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Deja vu for D'Antoni: No Steph can be big step

Shaun Powell

May 13, 2008

They were together 25 days, the head coach and point guard, stuck on a bad team that was headed for a bad season.

That was five years ago in Phoenix. They wouldn't last a month together. Mike D'Antoni stayed, Stephon Marbury left, and in the long run, the Suns were better off. The very next summer, the Suns signed Steve Nash and the rest was history.

As for Marbury, he went back home to New York and the Knicks were history.

It's a weird coincidence that D'Antoni and Marbury are back together, a relationship that, like their previous one, is destined for death. Once again, they're headed for a split that'll be for the good of the team. Once again, D'Antoni will be staying and Marbury no doubt will be leaving New York, sooner if not later.

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Of course, there's an important piece of this recurring story that's a big mystery right now:

Can the Knicks transform their team by using Marbury the way the Suns did?

If the hiring of D'Antoni is going to work in New York as it did in Phoenix, then it largely depends on how drastic and effective Donnie Walsh, the team president, reshapes the Knicks. This team is stuck with bad contracts, odd-fitting pieces and a point guard who must go. The Knicks, as constituted, aren't getting better anytime soon, not with this roster, and it doesn't matter who's coaching this team, be it D'Antoni or Red Holzman. They need to throw bodies overboard, and Walsh can start with the player who symbolizes all that went wrong in the Isiah Thomas administration.

The Knicks have two choices. They can keep Marbury and allow his contract, which expires after the upcoming season, to melt off their cap. Or they can use his expiring contract in a trade to bring help.

One way or another, Marbury is going to put D'Antoni in position to win, just like in Phoenix.

If Walsh is serious about dumping salary and getting the Knicks under the cap in three years max, then he should keep Marbury and cope with the poor body language and sour attitude. Next season's going to be a wash, anyway, so this probably isn't such a bad option. If he has any pride left, Marbury will dedicate himself to basketball, clear his head and use next season to audition for his next stop. Wherever that might be. At least this way, the Knicks would be assured of at least one motivated player on the roster.

And if nothing else, by keeping Marbury, it would prove they've learned their lesson from the highly illogical Patrick Ewing trade in 2000. Remember that one? With Ewing entering the final year of his contract, the Knicks did what 99 percent of the rest of the NBA wouldn't do: trade him for a bunch of mediocre players with bad contracts, rather than keep him and let him walk the following summer. That trade officially set the tone for the Knicks this decade and they haven't dug themselves out of the rubble yet. After that, they didn't make too many playoffs but did make plenty of payoffs.

Dumping contracts, starting with Marbury's, would hasten the Knicks' ability to sweet-talk free agents into taking their money. LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh and others will come "free" in a few years and the Knicks will search for the star they'll need to justify the expensive seats and the painful recovery from Isiah.

Then there's the other approach. They can package Marbury's contract with someone else, maybe David Lee, and get more immediate help. This would make sense only if the Knicks get a good young player in return. Someone like Michael Redd of the Bucks. And provided, of course, they find someone to take another albatross off the roster to keep the payroll reasonable.

Marbury is extremely useful to the Knicks only because of his history. Every team that traded him immediately got better. D'Antoni knows this as well as anyone.

That will be on Marbury's basketball tombstone, and it's sad. Minnesota, the Nets and the Suns all used Marbury to get healthy. And someday, the Knicks, who have only one direction to go, will join them once they send Marbury on his way.

So the future of the Knicks depends on how Walsh, not D'Antoni, uses Marbury next season.