LISTEN, we’ve all been where Stephon Marbury is, OK? We’ve all had bosses we didn’t get along with. We’ve all worked for people who, in our view, treated us miserably, with disrespect, without a care for our feelings or emotions.
And you know what?
In our world, in the real world, we have two options when things reach a point close to intolerable. We either keep our mouths shut, grind through life one miserable eight-hour shift at a time, come home and pound our fists against the walls. Or we quit.
We’d all like to take the third option, which doesn’t exist in any precinct of the real world, the option where we choose insolence and insubordination and aren’t asked to pay consequences for taking that path. But in our world, in the real world, that isn’t an option. It was Johnny Paycheck who summed up perfectly the laments of workers everywhere, for all time.
Most of us just stick to singing “Take This Job and Shove It.”
We don’t actually say it. Last night, for the second time in a week – and for what has to be, has to be, the last time in his career as a Knick – Marbury was asked to suit up and play after spending the season decked out in street clothes, inactive – and, according to two sources, he refused.
Last week, in Milwaukee, Marbury tried to spin the story differently than Mike D’Antoni did, claimed the opportunity that night wasn’t as clear cut and obvious as D’Antoni said it was. It was difficult to give Marbury the benefit of the doubt then, because he hasn’t exactly built a firm wall of credibility in his time in New York.
It is impossible to do so now, because he did it again, because he turned down what amounts to an olive branch from D’Antoni that couldn’t have been easy for the coach to extend, the opportunity to be the Knicks’ starting shooting guard the rest of the season.
D’Antoni believed it was the best way to salvage what had devolved into a hideous situation: The guard-strapped Knicks would add a former All-Star to their rotation, and Marbury could prove to the eyes of league scouts that he still had enough game left for one last contract. He tried to make win-win out of lose-lose.
This was Marbury’s final chance to seize any swatch of high ground in this debate, and in his Knick career. Marbury never has been the perfect soldier as a Knick, not even close.
Still, as wonderful as it has been to see D’Antoni’s work under trying times here so far, as gratifying as it is to see a professional working the sidelines on game night, it’s hard to believe he could have handled this Marbury situation any worse, waiting until opening night to define Marbury’s role – or lack of it – with the team.
Fair enough.
Here’s the thing, though: Whether Marbury likes it, D’Antoni is his boss, regardless of the fact that he’ll make about $16 million more than the coach this year. Maybe Marbury just got used to being able to rule Isiah Thomas’ playground, stomping his feet until he got whatever he wanted, or maybe this is simply the sad climax of a coddled athlete who’s been irretrievably enabled going all the way back to Lincoln High.
Whatever. This is the end. This is the final straw, the straw that breaks forever whatever emotional, ethereal ties Marbury has to the Knicks, and the Knicks to Marbury.
Donnie Walsh has to act quickly and firmly, needs to fine Marbury for every game he refuses to play, needs to expedite making him an ex-Knick. Enough is enough.
The Knicks are desperately trying to move on, to limp into their future, to patch something credible between now and July 1, 2010.
They need to shed this albatross in order to make it happen. It’s time. It’s past time. It’s beyond past time.
michael.vaccaro@ny post.com