Charles Oakley’s forcible eviction from Madison Square Garden — and eventual arrest on misdemeanor assault and criminal trespass charges — on Wednesday night has reverberated throughout the NBA, and the reactions do not help the Knicks’ reputation.
Oakley, a Knicks fan favorite as a rugged power forward during their 1990s heyday, insisted to The Post he was not heckling owner James Dolan from his baseline seat. The Garden has decried Oakley’s “abusive behavior” and said of Oakley, “Everything he said since the incident is pure fiction.”
LeBron James, the NBA’s most renowned player, sided with Oakley in an Instagram post late Wednesday night — “#Legend,” it said, alongside a vintage Oakley photo — and returned to the subject in closing his post-game interview Thursday night.
“Oh, I missed one,” James said. “Charles Oakley for President.”
“[Oakley] ain’t like that, and if you ask any player in our league now who knows him, they’d say the same thing,” James added, via Cleveland.com.
Carmelo Anthony’s pals and fellow banana boat riders Dwyane Wade and Chris Paul, who also serves as president of the NBA players union, used their social media platforms to express outrage over Oakley’s handling. Paul objected to the Knicks’ initial statement questioning Oakley’s health (“We hope he gets some help soon,” the statement read) and Wade situated the altercation in a racial context.
Hope that he gets some help soon? Not the right way to portray Oak…always had my back and the realest person our league has seen #UncleOak
— Chris Paul (@CP3) February 9, 2017
10years!!! 10 years Oak gave everything he had for this organization and the image everyone will be left with won't be this picture. It will be the imagine of him being taken down to the ground last night in the same arena he gave his all 2 as a player by the guards! This Could happen to any of us!!! #StayWoke We are not above this treatment!
A photo posted by dwyanewade (@dwyanewade) on Feb 9, 2017 at 11:02am PST
Add to the chorus an array of NBA playing greats who now share their opinions on national television broadcasts.
Charles Barkley, a habitual Knicks skeptic who frequently tussled with Oakley on the court (and who hates agreeing with James), went on a mini-rant Thursday night on TNT’s “Inside the NBA” that contained the scorching summary: “The Knicks are an awful basketball team, they have been disrespectful to Carmelo Anthony, but this was a black eye for the entire sport.”
Charles Barkley on last night's incident with Charles Oakley at MSG. pic.twitter.com/qta2fzUWus
— NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) February 10, 2017
TNT’s Kenny Smith added: “If you have one of your esteemed people in the building, it takes one guy to walk over to him and say ‘I need to have a private conversation with you in the back.’ That’s it. But when you send six guys over, it is a confrontation.”
Marv Albert and Chris Webber did not hold back on the Knicks/Oakley tonight and both well on the side of Oakley.
— Richard Deitsch (@richarddeitsch) February 10, 2017
Perhaps it was Reggie Miller, of 8-points-in-9-seconds Garden infamy, who best summed up the risk to the Knicks’ future — specifically, in luring free agents to a team in need of upgrades — of the optics of the Oakley mess.
If you're a FA to be, why would you play for an Owner who treats the past greats like this or a President who stabs star player in the back?
— Reggie Miller (@ReggieMillerTNT) February 9, 2017
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