There is frustration and then there is despair, and among the more seasoned souls in the Knicks' locker room, there is enough wisdom to know the difference. Maurice Taylor began his career with the Los Angeles Clippers and is therefore an authority on the subject.
In Taylor's rookie season, 1997-1998, the Clippers went 17-65. Then they won nine times in a lockout-shortened 50-game season. In his final year in Los Angeles, the Clippers won 15 games.
Three years into his NBA career, Taylor had won just enough games, 41, to qualify for a .500 season.
The Knicks (6-17) have lost six straight games and are on pace for a 21-victory season. But there is no sense yet that a culture of losing has set in, or that anyone has given up the vision of a .500 record. They are, in Taylor's opinion, far from veering into Clippers territory.
"That," Taylor said with a serious look, "was a whole different story." That was like 20 years of that. There's no comparison. None whatsoever."
That was "a doomed feeling," said Taylor, a feeling he said he did not sense among the Knicks. "No, I don't."
While the Clippers, the league's most cursed franchise, are having a surprising revival, the Knicks are careering toward a fifth consecutive losing season. They may not feel doomed, but they do not have much optimism, either.
Despite a drastic makeover, the Knicks are three defeats shy of matching last season's longest losing streak. They have three home games coming up: against the defending champion San Antonio Spurs on Wednesday, the surging Utah Jazz on Friday and the rival Nets next Monday.
The Knicks then close out the calendar year with games in Orlando and in Milwaukee -- the teams that just beat them by 15 points (the Magic) and by 20 points (the Bucks).
When Taylor was with the Clippers, long losing streaks were the norm. The danger for the Knicks, with a roster filled with impressionable young players, is that they could become similarly accustomed to failure.
"There's always a danger of getting used to the results in the NBA," Taylor said. "I don't have enough history here to say what's going on, but at the same time, I think we have enough in this locker room to kind of change the atmosphere."
The Knicks' near miss against the Indiana Pacers on Saturday night provided modest relief. They had a lead late in the fourth quarter before losing by six points, a significant improvement after three consecutive double-digit losses.
Afterward, coach Larry Brown joked about his team's struggles, saying, "I wanted to wear a baseball cap and sunglasses to my kid's game today." But at least he was in a joking mood, which was also an improvement.
The struggle for Brown is figuring out which players will lead the Knicks out of the darkness, or if he has any who are capable. He has already installed a 22-year-old rookie, Channing Frye, at power forward, and a raw 20-year-old, Trevor Ariza, at small forward. But just as the youth movement hit high gear, Brown yanked the rookie Nate Robinson from the starting lineup, then removed him from the rotation altogether. Robinson was placed on the inactive list Saturday, and Brown said he wanted to play just three guards.
The same factors that retarded the Knicks' cohesion early in the season continue to hinder them -- injuries, youth and Brown's ever-changing rotation. Brown pledged consistency last week, but he was immediately undermined by injuries to Eddy Curry and Jerome James.
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