Empty the Bench

He’s not as spicy as the main courses down on Indian Row, and his numbers have headed due south since his good friend and teammate Jamal Crawford bid adieu to the 2006-07 season with a knee injury, but New York Knicks center Eddy Curry still has head coach Isiah Thomas addicted. Marc Berman for the New York Daily News reports that Thomas isn’t about to curtail his team’s steady diet of Curry:

Curry got in foul trouble and did not play the final 23 minutes, when the Knicks broke open the game in their 92-74 Garden-matinee rout of Toronto. “I’m not a drug addict, but he’s my No. 1 drug,” Thomas said. “If it got close or tight, that was the button I push. I can’t help it. It’s like I’m Pavlov’s dog. I’m pushing his button.” Told about Isiah’s “drug-addict” remark, Curry said: “It feels good that he has that type of faith in you.”

Drug addiction analogies? Pavlov references? The NY Knicks in the playoffs? What is going on in Madison Square Garden!? Though we’re not positive that Zeke was referring to Pavlov, the Russian Nobel Prize winner, and not Pavlov’s Dog, the ’70s cheese-rock band, we do know that Curry’s statistical decline has to be curtailed, and soon, if the Knicks are to make the playoffs.

Since Crawford’s departure from the active roster, Curry is averaging 14.6 points, 6 rebounds, 45% FG, and 3.75 turnovers a game; that’s nearly 5 points, 1 rebound, and 12% less than his season-long output. This decline can likely be attributed to a combination of three things: he’s played more minutes this season than during any other in his career, he’s having some difficulty adjusting to double- and triple teams on the blocks, and he’s not getting as many easy alley-oop baskets from Crawford. Four of the Knicks’ next five games are at home, and they’re currently 0.5 back from New Jersey and Indiana for the 7th and 8th seeds, respectively, in the Eastern Conference.

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