TUESDAY’S MORNING MASHUP: KNICKS OWNER JAMES DOLAN REPORTEDLY TAPES CARMELO ANTHONY’S ON-COURT CONVERSATIONS

WEEI

By Jerry Spar

♦ According to multiple reports out of New York, Knicks owner James Dolan had audio technicians stationed at both ends of the Madison Square Garden court during the team’s two weekend games holding parabolic microphones designed to capture everything said by and to Carmelo Anthony.

Anthony recently was suspended one game for his postgame altercation with Kevin Garnett that began when the two exchanged insults on the court. Apparently, Dolan wanted a tape of every conversation Anthony had — perhaps so that he could vindicate the player if he’s involved in another confrontation, although the specific reason is unclear.

Said coach Mike Woodson on Monday: “I heard about it, but I don’t know about all of that, I don’t know where it came from.”

Said a league executive to the New York Post: “I’m sure they were trying to placate Carmelo Anthony over anything else. But it would [tick] me off if I didn’t know about it.”

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This is EXACTLY why the league fining Danny Ferry a pittance set the wrong precedent

Owners should handle the financial affairs of their team and their other businesses. GMs should be worried with player relations, signing deals and building a team to win. Coaches should be designing plays, motivating players and making in game decisions. And the NBA should handle disciplinary actions. Everyone should stay in their lane.

If some idiot like Dolan is allowed to make hay by 'informing' the league of something that happened in the heat of the moment which he became aware of because of this kind of paranoid eavesdropping - what is next?

Come to think of it, you cant record any conversation without both parties knowing about it....is this kind of invasion of privacy even legal?

The NBA should step in - fine Dolan a million dollars and put the matter to rest.

Spot on Mk...........Dolan is a wack job.................No achievement druggie who was given the MSG job because they had no where to put the idiot in the family's cable business (Cablevision). I have been at some parties in the past that he also attended and he acted as the complete village idiot...spoiled one at that!

The league has to put an end to this or there is no end to the madness.

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I am surprised no one else commented on this subject.

MK

Me to. It will be interesting next Thursday when we play them again at MSG.

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mrkleen,

I already had an extremely low opinion of James Dolan, so this didn't change that.

I don't see it as an invasion of privacy because the players are in a public setting, and we already have players and coaches with microphones on as well as directional mikes at sporting events. I don't see this as really all that different than being able to hear what football players are saying to each other on the sideline in an NFL Films piece. Of course James Dolan took it to a creepy extreme, but that's what the James Dolans of the world do.

I don't think there will be an uptick in actions by the league against players who say mean things to Carmelo. The league is probably rolling their eyes at this, and they're not going to send in the black helicopters just because the Knicks sent in another audio tape.

In the end, I thought it was odd, but not a big deal.

If Dolan sends 5 tapes to the NBA and they laugh at him and do nothing, I agree this is no big deal. But if players end up getting suspended or being assessed fines due to something that was pointed out to them by the Knicks new surveillance - I think it will become a big deal.

The Supreme Court ruled on a very similar situation - where the police in DC put a GPS unit on the vehicle of a suspected drug dealer for weeks....until they finally saw him do something wrong. The Supreme Court said this is was a violation of his fourth amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure.

A bit of a stretch to apply that here.....but I can see the parallels.

how many Celtics know languages OTHER than english? I know the league is full of other languages, could be fun to screw with the those microphones..