The Doom Machine (3/19): The Absurd

However sullen your existence, it is hopefully devoid of Knicks fandom. If you keep your societal contributions to a minimum there is a chance you caught the live unveiling of Phil Jackson as the new Knicks President of Basketball Operations. As torturous as 9 to 5 employment may be, the added insult of being able to watch most Knicks games after literally fighting your way home during rush hour in the most inhumane city on earth has been a prerequisite to allow yourself the joy of yesterday's event. If you have not watched I suggest you do so solely to witness James Dolan say nine words, all of them magical.
 

Dolan sat there, fresh off a panic room escape, wearing a glimmering gold watch that made it clear he is 5'7" and wealthy. Failure can be defined as kidnapping your own basketball franchise, keeping it under the floorboards for years, repenting after a viable option is presented in the form of a capable kidnapper and reassessing your kidnapping abilities to realize: "I am by no means an expert in basketball."

Well, that is a surprise because absolutely no one was ever under that impression unless Dolan was paying them to pretend his basketball expertise was an existing component of our shared reality. But this is not my Dolan nor is it yours. I expected, no, I desired denial and was in disbelief of this confession...

Until his soul returned to his body.

If you watched the press conference and arrived at the conclusion that Dolan was happy, satisfied or somewhat enthused he was seceding from the nation that is his ego it is safe to say you should never be allowed to conduct interviews for vacant positions at any organization, place of business, institution or pick-up game at your local park/recreational center. The smirk, the posture and the snickering were indicative of a reprimanded adolescent found guilty of going overboard with dad's credit card; a sorry-not sorry CEO, in other words.

Now that Jim (James to those of you that are not family friends) has expired and the Mystery of the Foul Odor in Manhattan has been solved we have some answers. The most important of these coming in the form of a wholesale throwing under the bus of everyone ever hired to make basketball related decisions since day one of Dolan's reign. For he, in the form of merciful savior, was forced to intervene when those employees were not performing at a desired level. Dolan made sure to let us all know that he never really wanted to get involved as much, and as often, as he did. This was denial topped with a martyr-flavored icing that tasted like self-sacrifice in the midst of incompetence. Perfection.

But there is no need to worry, ticket prices will not go up next season. They will surely go up for the 2015/16 campaign if the Knicks resemble anything nearing a competent professional basketball team. In which case you should only suggest watching a Knicks game at MSG after carefully considering your priorities, savings account balance, credit limit and applying for that 12 month 0% interest card with balance transfer.

Being the non-wealthy humans they are, reporters laughed at Dolan's hopeful ticket price increase quip and he was caught with a bewildered look on his face: the look of a billionaire completely missing what was so absurd about raising ticket prices on some of the most expensive ticket prices in all of sports.

Never change, Jim. Never change. 

- Alex Moran (@MoonbeanMarcos)