James Dolan & Isiah Thomas Interview Transcript

Q: Why did it [the situation with Larry Brown] take 40 days to iron out?
James Dolan: There are a lot of things that came into play. First off, it was not a decision that was easy to make and there were a lot of different factors that went into the consideration, not just what ultimately happened, but when we called the meeting. You will understand us as we talk more about the issues that we had between the coach and the rest of the organization. The first thing that you probably should be surprised to know is that I never received a phone call from Larry Brown - at least not a phone call asking for a meeting. It is not like Larry doesn’t know how to get a hold of me and it’s not that we didn’t talk before. When we were playing Cleveland and he had health issues, and I sent a company plane to go get him. It’s not that we didn’t have a relationship and it’s not like he couldn’t have called me. Second of all, he asked for the meeting first from Isiah and then he went over Isiah’s head to Steve. Then when Isiah called him back, he wouldn’t return Isiah’s phone calls. Then finally, from a team perspective, from a business perspective, we didn’t need to make this decision until we did. The only factor that was in there that weighed against waiting was basically you guys - all the press. I try to not make my decisions by what the press says. The press tells me, ‘I should have a meeting’ - it’s not that immediately I think to myself I shouldn’t have a meeting, but I do look at it and I say why am I having this meeting? The fact is that there was nothing going on basketball-wise or business-wise to make the decision. I have one employee who is not returning the phone calls of his boss and I’m not necessarily going to react until I need to. There was some hope that it would clear up without me and I also deliberated whether I should get involved at all. But finally it came down to the draft coming up soon and the other thing is that we knew that in Larry’s contract there is a clause that calls for any disputes to be arbitrated by the commissioner and he was obviously in the middle of the Finals and all the issues that went along with that. The timing that ended up being the timing is based on all of those factors. I would have to say that the primary one was that I really felt that there was no real good business-basketball-reason other than the press pushing us on this one, and I just didn’t want to make the decision based on what was written in the paper.

Q: He hoped it would be resolved with you?
James Dolan: He wants a meeting with me, essentially the chairman and CEO. He’s got a person he directly reports to, Isiah. He’s got a person who Isiah directly reports to, Steve Mills and then me. There were issues that precipitated this that I hoped would be resolved, which would possibly mean we wouldn’t have a meeting. Those issues never did get resolved. What you didn’t ask me, what you were supposed to start off with, was why I fired Larry?

Q: Why did you fire Larry?
James Dolan: I don’t want to get overly specific about it. It is at least my contention that Larry never intended to coach this team beyond this season. We had issues throughout the season with our coach. We had issues with our press policy. Let me start off by saying something about that. When I went to Larry Brown’s house, I think [media] were outside. We had a very specific discussion before we hired Larry about the press policy. The press policy basically is that we never communicate to our employees through the press. We don’t use the press as the medium by which we talk to each other. I’m sure all of you remember the days of Jeff Van Gundy and Ernie Grunfeld, and the circus that that was, and that’s how we came to that decision about that policy. I think it’s a well founded policy. Larry absolutely agreed to that policy and said he completely understood it and thought it was the right thing and understood that we had a press department and division headed by Mr. Watkins here, and that he and his team would be with Larry whenever he had press availability, and that was no problem with Larry and he completely understood that. To go into the season and so quickly start having our players be talked to through the press was a surprise.

Q: How do you know his intent?
James Dolan: I think that there is a stack of evidence that high. On top of which after a month of this where Isiah went down and talked to him, Steve went down and talked to him and finally I went down and talked to him. We went through what the press policy is and how to prepare and answer questions so you don’t say something that you don’t intend to say. I have to reiterate my contention that it was intentional. Second, it may be one of the more disturbing things here, is that we couldn’t get Larry to focus on his job. Larry wanted to focus on Isiah’s job and in fact we had several instances where Larry goes and talks to a GM of a team or an assistant GM of a team, and starts to negotiate a trade. We actually had two instances where Isiah was negotiating with a team and the GM said, ‘That’s great, but I got a better offer from your coach.’ We brought this to Larry, we talked to him. I talked to him about it and said it can’t be - you have to focus on coaching. Tell us what you want in the team and Isiah will do his job and go out and get the players that you want. We actually went through a series of meetings on this, discussing what the makeup of the team would be. I attended the first couple of them to make sure that everything was on track with it and continuing to reiterate to both Isiah and Larry, but particularly to Larry, to do your job, not the other guy’s job. We continued to have these problems. In fact we continued to have these problems going up past the end of the season. I have this piece of paper in front of me and I’ll tell you why in a minute. Larry obviously lost the team. I think you guys who are the beat writers probably know that as well as anybody else. It is no surprise that he lost the team because when you talk to your players through the press rather than talking to them directly, it creates animosity and a lack of respect and I was also faced finally with the situation where towards the end where Larry was no longer talking to his boss and literally refused to talk to his boss. He did things like have his secretary return his phone call or his agent. The reason that I have this paper in front of you is because we went into that meeting on Thursday, and I’m telling you, that I went into that meeting hoping, thinking that we were going to have Larry Brown as our coach next year, that there was a way that this could work and I literally wrote down how we can make it work, how we can get past the problems. To be honest with you, if we could get past the problems, and we could get back the guy who is supposed to be the Hall of Fame coach that was going to nurture our team, do the things he said he was going to do when he came on - that we had every reason to expect that he was going to do and to be honest, why anybody would pay someone $10 million to do this job was to expect that he was going to help build this team. We were rebuilding. We still are rebuilding, and that Larry Brown had a reputation of being able to build, and Larry Brown agreed that that was what he was going to do. So my thought was that going into this meeting was to if we can get back to that person, if we can get that person into coaching the team and get that person to cooperate with the rest of the organization and be part of the organization that it would be a great thing. And no, I did not want to have to pay him $40 million. But I have to tell you what happened in that meeting. I couldn’t get Larry to acknowledge one of these things. Not one of them. I had a plan if he was willing to acknowledge them, how he would correct them, how he would go forward, how he would stay coach and I actually told him at the meeting, ‘I’m here to figure out how to go forward together. I need you to acknowledge these things.’ They are not in our head, they are not fictional, these things happen and they can’t continue to happen and have us go forward. He would not acknowledge that they happened. He would not acknowledge that there was a problem, and in fact said that we had to change out essentially all but five or six players of the team and proposed that we take on another $180 million of salary. We’re talking over $200 million. He wanted those five or six players waived.

Q: Is that why you knew he didn’t had any intention of wanting to come back?
James Dolan: He knew that wasn’t possible. Essentially that’s what happened, after the season ended, and we met with you guys, and we brought in Larry afterwards - he told us this afterwards - I think this is how this rumor started. He essentially told us that if you don’t do this stuff, if you don’t use the midlevel exception, and trade away your expiring contracts to take on more dough, then we must not really want to improve the team and we must not really want him as a coach.

Isiah Thomas: He said that at the end of the season. If we weren’t willing to change the players and trade the contracts what we had this year, then what we had this year is what you are going to see next year.

James Dolan: At the Thursday meeting when we told him that we didn’t know we could make all of those trades, he said then, ‘Well, if you are telling me that you are going to make me play all these players, I am going to cut and waive five to six players, equaling almost $180 million straight dollars.’ Look at it this way, he can’t because he is not in my shoes. He is saying, ‘I am going to make you fire me.’

Q: Could you have done what other bosses could do and make him resign?
James Dolan: No, he wouldn’t resign. The day after the rumor came out, his agent came up and said ‘He is not resigning.’

Q: It sounds like what you’re saying is you are describing criminal fraud? He never intended to go beyond the season?
James Dolan: I am not saying that. You are not getting that out of me. I can’t say that, but in that Thursday meeting, I think he came into that meeting with the frame of mind that he was not going to coach this team and he was not interested in finding a way to coach this team.

Q: Can you understand his thinking because the story was not denied for 40 days?
James Dolan: I understand that he said he wanted us to come out right away and say, ‘Larry is our coach’ or ‘Larry is not our coach.’ But you have to understand, in-between the time we first said that and when this rumor came out, the discussions with Isiah and Steve left us in a position where I could’ve just told you guys that he is still our coach. And this same thing could have happened. Maybe I should have been condemned for that even though knowing there was a possibility he wasn’t our coach, a real possibility. I could have just told you he was and you all would have been surprised before last Thursday. Believe it or not, we actually do value our relationship with you guys. We try not to ever speak a mistruth or misstep or you clearly would have known.

Q: When you say intended to be fired, you mean everything to be included?
James Dolan: That all built up to a very tough situation. Adding up to what you just said are the Jalen Rose and Steve Francis trades. No less than three weeks after we made $80 million worth of transactions and added $80 million to our salary cap - three weeks I was told that these guys are no good. We have to get rid of them. And how do I take that? Upon hearing after the season was over - after we reaffirmed him as a coach - to hear we should make another huge roster change and eat another huge amount of money. How do I confidently go into that? To be honest, it is real difficult to do. But the fact we had had both the Francis and Jalen trades and the trades he asked for that didn’t happen.

Q: When did your mind change that this isn’t working?
James Dolan: Not really until those 40 days. You all know me. You covered me enough. I am a rather stubborn individual when it comes to people that I work with. I believe in backing them up and giving them as many chances as possible. Unless they do something that is really erroneous, I will give them a chance. I just point to our experience with the hockey team, but it was worth it, because I had a guy there making the right decisions - and you just didn’t like the record and there a lot of things they didn’t like - but I do, and he was doing the right things.

Q: Was there a point in this thing when you said Larry doesn’t want to coach this team?
James Dolan: When Isiah and Steve reported back to me the conversation they had around the second week of May. That Larry had reported that we are going to have to do all these trades in order for things to be better and we needed to prove to him that we wanted him to be a coach. At that point, there were real misgivings in my mind. I never really thought this would end with him being gone. But not before that. I was unhappy but I also just signed a guy for $50 million for five years. I was very motivated to keep him as the coach.

James Dolan: I was not convinced until in the Thursday meeting. Because of the things I just told you about what we bought up: working with the general manager, being a coach and not being the guy who did the trades, following the press policy, working with the players, trying to gain his players confidence and really being a part of the team. You do those things that we’re not really asking an awful lot, to follow the press policy, to not do your boss’ job and doing things you are known to be good at. I can come with this list to any employee who wants to keep their job and I am telling you, any employee will do these things. He would agree that they are not going to interfere with trades. I couldn’t even get an acknowledgement. If you can’t get an acknowledgement, then you sure you are not going to get any changes ahead.

Q: Do you think he came last season with the intention to not coach?
James Dolan: No, I didn’t say that. My opinion of that meeting is that he didn’t want to coach the New York Knicks. When you ask me how much earlier he had decided, it’s all speculation in my mind. What I know at that meeting he was offered an easy opportunity to move forward with this organization and he elected not to take it. That told me he didn’t want to have this job. There was a piece of paper where we agreed on how we were going to go forward. He should have signed it. I signed it. Isiah was going to sign it too. He did not get an opportunity because he never acknowledged any of the things that were in here.

Steve Mills: One of the most telling things, from my opinion, just as you guys are wondering what is on that piece of paper. We laid out all the issues that we had with Larry and what we thought needed to be approved upon, and not once did he ask to see the piece of paper.

Q: Didn’t you know from Larry’s history that he acts this way?
James Dolan: We did our homework and we were very thorough about it, just as you guys were warned and everything else. We thought that from the research that you did, these issues didn’t arise until after the second or third year. They didn’t start happening the first two, three months.

James Dolan: Let me give you a sound bite. We made a mistake hiring Larry Brown. The shoulda, woulda, coulda. I’ve gone over it in my head a bunch of times, Isiah has too, Steve, we all sat around talking about how can we be in this position but the fact is we made a mistake.

Q: But you had a relationship with him for a long time.
Isiah Thomas: I don’t know. We needed Larry Brown. Me more so than anyone. I wanted Larry to do a great job for us and I thought he would and I thought he could. We needed the things that he was bringing on his resume because we were going through a rebuilding phase and we needed credibility with our fans. We thought we could borrow off of some of the things he was bringing. What really disappointed me, after the story broke, we would have our workouts and I would go and speak to him and I treated him very professionally. Then he turned around and went out publicly and said to you guys that I wasn’t speaking to him and he gave the impression that I wasn’t speaking to him and that wasn’t true at all. I said to his agent, Joe Glass, why is it that you are calling me and I’m not speaking to Larry, and Larry won’t return any of my phone calls?

Q: When he is criticizing players, do you take it personally?
Isiah Thomas: All of those things had been talked about, suggested, rumored, as a manager and as a member of the Knicks organization, I couldn’t allow myself to think that way or believe that.

Q: Has it set you back?
Isiah Thomas: It definitely was a set back, however it’s not one that we can’t and won’t recover from.

Q: Are you heartbroken?
Isiah Thomas: A little heartbroken, a little pissed off. Depending on the day we talk about it, you either get to be the heartbroken guy or the pissed off guy.

Q: You knew what kind of players Larry wanted before you hired him.
Isiah Thomas: We were moving towards that. When Larry got here, we had Tim Thomas, Sweetney, the guys that we were taking into the camp and then we had a chance to trade for Eddy Curry and Larry was heavily involved in that trade. Then we brought in Qyntel Woods. He liked all three rookies that we drafted. He likes Jackie Butler and he was on and off about Quentin Richardson, Malik Rose and we go and we make the trade for Francis, Jalen Rose. He and Marbury: one day they were together and then the next day, they weren’t. Some days Marbury could play for him, some days he couldn’t. So when you talk about the scope of the roster…

Q: You thought Steve Francis was a Larry Brown-type player?
James Dolan: Larry Brown thought Steve Francis was a Larry Brown type of player.

Isiah Thomas: At that point in time, we were chasing Earl Watson.

James Dolan: When you sign a contract with a guy like we signed with Larry, you are really - we were invested in him, significantly invested in him. And in fact we made both the Steve Francis and Jalen Rose trades based on him. It should have been a real re-affirmation to Larry Brown that this team was willing to do the things necessary in order to get him the team that he wants.

Q: What’s in the contract? Did you want Stern in specifically?
James Dolan: What the contract does say is that this goes to the commissioner. Any disputes at all go to the commissioner. It is not common for us and we’ve never done it before. That was at Larry Brown’s insistence. David Stern knows about it. It was at Larry’s request. Whatever the commissioner decides, if it is to pay him all of the money, or none of the money, we will have nothing more to say about it and we will just do as we are told – we will be moving on. He has not at this point contested the contract. We stopped paying him. As far as we know, he has not contacted the commissioner’s office.

Q: Do you think you will have to make a presentation?
James Dolan: I don’t know. I assume we go in and tell our story, the way we see it and Larry gets to tell his story, but the resolution is completely in his discretion.

Q: In Memphis it was clear you did not back Larry.
James Dolan: A good portion of what was going wrong, had already gone wrong at that point. I had 50 million reasons to stay with this and if I thought there was any chance that we could have next season the Larry Brown that everyone thought we were gonna get, I would jump through hoops for that, but I don’t believe that there was any opportunity to do that.

Q: We have a great idea what Larry did, but why did you make Isiah the coach too?
James Dolan: There is a change here that some of you haven’t heard before. I’m saying this right with Isiah here. This is his team. He made this bed. There is nobody better than him to make this thing go forward. But he has to do that and he has one season to do that. At this time next year, Isiah will be with us if we can all sit here and say that this team has made significant progress towards its goal of actually becoming a championship team. If we can’t say that, then Isiah will not be here. I’m saying that to you with him right here. As I said, it’s his team, his responsibility. I believe he can do it, I believe he will do it, and the team will be completely behind Isiah and that they are going to want to prove him right too and that you are gonna see a real motivated effort from the New York Knicks next season. But we do have to be sitting here next year saying we made progress, we are getting closer. It should be evident progress. I’m not gonna put a number on that. I’m hoping that we are sitting here mid-season saying we already got evident progress. Isiah has the full season to do this and it is his ship to steer, ship to make go fast, to crash, his ship.

Q: Clear and public pressure?
Isiah Thomas: I’ve been in pressure situations before. All my life it’s been about pressure and having to get it done. Just because you say it publicly, it does not make me afraid of it or make me shy away from it.

Q: Is it fair?
Isiah Thomas: I believe in the players and what I’ve put together and we’ll make it work.

Q: What will your coaching staff look like?
Isiah Thomas: I like the guys that we have now. I’ve yet to talk to Phil Ford. I’ve had a great discussion with Dave Hanners and he wants to stay on board, and I’d like to keep him on board. Phil hasn’t returned yet from Carolina. When he returns, I’ll sit down and talk to him. We will keep everything as is.

Q: Why do you think you are right for the job?
Isiah Thomas: I’d rather bet on myself. If my career is in the hands of someone else, it is not something I have a lot of faith in.

Q: At the exit meetings, all of the players talked bad about Larry.
Isiah Thomas: I’m done discussing Larry Brown.

Q: Was coaching this team your first choice?
Isiah Thomas: My first choice was to work it out with Larry Brown. I needed Larry and I gave him 50 million bucks. This is a situation that I’m in and I’ll handle it and I’ll make it work.

Q: Larry did not believe in these players, but will you make more changes?
Isiah Thomas: I’ll continue to try to make changes to better improve the team. But at the end of the day I want to do what is best for the Knicks organization. My goal is pretty clear. There is not a player on this roster now, who doesn’t understand or believe that if he is not performing, I don’t have problems getting rid of them.

Q: Will you add more staff to do the nuts and bolts?
Isiah Thomas: There are a lot of people behind this thing that you guys have not met. There is a multi-structure that will be able to handle everything that comes into play.

Q: Was this a choice or a demand?
Isiah Thomas: Actually it’s challenging. I don’t think there is anybody else in the League forced to probably work under this situation. However that’s how it is.

Q: Do you think you became a target of the fan’s wrath?
James Dolan: That’s what you get when you only win 23 games. I don’t think any team can prove, especially with that type of record, especially having made the moves we made with the high payroll we have, and we had the coach with the highest payroll. I am not shying away from it. I understand people think we are in a bad situation. They have to look at ownership if ownership is responsible and that is the job I took. When I don’t want it, I’ll not do it, but right now I want it. I still plan on doing the job. I think basically I deserve everything I am getting in terms of fan’s disappointment. I don’t blame them one bit. That’s what goes with the territory. I am going to do my job. I still make my decisions based on the facts in front of me for my team and hope that we get there. Do I think we made mistakes? Yes. Do I expect people to understand that and be apathetic? No and that’s ok.

Q: Can you talk about the draft?
Isiah Thomas: I would say it’s a very interesting draft because we really don’t have a great feel with what’s happening before us. A lot of teams are talking trades but really haven’t settled on the directions they want to go. But sitting on 20 and 29, you think you are trying to catch what’s falling to you. I would still like to get more athletic and have players that can really cover what’s going on in the game. When you look at the way teams are playing and shooting the three ball, you really have to extend your defense. You really have to cover the three point line. You have to be quicker to get out there to cover the paint. The type of athletes we draft still need types of versatility on the defense side of the ball, run the offense. You should still be concerned on the offense side of the ball

Q: Are you looking for needs?
Isiah Thomas: Where we sit now, I don’t think we have the luxury of the 20 teams before us. I think we are going after the best players we can get on the board.

Q: Do you want both picks?
Isiah Thomas: If it fills a need, if it fills a rebuilding situation. And my goal is to fill and rebuild and I am not going to be shortsighted. So there is pressure on me to do big things here. I won’t shortchange the Knicks organization. I like our young players. I’ve been in this situation before in Indiana where they were rebuilding and the first year they were in transition and a .500 team, and the second year that was when we really started the rebuilding phase and got a little younger and we ended up going to the playoffs all three years. So I am confident and very secure in working with young players and helping them develop and helping them move along the path.

Q: What’s at stake for Steve [Mills]?
James Dolan: Steve has responsibilities that transcends the Knicks. They go to the Rangers. They are with all teams at Madison Square Garden and sports that we our trying to evolve outside of Madison Square Garden. I have been very pleased with Steve and he is doing a great job. I will continue to want his council and I continue to want him to stay on that job.

Q: Have you spoken to Pat Riley and asked for his counsel on doing both jobs now?
Isiah Thomas: I will speak to him.

Q: Will David Stern have final say in the arbitration?
James Dolan: That’s the intention of the clause and it’s very specific - that no one will debate it. It’s completely in his discretion. I don’t know why they wanted it. But clearly they are the ones who asked for it, not us.