#new york knicks

ByJames Epstein

The Knicks are losers again after Phil Jackson failed to land his best and only head coaching candidate.

Steve Kerr just orchestrated a masterful coup, landing his first coaching gig as the head man of the Golden State Warriors.

It’s a prime situation, one that will 1) provide the economic security of a five-year, $25 million contract (more than he ever made during his playing career), 2) offer all the firepower of a roster with a strong core and the flexibility of future draft picks, 3) keep him close to his San Diego-based family and last and most importantly, 4) keep him far away from the circus that is the New York Knicks.

Coaching the Warriors is the absolute right move, and as great as it will be for Kerr, that’s how absolutely awful his decision is for the Knicks’ future.

I can’t remember a time when losing out on a coach felt this disheartening. Kerr represented many things to me, and indeed, an entire franchise struggling to reach respectability. He seemed a perfect fit with new president Phil Jackson, having benefited firsthand from Jackson’s coaching philosophies and adopted them as his own. He would have been a winner walking into a franchise of losers, having played for only top teams in the Chicago Bulls and Gregg Popovich’s San Antonio Spurs. He had the savvy and connections from his years as general manager of the then-revolutionary Phoenix Suns. Surely pairing him with Jackson would be the first major step in an organizational turnaround.

With those two at the helm, the culture would slowly change. New, better personnel would cycle in. Shrewder strategies would take root. The Jackson and Kerr combo would serve as the base-level infrastructure necessary to rebuild the Knicks and get them back on their feet.

(TIMELINE: The many failed coaches of the Jim Dolan era)

Instead, the Knicks are left in the lurch. And the irony of it all is that Kerr likely wouldn’t have garnered so much interest if Jackson hadn’t reached out to him so early and often. The courting process between the two started about a year ago, after which Kerr’s name started popping up in the conversation over nearly every head coaching vacancy, from the Lakers to the Warriors to the Utah Jazz. Given the attention, he might owe Jackson a finder’s fee.

What is certain is that Kerr didn’t do Jackson any favors when it comes to credibility. A good executive gets his man and gets the deal done. The Knicks brought their new president on board in large part for his ability to do that, to attract and cultivate talent, only to watch him bungle his first big opportunity. New York now has to launch a full-scale coaching search just two weeks from the NBA combine, with few options and a star free agent, Carmelo Anthony, mulling whether it’s worth it to stick with his mess of a franchise and at a discounted rate to boot.

There are no options as attractive as Kerr, especially with X’s and O’s guru Stan Van Gundy off the board and heading the Pistons. Jackson disciples Kurt Rambis, Tyrone Lue, Mark Madsen and Luke Walton inspire little to no confidence. Jerry Sloan and George Karl are past the headaches the Knicks are sure to give them.

That likely leaves Mark Jackson and Brian Shaw, both interesting options with potential downsides. Jackson might not be on the same page philosophically as Phil Jackson, and does his best work with point guards, which the Knicks are currently without. Shaw, meanwhile, is complicated because he’s still under contract with the Denver Nuggets.

There’s no simple path for the Knicks from here. Kerr represented the best chance to transform the franchise into a stable, forward-thinking organization. Everything else seems a gamble, another possible step deeper into the drudgery of the Jim Dolan era. Jackson’s arrival was supposed to change all that, but even he might be finding that the hole the Knicks dug themselves over the past 15 years is a bit deeper than anticipated.

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James Epstein is a contributor to Began in ‘96.