The new york knicks head coach wants to step down.
James Dolan hopes that even after leaving his posts on the NBA board of governors committees, the league would continue to treat the New York Knicks fairly.
Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN first revealed Dolan’s resignation. It followed his negative opinions on a number of league matters and came before the Knicks sued the Toronto Raptors in August, accusing them of “trade secret theft.”
In the message that ESPN was able to receive, Dolan stated, “I hope that the Knicks will be treated equally and fairly as all other NBA teams.” “.. As you are aware, I have a lot on my plate at the MSG family of companies. I have to put my time to use where I can be most effective.
Dolan is currently concentrating on his latest business endeavor, The Sphere in Las Vegas. Jamaal Lesan, general counsel of the Knicks, has taken over for him and is now representing him in NBA Board of Governors meetings.
Opinions Critical of James Dolan
ESPN reports that Dolan had expressed disapproval of the league’s revenue structure, which mandates that the Knicks, a large market franchise, split their significantly larger earnings with teams in smaller markets.
The Knicks made $506 million last season, a 12% increase over their projected $452 million earnings from 2021–2022. According to Statista, the Knicks earned the third-highest revenue of all 30 NBA clubs, trailing only the Golden State Warriors ($706 million) and the Los Angeles Lakers ($516 million).
Dolan also voted against the WNBA’s expansion to San Francisco and Michael Jordan’s sale of the Charlotte Hornets, which prevented a black owner from joining the NBA Board of Governors.
The two incidents functioned as the prelude to Dolan’s departure.
Knicks Contest Adam Silver’s Neutrality
In response to the Raptors’ move on October 16 to dismiss the Knicks’ initial case and have NBA Commissioner Adam Silver mediate the disagreement, the Knicks are requesting more than $10 million in damages in a court filing on Monday, November 20.
The document also cast doubt on Silver’s impartiality due to his purported “closeness” to Larry Tanenbaum, the owner of the Raptors.
The Knicks stated in the updated filing that Tanenbaum is Silver’s supervisor and that he “exercises control over and heavily influences Silver’s continued employment and salary.” Tanenbaum has been called “a close ally of Commissioner Adam Silver,” among other things. “Not just my boss as the chairman of the board of governors, but he’s very much a role model in my life,” was how Silver himself put Tanenbaum. Silver would be arbitrating a case on behalf of his boss and ally if he were to preside over the current disagreement.
The case originated from Ike Azotam, a former employee of the Knicks, who, while still under contract with the team, allegedly provided some members of the Raptors organization, led by new head coach Darko Rajaković, with sensitive information.
Rajaković, the new head coach of the Raptors, and the other defendants are accused in the lawsuit of “conspire[ing] to use Azotam’s position as a current Knicks insider to funnel proprietary information to the Raptors to help them organize, plan, and structure the new coaching and video operations staff.”
The lawsuit claims that they have also instructed Azotam to produce and then distribute over 3,000 files containing data and information about movies to the Raptors defendants by abusing his access to the Knicks’ Synergy Sports subscription.
The Raptors refuted the claim that any NBA team could get those publicly available pieces of information.
