What was Isiah's Worst Deal?

[duetta]

Here's your chance to weigh in on the question that every NBA GM is asking...

[drj]

Oooh, tough question! I'm leaning to the Curry trade, with Marbury a very close second. Also worth mentioning (though probably not quite so awful) was trading Moochie (expiring) and a #2 pick for Mo Taylor.

And what about his coach hirings?
-Lenny "the corpse" Wilkens
-Larry "the tank" Brown
Or his FA signings?
-JJ1
-JJ2

So much to choose from!

[drj]

Also: it may be too early to judge whether the Marbury trade was more unbelievably god-awful for us than the Curry trade, until we know how high a pick we wind up surrendering to Utah.

[Neb]

That deal with the Devil.

Worst for us, that is.

[ElMatatan]

Without a doubt the Steve Francis trade..

[superjay779]

Larry Browns steve francis trade was the worst in franchise history. I'm so happy he's out of here. Now Isiah needs to go next.

[KnicksGadfly]

i kinda miss those lotto picks now. what the hell have we been doing the last few seasons?

[gr3en]

Steve Francis trade. That was redundant and led to an equally redundant trade for Zach Randolph. We should have at least gotten some future picks.

[StutterStep]

EASILY. The CURRY Trade!!

I hated it when it first happened.

Got lukewarm to it last year.

This year, I realized that, as others said, Isiah used a 3-card monty scheme to up Curry's value last year.

The only problem: he should have dumped the lazy MOFO after doing so.

[Deeeez Knicks]

The Marbury trade.

It started this whole maddness under Isiahs watch (McDyess for Penny for Francis for Randolph) and forced us into a lot of other short sighted moves. The contracts we got back from that deal are still haunting us to this day.

If we didnt do that deal we would have been forced to let McDyess expire and we coulda been much closer to rebuilding.

Plus the pick we gave up looks pretty good as there were a lotta decent players there and we still owe one more pick.

[kosmovitelli]

As I said a zillion times, the Marbury trade is the worst trade Isiah ever made.

Technically, it may not be the worst trade (Curry might have my vote) but I say it's the worst simplye because it's the one that started the terrible spiral of overpaying for marginal talent.

When Isiah Thomas was named GM (december 22, 2003), he started pretty good, he took time to think and decided who he should he keep and who he should let go.
He claimed he waived Zlavko Vranes because he didn't work hard in practice and wasn't good enough for the NBA. He considered buying out Weatherspoon and finally traded him for back up PG Moochie Norris (one of our biggest need at the time), I thought he did a great job at the time. I couldn't believe he was able to trade Spoon.
Isiah did a solid work the first month, he found out who he needed to get rid of and who he needed to keep.
Everything was going well. Isiah inherited of a team with a 10-18 record and after he was named GM the team lost one game and then had a 4 game winning streak. Isiah pumped the team. We had Keith Van Horn, Allan Houston, Kurt Thomas and Antonio McDyess (coming back from a season ending injury) so contrary to popular belief that team wasn't garbage. It was surely a flawed team (hence the losing record) but not a terrible team (like the one we have now), we could work with that team. You could either blow up the team or rebuild on the fly. Isiah had the choice. If Isiah added a good distributor (like Cassel) and a PF (like Rasheed Wallace), he could have tried to win now and rebuild on the fly at the same time. With the expiring contracts, Sweetney, Lampe (who somehow had value at the time) and the picks if needed, Isiah should have done a much better job.

So after one month, the infamous Stephon Marbury trade happened then it was over. Isiah Thomas gave up all the assets he had : the expiring contract of McDyess, Charlie Ward's unguaranteed contract (the Spurs wanted to trade for Ward at the time, they were delighted when they signed him after he was waived by the Suns), Lampe, Vujanic's rights and two first round picks (one unprotected and one protected throught 2010).
Not only Isiah surrendered all that to get Marbury but he also accepted to take back Penny Hardaway's horrendous deal.

It's one of the worst horrible trades I've ever seen because Isiah compounded the mistakes :
1. He traded for a player that didn't fit the team
2. He traded first round picks (including one unprotected)
3. He took back long term contracts

Horrible deal on all accounts.
I will even add one more : this deal pumped the fans (and the ownership) and made them believe the Knicks were back on track and only needed one or two additional trades.
They thought we were one or two players away from being a contender.

So it led Isiah to trade KVH (who played well for us) for Tim Thomas and Nazr, expiring contracts for Jamal Crawford and so on.

The Hawks traded Rasheed Wallace for expiring contracts and a late first round pick. Isiah could have traded McDyess and Sweetney for Rasheed Wallace. Not only Sheed was a dominant PF (one of our biggest need with the PG position) but he only had 4 months remaining on his contract. Basically you trade for Sheed, see what happens and decide if you keep him or sign and trade him to another team. Instead Isiah traded for the albatross contracts of Marbury and Penny. Monumental mistake. That's when everything went wrong. Isiah started good the first month but with the acquisition of Marbury and Penny he made the team derail.

After the acquisition of Marbury it was a chase for an elusive playoff spot. Isiah Thomas moves got him into a tight corner, after that he could no longer rebuild (even on the fly), he tried to chase the playoffs at all costs.

The Marbury trade is also his worst move because he gave a signal to all other NBA teams. With Layden, the whole league considered us as the garbage disposal of the NBA. The only team where you could turn instantly an albatross contract into an expiring contract. The Mavericks dumped Howard Eisley on us, the Rockets did the same with Shandon Anderson, etc.
I (and so did most people) thought it was a regime change after Layden was fired. Keep in mind also after the Dice trade, Layden didn't made any bonehead trade. In the next 18 months he only traded Spree for KVH (not a bad trade, he didn't add too much salary and both players had same value). The Marbury trade changed everything, it gave a signal to other teams that we were back on business and ready to accept garbage contracts for marginal talent upgrade. We were ready to trade short contracts for longer contracts in order to win now.
The other side-effect of the Marbury trade is the fact we traded two first round picks (including one unprotected, pretty rare to see a team trade an unprotected pick) and two second round picks. We gave a signal we didn't mind trading picks. The whole league probably laughed and all NBA teams played the same game : try to dump albatross contracts on us and try to steal away draft picks.
If you take a look at the Curry trade, it's quite obvious John Paxson used the Marbury trade as a blueprint.
For Marbury Isiah traded an unprotected first round pick (2004) + a future protected pick (until 2010) + two 2nd round picks + expiring contracts.
For Curry, Isiah traded an unprotected first round pick (2006) + a swap of first round picks (2005) + two 2nd round picks + Sweetney + a swap of expiring contracts (Antonio Davis and Tim Thomas).


All things considered, the Marbury trade is by far Isiah's worst trade and one of the worst Knicks trades I've ever seen. Monumental mistake that set back the franchise for years. When you have no plan and no direction, you're bound to make a mistake like that but this one was monumental.
The Ewing trade was the turning point for Layden. Marbury is a similar mark for Thomas, a historical change of course for us. And I didn't even mention, thanks to that trade, we still a first round pick to the Jazz. We are handcuffed by that debt to the Jazz. Complete disaster.

[Balkman32]

The one that hurts the most is Marcus Camby and NeNe for Officer McDuffy

[Balkman32]

Thanks Layden

[Lockdown]

As I said a zillion times, the Marbury trade is the worst trade Isiah ever made.

Technically, it may not be the worst trade (Curry might have my vote) but I say it's the worst simplye because it's the one that started the terrible spiral of overpaying for marginal talent.

Fantastic post, that pretty much nailed all of it. That should be required reading for the Cosellouts of the world.

[bringinhinkie]

KVH for TT

killed our chemistry, van horn and marbury were VERY good together, i believe we may have even been in first when the trade went down in the atlantic??(im not sure but we were winning).. salary-wise and value wise not the biggest blunder, but it killed ANY chemistry we have had in the last couple years

in 47 games he avgd 16.4ppg 7.3rpg 2apg .4bpg (same as curry) on 45% shooting..

edit: we were 2nd in the atlantic at 25-29 at the allstar break.. not great but MUCH better than recent years

[DoubtingThomas]

His next one.

[stuporman]

The one where he put his signature on the contract to be part of the Knicks organization.

[-Ducky-]

KVH for TT

killed our chemistry, van horn and marbury were VERY good together, i believe we may have even been in first when the trade went down in the atlantic??(im not sure but we were winning).. salary-wise and value wise not the biggest blunder, but it killed ANY chemistry we have had in the last couple years

in 47 games he avgd 16.4ppg 7.3rpg 2apg .4bpg (same as curry) on 45% shooting..

edit: we were 2nd in the atlantic at 25-29 at the allstar break.. not great but MUCH better than recent years

This one is underrated. Van Horn was getting 20 pts nightly and hitting open 3's with Marbury. Its ironic cause Marbury, Kurt Thomas and Van Horn really gelled on the court, but for w/e reason Marbury couldn't get along with either of them.

[James_Dolan]

The next one he makes because 1. it guarantees he still has a lot of power with the Knicks and 2. it will be him trading from a point of desperation.

[Jemini80]

you have to go to the trade that started this all off, the marbury trade.