As one might expect, Deadspin is already thoroughly on top of this, as of course are the New York tabloids, but the Isiah Thomas sexual harassment suit keeps managing to get uglier and uglier--as such suits tend to do, which is probably one reason they're so often "settled." Highlights so far have been Stephon Marbury sleazily admitting to having sex with an intern in the back seat of his truck (a tale immortalized in the Post under the headline "Scoring Machine"), and Isiah frequently addressing plaintiff Anucha Browne Sanders as "bitch," perhaps most memorably in the immortal sound-byte, "Bitch, I don't give a fuck about these white people," allegedly uttered in reference to the Knicks' corporate sponsors. Truthfully I find it pretty hard to get worked up about that one, since I generally don't really like white people either and I'm white myself.
Regardless though, what a fucking mess of messes the Knicks are. Weren't things embarrassing enough for these guys just in terms of on-court misadventures? If anything, this just continues to show how completely and utterly insane James Dolan is. Let's think about this: in cases like these, there are two competing versions of reality at work. In the first, Isiah is a fucking dirtbag who's dangerously inappropriate and unpredictable. In the second, Browne Sanders is an extremely vindictive and unpredictable former employee with a serious axe to grind. In either case, do you really want this thing going to trial? I'm honestly inclined to believe the first reality--Sanders doesn't seem crazy and her stories of misconduct seem too specific and detailed to be completely fabricated--but even if Isiah is innocent, this case is already a huge embarrassment, as you have the team's marquee player admitting on the stand to referring to female employees as "bitches" and having (consensual) sex with interns outside of strip clubs. Neither of which are illegal in and of themselves, but both of which further enhance the image of the Knicks as an out-of-control operation. I mean, everyone hated Marbury before this garbage came out; this just makes everything worse.
But hey, at least they've got Zach Randolph coming in to clean up the culture and provide some much-needed veteran stability and leadership.
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