Quote:Simmons: Isiah, don't you think you're almost too obvious at this point? At least we could see both sides with some of Mitch's moves. In your case …

(Editor's note: Over the next 30 minutes, Simmons proceeded to list all of Isiah's terrible decisions since he took over the team in December 2003, in chronological order, as the crowd voraciously applauded each move, almost like how the president gets applauded over and over again during the State of the Union address. For space reasons, we're skipping to the tail end of Simmons' question.)

Thanks to all of those moves, the Knicks have more untradable contracts than everyone else in the league combined; they won't be under the cap until 2009; they have a payroll that's $50 million higher than anyone else; and they won't have a high lottery pick until 2008 because of the Curry trade. So how can you sell this as a rebuilding effort when you don't have any picks, and how can you sell this as a move to contend when none of the current guys could possibly mesh?

Isiah: That's an excellent question. The key is to make people believe you're trying something that's never been done before. In my case, I always try to acquire the best guy in the trade, regardless of whether it's a good deal or not -- then I can say I'm "stockpiling assets," which throws people off the trail a little bit. Then, I like to float big names to reporters … like right now, I'm making it seem like KG is a possibility for us, and that's why I'm gathering all of these assets. But I don't have a chance in hell of getting KG. If Minnesota trades KG, it's going to be for cap space, picks and young players, and we can't give them two of those three things. So they would never deal with us ---.

McHale: I wouldn't be so sure about that!

Isiah: Really?

Quote:"I've got a lot of e-mail on something written by a guy named Bill Simmons on ESPN.com. He bashes Houston. Please don't respond to him. Please don't ask me to respond. People write stuff like that because they're desperate for someone to read their stuff. They're doing it to push buttons. The guy couldn't be more irrelevant." -- Richard Justice writing in his Houston Chronicle blog this week

Quote:Layden: Hell, yeah. Take the Francis trade, if it happens: Logically, it makes no sense because Francis and Marbury are the same player -- expensive, shoot-first point guards with huge entourages and attitude problems who have never won anything. Even if you're getting Francis for nothing, it still makes no sense on paper.



For example, let's say you spent $3,000 on a living room sofa two years ago that you didn't really like. To make the sofa stand out a little less, you bought a leather chair for $2,200 that doesn't match --.



Simmons: Marbury is the sofa and Jamal Crawford is the chair in this case?



Layden: Precisely. And the room still looks bad. So now, you're on Craigslist and you see that someone is selling another $3,000 sofa for $900 that's almost exactly like the sofa you have. And there's no way you would ever want two big, ugly sofas in the same room. It would just look ridiculous. But your mind-set is, "Hey, how can I turn down a $3,000 sofa for $900?" So you buy the sofa and stick it in the room, which is now cluttered with stuff since you also spent another $10,000 on some crummy art, a coffee table with support problems, two giant bookcases that have to be turned sideways, some wobbly end tables and a smashed sculpture that was patched back together with duct tape. But since it's too late to go back, you spend another $5,000 on an interior decorator to make the room work. Well, you know what would happen? He wouldn't be able to make it work. You bought too much crap.



See, this is why Isiah is a genius: He's assembling the basketball version of that nightmare living room, and he has the fans convinced that either the expensive interior decorator -- in this case, Larry Brown -- will be able to make everything work, or he can somehow swap some of that furniture to one of his neighbors for a first-class piece of art. And he's spending an ungodly amount of money! And you never hear rumors that he might get fired! I think it's a tribute to him and his staff. He's the best-ever at being an atrocious GM. He really is.