James Dolan

all right welcome back to the carton show chris mcmonagle craig carton and uh thrilled to have a dear friend of mine joining us in studio and i didn't realize till last night reading the new york post that james zone hasn't spoken publicly since he joined me and evan roberts three years ago and now he's back happy new year thank you for joining us happy new year this is my biannual confession

No one ever asks me outside.

None of any dates.

That kind of thing.

Or maybe not.

Or maybe not.

There's a lot to talk to you since I guess you haven't spoken of a lot of your Knicks and Rangers issues in the last few years.

Let me start with the Knicks.

Obviously, the great run last year.

Looks like they're on their way to a special season this year.

But in the process, you also made a decision, you and Leon Rose, to relieve Tom Thibodeau of his head coaching duties.

And Mike comes in, has done a really nice job thus far.

Can you walk us through what the thinking was at the time you made it?

If it was just Leon coming to you saying, we need a change, if you guys collectively thought the team needed a different voice in the locker room, and what was the genesis of moving on from Tom?

I don't want to put words in your mouth.

Do you mean like not using the bench that much, the style of play?

So part of that's develop players that become trade pieces, develop players that obviously become valuable depth guys off your bench.

Well, he's the guy that, you know, he likes playing the veterans.

He likes playing the guys that, you know, buy into his system.

And guys like that, he has throughout his career have a shelf life, right?