He was doing a very good job of saving New York until the devil decided he knew more about basketball.

Now Walsh is gone and the devil is back.  So are the bad contracts and bad decisions, over-rated, over-paid centers from Chicago.

Steve Adamek, who used to write for the Bergen Record, now freelances for the Times.

Al Iannazzone (not a big fan of spelling that last name) who is familiar to me from some place I can’t recall, briefly took over Steve’s blog, Knicks Knacks, but has taken over Alan Hahn’s blog on Newsday.

Alan Hahn, of course, got promoted to MSG commentator, but still seems to be active on his Knicks Fix facebook page.  Congrats Alan.  One step closer to Jimmy D.

Tina Cervasio is always on twitter.  Today she is tweeting about Clyde’s suit.  Seems like she is trying to build up a following in case anything funny happens at Madison Square Garden.

You never know…

Hot off the presses from ESPN.com

From the seats behind me I heard some harsh criticism from supposed Knick fans. “Fire D’Antoni” was popular, but never erupted in a chant such as “Fire Isiah.” I still think we should chant that at the Garden.

I couldn’t disagree more with the “Amar’e is a bum” people. Amar’e was great last year. Last year was the best Knick season in the past 10 years, and I have been following this team religiously since 1988. Last year was good times. Then Dolan forced the trade and we lost all of our coherent team players for this group.  We have no chemistry on either side of the the half court line.

Good job Jim Dolan!  You chased Donnie out of town and assembled a team that can’t beat a d-league caliber Phoenix Suns team.

The Knicks are still trying to piece it together.

My only hope is that they continue to fight and don’t give up and just point fingers at the coach.

That is how your average Knicks fan thinks, that this is all on the coach.

I continue to believe the coach has been undermined by the owner and management.

There simply isn’t a functioning point guard on the team, maybe that changes if/when Davis steps on the court.

In the meantime Carmelo is the best playmaker on the team and he’s a ballhog.

Amar’e can’t operate as fluidly, be it because of injury or because Tyson Chandler is here now.

Amar’e always wanted a center, now he has one.

6-7 going into tonight against Nash, Hill and Channing Frye. Phoenix is 4-9.

If someone else gets a career high tonight, is it automatically D’antoni’s fault?

Not only was I unimpressed with the Carmelo trade and the overpaying of Tyson Chandler (the Isiah days are back apparently when you spend $60 million on a center from Chicago), I would venture to say right now that the team as constructed currently would get its ass kicked by last year’s team with Felton (A REAL point guard) and Gallinari (once a great Knick).

Amar’e is not the same since the playoff injury. Maybe he can pull it together, but he’s not the Amar’e that carried the Knicks all last season. He’s a turnover machine now, “stumbling and bumbling” every time he tries to catch a pass he dribbles it off his foot.

I’m not drinking the Shumpert cool aid, although I’m sure some Isiah loyalists will say Isiah drafted him and not Donnie Walsh. The truth is people raved about Landry Fields last season and this season he looks like he’s about to get sent to the D-league. Shumpert has athleticism and is anything but humble, but he’s not a point guard and Bibby can’t even hit the j we expected from him when we picked him up.

It was said by TNT that to run D’Antoni’s system there needs to be a solid point in place. We don’t have that. Douglas is a reserve.

Banking all the offseason moves on cutting a functioning, thoughtful Chauncey Billups with the thought that we don’t really need a point guard is really to the detriment to the coach. It is fucking sabotage from Dolan and Isiah. Baron Davis? Does he have anything left in the tank? If so, he better lace them up soon before the coach gets unjustly fired.

Tell me you could tell the difference on paper between Tyson Chandler’s numbers and Kurt Thomas’ numbers when he was a Knick. Stop lying. Did Kurt get $60 million from us?

Many a Knick fan penciled New York into the finals with the addition of Chandler but overlooked the subtraction of Billups.

This is not a functioning basketball team now. The dysfunction can be traced to the owner Dolan, not the coach. Don’t believe the hype.

Where is the sense of urgency to replace Donnie Walsh with a real president? With yes-man Glen Grunwald (an Isiah hire) the poor decisions, short-sightedness, malice and overpaying are back. Maybe they never left, despite Donnie Walsh’s efforts.

Happy MLK day to all.

So our DVR didn’t record the last 6 minutes of Melo going off in the 4th.

This is what you should have seen:

Annoying to hear Kerr still bitter and hateful toward Amar’e and the Knicks. Get a life.

I think Charles Barkley is right about the Knicks needing a real point guard. Toney isn’t a playmaker yet, though he is a good scoring guard.

Shumpert has talent and I think is best utilized off the bench this year. He’s out 2-6 weeks now with a knee injury.

How long before Baron Davis laces them up for New York? He is a difference maker if healthy when the playoffs come around.

Until then: Does Amar’e still have his explosiveness after the back injury last year and gaining 20 pounds of muscle in the off-season? I saw him catch a pass he would have slammed any other year but tonight it was a lay-up.

‘Just Bloggin’

Good win today. Not having Paul P. obviously hurt the C’s.

They booed the shit out of humphries, then spent the rest of the time chanting for him.

The garden was filled with bandwagon jumping white chocolate scubs posing as the die hards.

Jorts played well at time reminded me of laimbeer….   I won’t go there…

Shump needs to stop trying to be crawford and play fundamentally sound first and foremost.

This was definitely not ssol, but the corner three was still wide open, we just could not hit them.

Bibby and landry, are either going to be a real factor this year? Will toney?

When do we get jerome jordan in a uni, thought that was in motion.

Good d by the knicks tonight.  Dantoni is still my guy.

Jorts just checked in.

The crowd is asleep.

Shumpert had a nice move under the basket but didn’t convert.

Nice to see melo playing defense.

$2.5 Million for one year seals the deal for Baron Davis to join the Knicks. He’s got a bulging disc back problem, so that makes two important Knicks with back problems (the other one being Amar’e who is telling people in new interviews he’s now an outside-shooting power forward) but I digress.

Amar’e's first preseason game was forgettable, but Iman Shumpert’s wasn’t. He cut to the basket, showed good shooting ability and displayed a sort of confidence Clyde Frazier described as “almost cocky.” It makes losing Billups easier to cope with. With Douglas and Fields question marks in terms of being able to step up and take their game to the next level, it is good to have Shumpert, Bibby and now Davis (assuming he can get healthy and keep the weight in control) in the back court to go with our “most over-rated front court in the NBA.”

I don’t read too much into Balkman’s 2nd first game with the Knicks, preseason doesn’t mean anything and Balkman still can’t shoot and plays out of control when on offense. The image of Balkman barrelling into the paint to end up on the floor is all-too familiar to me during his first stint in New York. But with us losing out on Shawne Williams (What a damn shame, Shawne was a good Knick and showed grit in the playoffs; I wonder if it was easier for him to say goodbye to New York knowing that they did Donnie dirty and he knew Donnie was the guy who re-kindled his career) Balkman is a last resort and will probably get his number called at some point during this season if not for Amar’e's back issues then for Isiah’s continued influence of Jim Dolan.

Yes the Mike Woodson hiring was an Isiah Thomas hiring.

I have not seen any explosion in Amar’e's step and I heard he gained 20 pounds of muscle in the offseason, that’s not going to be good for his hops, but with Melo here I doubt he needs to play like he did in Phoenix on a nightly anymore.

Just curious: Did Chandler look like a $60 million man to you?

The Knicks are looking like a second round team, if Baron Davis can get 100% healthy, maybe deeper than that, but right now, a second-round playoff team.