his players during the summer and many expressed displeasure playing with Marbury.  The main reason the team went against Isiah Thomas last season was due to the Marbury incident when Marbury left the team before they were going to face the Phoenix Suns.  He then returned and Isiah let him be in the starting line-up the next game, much to the displeasure to the rest of the Knicks.  Since Marbury is sitting D’Antoni is setting an example and unless one of the knicks guards get injured, Marbury is going to stay on the bench because if D’Antoni lets him play, he will lose the team like Isiah did.  D’Antoni gave him a chance in the preseason when he started one game of the last games, but his initial thoughts of Marbury were correct after Marbury had a shouting match with Eddie House of the Boston Celtics:

— “Less than two minutes into the Knicks’ 101-90 beat-down by Boston, Stephon Marbury started trading Tuesday night trash talk with Eddie House.  After Marbury drew a foul on Kendrick Perkins and hit two free throws, he turned and screamed at House, from mid court: “You’re a bum!”  When play returned to the Celtics’ side of the court, House chirped, “Don’t worry about me. You better worry about Ray Allen,” whom Marbury was guarding. Marbury shot back, “You’re nothing!” then added, “You’re caught up in basketball. Get caught up in life.”  “I’m worried about you,” Marbury blurted back before later calling the Celtics’ guard “[unprintable] garbage.”—

This was pretty much the last straw for D’Antoni and he decided to bench Marbury.

On the flip side, Marbury needs a new start, with all that happened last year with the Knicks, and also his personal life, (aunt and father dying) he needs to be put in a new situation with another franchise.  He’s still younger than the likes of Allen Iverson, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, Jason Kidd, and Kevin Garnett, and only one year older than Kobe Bryant and Dirk Nowitzski.    He’s still got a few years left.  Though I agree the knicks should get rid of him, they shouldn’t have put themselves in a situation where they pretty much are forced by their actions to sit Marbury.  Just having Marbury at the bench is a distraction for the Knicks.  If D’Antoni is telling the truth about playing for the future, he should have let Marbury play, so his trade value could still be decent, and let the Knicks organization find a suitable taker for him.  By having Marbury not playing, his “attitude” becomes more of an issue for other teams, causing his trade value to fall.  Marbury could be taking the minutes that Anthony Roberson and Marty Collins are taking, players that skill-wise do not deserve the minutes if Marbury is sitting on that bench so he can audition himself for different trade scenarios.

As for the Knicks themselves, I think they can surprise a lot of teams this year if they can control their “hot streaks.”  The knicks have many streaky players, Crawford, Nate Robinson, and Q-Rich.  Wilson Chandler has been playing consistently well, and Nate Robinson is still streaky at times but is getting better.  Crawford had a game where he scored only 1 point, not good.  I think D’Antoni’s offensive scheme is the best the knicks can do to compensate the lack of a “superstar” by having many supporting players on the team that can finish.  The lack of size and a defensive presence in the paint hurts (only 1 knick has more than 1 block total this season, wilson chandler with 3, which he got all in 1 game).  Eddy Curry is sitting on that bench and is not good for the D’Antoni offense, trade him for an atheletic big man!… maybe for Al Harrington, he wants to get traded, but i’m sure the Knicks would have to sweeten the deal more since Curry is not really a wanted player at this time.

In summary, hopefully Marbury learns from this and gets everything straightened out, snap back to reality, leave the Knicks, join a competitive team as a role player, and try to break his own curse.  Marbury is in a tough spot but if he learns from this and get out of the situation, everyone will benefit.   Oh and I think this can all happen much easier if Marbury was not his own agent, so.. get some help.