Knicks and Rangers Fooled Me Again

"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — [pauses] — shame on you. Fool me — [pauses] — You can't get fooled again." -
George W. Bush

There really isn't much to say after last night's loss

I've been trying to write this blog post all day but it has been tough to figure out where to begin. I think that quote from Dubya seems like as good a place as any. As I look down at my hands to find that I've bitten through all my nails, I wonder how we got here? When the season started there was no reason to think that the New York Rangers or New York Knicks were real contenders. Heck, a few days before their regular seasons, I was going to be happy if one of them made it out of the first round. This is a Rangers team that got the ultimate luck to even get into the playoffs and a Knicks team that started calling random games must-wins down the stretch because they looked so helpless.

And yet I sit here with that uneasy feeling in my stomach thinking about my two teams from Madison Square Garden.

The problem is that I got fooled into thinking that they were better than they were. The Rangers have been a gritty, gutsy team that you love to root for. They block shots, they check, they forecheck, and they really seem to leave it all on the ice. Their best player is their goalie and the rest of their team is young and inexperienced and missing some of their top line forwards to injury. And yet I sat there last night thinking that a 3-0 lead was safe and lamenting that they didn't win a very winnable Game 1 because they could have been up 3-1 in the series.

Then the Caps scored two quick goals and I sadly knew the game was over. Reality set in. I sat there for the rest of the third and two overtimes just waiting for the Caps to win the game. You knew that the Rangers chances would fall by the wayside either because of a bad call or because the referee couldn't get out of their goddamn way. You knew that going 0-7 on the powerplay was going to kill them just as every poor game with the man advantage has killed the Rangers all season long. And you knew a fluky goal was going to put their season on the brink--and then it happened (off the stick of Gaborik of all people).

The problem is that the same exact thing also happened to the Knicks just a day earlier. Faced with a second consecutive chance to steal a game in Boston, the Knicks fell apart at the end. While the Rangers are young and inexperienced, they play a mostly disciplined game. The Knicks, when things fall apart at the end of the game, look like they're an 8-year-old playing basketball for the first time and their coach looks like Morris Buttermaker coaching the Chico Bail Bond Bears--before he sobered up. If the Knicks had a 15 point lead with 15 seconds left, I'd expect them to find a way to let Ray Allen drain 5 treys. It's gotten that bad.

And this comes from the point where I thought an Amar'e/Melo combination with Toney Douglas, Chauncey Billups, Landry Fields and a cast of characters could challenge anyone in the East including the stumbling Celtics. Now I wonder how Jared Jeffries or Roger Mason, Jr. are ever in an NBA lineup--forget about together and in the most important crunchtime minutes of the most important game of the season--and how shortsighted it was to give up all that talent for Melo and leave him no one to pass the ball to when he gets double teamed in crunch time. Someone made the joke "he went to Jared?" on Twitter two nights ago and I've been nervously laughing at it ever since.

The problem is that I may be spoiled. The Yankees have Mariano Rivera who is the greatest closer in the history of sports. Kyra Sedgwick would even be better than what the Knicks and Rangers are working with at the end of games. I always thought it was a dumb phrase but both teams play not to lose instead of playing to win. The Rangers had plenty of opportunities to score that fourth goal against the Caps when it was 3-0. Maybe that doesn't bury them (see: Kings, Los Angeles), but it at least gives them another mountain to climb. The Knicks don't have that stopper on defense who you know can say "enough" and get that huge steal or block or deflection in a big spot that saves the game. The Rangers are lamenting not being able to close things out but at this point, you know that if they have a 3-0 lead in Game 5, that the players will be back on their heels again waiting for lightening to strike again.

Right now the Rangers and the Knicks are both on the brink and things are looking about as good for them as it does for Barry Bonds making the Hall of Fame. I'm not saying it can't happen or it won't happen, but is there any reason to have confidence now?

The problem with these teams (and sports teams in general) is that as a fan you are taught to believe and to hope and to have confidence in your players--but then you're left feeling like I do today when all I wanted to do was type something about how the great Madison Square Garden crowd last night shut up that fat you-know-what, Bruce Boudreau. Ugh.

Of course, if you speak to me in a few days and the Knicks and Rangers are both heading to a seventh game, I may be right back here, but I'm upset with myself that I let myself be fooled again by those two teams from MSG. Would I rather be in this position than being a fan from New Jersey with the Nets and Devils sitting at home this postseason? Maybe. Playoffs are great but losing like this is really tough--especially when you get fooled again by teams that may not be that good.