Knicks fans should boo themselves

By Max J. Dickstein, amNewYork Sports Editor | mdickstein@am-ny.com

December 21, 2007

The contagious negativity surrounding the basketball team that plays at Madison Square Garden has infected the Knicks' loyal fans, to everyone's detriment.

Always irrepressibly forthright, Knicks fans have become something of a Bronx-cheering mob, showering boos on their team and "Fire Isiah" chants on the hated Teflon coach and general manager, Isiah Thomas.

But Knicks ticket holders have not adopted a uniformly abrasive tone.

"As long as they're putting in an effort, I'll never boo my own team," said Mitchell Hauser, 47, a season-ticket holder for 20 years. "Booing should be reserved for the refs and the other team."

When it was reported last week that Thomas told fans during a game that they were being a poor "sixth man," the disaffected Hauser reluctantly agreed with Thomas.

"Knicks fans don't act like the sixth man and cheer," said Hauser. "That's 100 percent right."

On Wednesday, protesters brandished a "pink slip" for Thomas, exhibiting the huge placard -- undersigned by "New York Knicks Fans" -- to media at the Garden gates.

Jon Combs-Schilling, a 28-year-old New Yorker observing the cacophony from California, said some of his fellow, frustrated Knicks fans are at cross-purposes with their goals. "They can at times be quite brutal and exacerbate problems through their rage," said Combs-Schilling. "Not that they're wrong, but I don't know if they help. They oftentimes perpetuate the cycle that they're trying to break."

The Knicks fleetingly placated fans with a 108-90 blowout of Cleveland the night of the protest, but there was still the specter of more wretched Garden unrest.

Monday's result, when lowly Seattle took advantage of the listless Knicks (8-17) for a 117-110 win, was a more typical offering to the Garden faithful, who are still filling up 96.6 percent of the arena each game.

Sonics coach P.J. Carlesimo, a Fordham graduate who once coached at Seton Hall, slowly shook his head when asked about Knicks fans' behavior.

"New York fans, in general, are the best fans in the world," Carlesimo said.

"It doesn't help the situation -- the players or the coaches -- to have to experience that. It just makes it a little tougher, a little more uncomfortable. I'll tell you what: if you're sitting on the other bench, it certainly doesn't disturb you."