Summer's been a quiet time around Knickland, thanks in no small part to the total rebuke of the notion that NBA players fall all over themselves to play for Mike D'Antoni. Not a single free agent, not fringey guys like Ramon Sessions nor silver foxes like Grant Hill, saw playing for D'Antoni as an appealing prospect. That's a disturbing thing for Knicks fans to swallow a year before they are supposed to be the beneficiaries of a shopping spree not seen since 16-year-old Nadine McCoy was let loose with her father's platinum card.
LeBron James is the killer pair of shoes for the season, of course, but he's not your typical luxury item. He won't just go to the highest bidder, or he'd already have re-signed with Cleveland, and it's not just a matter of whether he fits. That's why there's so much reading of tea leaves going on.
He loves Woody Allen movies! Yay! He hates faddish pizza trends! Boo! He wears Yankee caps! Yay! He calls people who serve drinks bartenders, not mixologists! Boo!
That's why it's always nice to get a clearcut signal. LeBron's mother, Gloria, was at a party for a new book about James in Manhattan this week, and Page Six reports that she said "he's a hometown boy" when asked about coming to live and play in New York. Mrs. James surely knows her son well, but parents tend to have a slightly skewed vision of what their child is really like so it's probably not worth writing things off just yet.
Especially not if Cablevision is planning to give LeBron his own channel as part of his deal to come to the Knicks. That's what Frank Isola of the Daily News reports, and, frankly, Mama James is a far more credible source. How would the owner of a team giving a free agent player his own channel not make a mockery of the salary cap that David Stern holds so dear? What's the point of the cap if Paul Allen could sign a player for X amount of money to play for the Lakers, and then give him 50 million more for being his software beta tester?
There's no way that this should be able to happen, even if you'd be willing to subject yourself to hours of watching such a channel if it meant LeBron would be on the Knicks. There's no way it will happen, not while Stern is still breathing, but it's a good way to dip back into the LeBron rumor mill which will churn uncontrollably this season.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City and is a contributor to FanHouse.com and ProFootballTalk.com in addition to his duties for NBCNewYork.com.
