Knicks making mark on playoffs - in booth

Neil Best

April 18, 2008

For the first time since 1987 and only the third time since

the Nets moved to New Jersey, neither New York area squad qualified for the NBA postseason.

So with the playoffs set to begin tomorrow, Big Town is a small part of the story, right?

Hah!

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Take the No. 1 team from ESPN/ABC, which features the current Knicks play-by-play man, a potential future Knicks coach and a former Knicks coach who also is a potential future Knicks coach.

Not to mention a TNT analyst who is close to Donnie Walsh and, who knows, might also be in the mix for the Knicks.

Face it, America, you can't escape us, even when our teams stink.

Let's start with Mark Jackson, still with ESPN but as of Wednesday no longer at YES alongside Marv Albert on Nets games.

Hardly anyone saw the Nets' finale in Boston, which was bumped from YES by the Yankees and from Ch. 9 by Flavor Flav's spectacularly sophomoric new sitcom. (Yeah, I watched.)

Jackson rewarded the die-hards with a bombshell that took YES by surprise: With his contract expiring, he will not return next season. (Jackson did not tell YES first when he added the ESPN gig last season, so he has a history of this.)

During the telecast, Albert called Jackson's announcement, which he initially made in the third quarter, "startling." As the duo signed off, Jackson said, "Thank you, people, for letting me in your home."

Naturally, this fueled speculation that Jackson is headed to the Knicks. But he told YES executives after the game that he simply had tired of the time apart from his family, which is based in Los Angeles.

Earlier Wednesday, I asked Jackson whether he enjoys broadcasting enough to put off his longtime wish to run a team as a coach or executive.

"I've said it before: If I never coach or never run a team, I'm fine with that," he said. "I'm having a blast."

Had he heard from anyone with the Knicks? "There is no need to think about that or talk to anybody right now; those jobs are taken," he said.

Knicks play-by-play man Mike Breen interjected that in considering Jackson, teams must be aware he might install himself as a player/coach in an effort to move from second to first on the career assists list. His 10,334 trail John Stockton by 5,472. "In the 13 or 14 years it will take him to pass Stockton," Breen cracked, "he could destroy a franchise."

Yesterday, Jackson issued two statements through ESPN. About leaving YES: "I've made a decision to make ESPN and ABC the focus of my broadcasting career."

About the Knicks: "I have not spoken to anyone about any head coaching vacancies."

(Jeff Van Gundy, who partners with Breen and Jackson, also has been mentioned as an option for the Knicks.)

Breen spent Wednesday's Knicks- Pacers game discussing in blunt terms with Walt Frazier and Earl Monroe what went wrong in the Isiah Thomas era.