KNICK NOTES
When the Knicks’ season ends tonight, Maurice Taylor switches from power forward to “expiring contract.” Or, as the blunt Taylor called it, “A piece of meat.”
Entering the offseason, Taylor becomes instant trade bait for Isiah Thomas, whose only pawns the past two years have been players entering the last year of their contracts. Squads looking to get under the cap vie to collect expiring contracts.
Taylor has one year at $9 million left – a more manageable, easier-to-trade sum than the maximum expiring contracts Thomas dealt this season in Antonio Davis (for Jalen Rose) and Penny Hardaway (for Steve Francis).
“I know when you have an expiring contract, it’s like a piece of meat, piece of property,” Taylor told The Post. “That’s not the way you want to go into the summer. That’s the way [Thomas] is with all of us. Some teams do that. Some teams look at you as a piece of meat.”
On the day Thomas acquired Taylor 14 months ago, he referred to Taylor’s contract as an asset after the current season – a strange thing to bring up on the player’s first day as a Knick and given that the 2004-2005 season wasn’t even over.
Taylor no longer cares if he gets moved; he and a half-dozen teammates could be playing their final game as Knicks at the Meadowlands tonight. “Either way,” Taylor said, “doesn’t matter.”
If coach Larry Brown is back, he’ll campaign for the Knicks to package their two late first-round picks (probably 21st and 28th) because he feels the roster already includes too many youngsters. Taylor could be part of that package. Jalen Rose’s maximum contract also enters its expiring year.
Brown believes the Knicks need a true point guard – free-agent Speedy Claxton is a possibility – and a defensive center such as on-the-block Theo Ratliff. Eddy Curry, who could be shopped for the Pacers’ Jermaine O’Neal, has been a big disappointment, and Jerome James could be bought out because the Knicks want to re-sign Jackie Butler.
One intriguing free-agent shot-blocking defensive center is Dikembe Mutombo, but the Knicks’ biggest interest is in rugged rebounding PF Reggie Evans.
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Malik Rose summed up the disgraceful season poetically: “We have a lot of talent in this locker room, a lot of weapons that can help us, but we didn’t come close to playing together as a unit,” he said. “That’s what made winning hard. We have all kinds of ammunition – blue ones, green ones, red ones and black ones – and couldn’t get our rainbow together. We didn’t play together all year.”
Fans gave rookie David Lee the Continental Work Hard Play Right award . . . Jalen Rose will be a sideline reporter for TNT in the playoffs.