From Bill Simmon's article in the Dec. 17 issue of ESPN Magazine:
After four years of enduring Isiah Thomas and James Dolan's screwing up their beloved franchise, a seedy sexual-harassment trial and a Marbury-Isiah feud have pushed the collective venom and hopelessness to a new level. Stuck "rooting" for another expensive, unlikable lottery team, Knicks fans have morphed into a loony hybrid of pre-2004 Red Sox fans and PETA members protesting the latest fur-ridden fashion show. They don't just hate what has happened to their team, they actually hate their team..."
". . .Still, it's a stretch to assign the phrase "long-suffering" to Knicks fans, no matter how fervently they believe it fits.. . "
"Just look at what's happened to the Blazers since they won the 1977 title. They saw a potential dynasty implode when Bill Walton's fragile feet couldn't carry them. They drafted Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan, for heaven's sake. And although they won 179 times from 1990 to '92 and made the Finals twice, they infamously self- destructed in countless close games. During Game 7 of the 2000 Western finals, they mailed in one of the mammoth choke jobs in NBA history. In this decade alone, they've suffered through the much-despised Jail Blazers era and a prolonged rebuilding project that was capped off by having Greg Oden fall into their laps, only to have his rookie season derailed before it began. Imagine if the timeline in the previous paragraph had been the Knicks'. We'd never hear the end of it. So why haven't the previous three decades of Blazer woes received as much attention as the travails of the Knicks have? Because they don't play in New York, that's why. The Knicks have the most fans, the most writers, the most people dissecting the team ... I mean, how many Blazers fans have you met in your life? Two?
How true, how true. . I hate my Knicks right now. But I'm still a Knicks fan!
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