All-time dysfunctionals

It hit me last night, while Stephon Marbury was driving the basket then turning away, his disinterest kicking in just in the nick of time, or while Steve Francis pounded the ball as if trying to bore a hole to China, then charged head down to nowhere and threw it away, or Maurice Taylor doing anything, or Channing Frye limping out of the season, or Isiah Thomas staring as if trapped in a burning car, or Larry Brown trying to figure out what to say after this one.

On dysfunction scale, can Knicks match Jacksons?

These New York Knicks are not pretty. They are barely watchable, given that you're hiding your eyes most of the time. But they are historic, perhaps. We won't see their likes again for some time, I reckon -- or at least till next year.

The question now, with less than a month until the Knicks pack up the tent and wait for the dry ice to settle on their lottery ball: In terms of all-time dysfunctional bunches, where do they rank? The definition covers not teams that are bad or even mediocre, which are a dime a dozen. More to the point, they must be composed of mismatched parts whose dysfunction rises in direct proportion to the salaries paid and the flop in terms of results achieved.

Chris Clarke at End of the Bench has already decided, it seems:

"This is the most any collection of players on one team has made since, say, ever. They are the most overpaid team in history at this point. I can’t think of the appropriate joke, but when did any group of people get paid so much to do such a terrible job?"

From one Chris to another and on to you, it's time to find out.

The most obvious corollary from today's landscape is Real Madrid, the galacticos trophyless for the past three years despite fielding the most glittering array of star power in the game, and a payroll. The New York Rangers of recent pre-lockout vintage were particularly dysfunctional.

Dipping back way into the past in these parts, the Argos of the early 1970s consistently signed high-priced talent (from Theismann to Anthony Davis to Terry Metcalf) and failed miserably, sometimes spectacularly.

Moving outside sports, how 'bout those Jacksons? Napoleon's Grand Armee?

Even Real, those Argos and the Jacksons look good next to the Knicks, whose record of 19 and 47 is but a game ahead of bottomest, second-year Charlotte in the league standing, and whose payroll of $124 million makes Mark Cuban's Mavericks ($97 mil.) look like pikers. And that payroll actually rises next year! So perhaps they're not done yet, these dysfunctional-for-the-ages Knicks.

I do think it's going to take something to catch them. Your candidates, please, for the Most Dysfunctional Teams in History. (And to start it off, nothing like a good Googlefight.)

UPDATE: That Skeets guy, he's back.

Comments

[JR]

Dysfunctional teams:

1975 Red Sox: 25 guys, 25 cabs.

Or the Billy Martin/Reggie Jackson Yankees?

[Mark Freedman]

I always thought the late 80s / early 90s Clippers were the most dysfunctional. Crazy talent. Players begging to leave. Calling their time with the Clips like jail. Quintin Dailey order hot dogs from the bench. Big Ben, well, being Big Ben. Quite the folly.

[BC]

They don't have a lottery pick this year. Traded it to Chicago in the Eddy Curry deal, no protection on it. That pick ends up #1, it still goes to Chicago. AND Chicago also has the ability to swap draft positions NEXT year with the Knicks as well, also no protection, so if their ping pong ball wins next year and Chicago wins the NBA Championship, the Bulls pick 1 and the Knicks pick in the 30s.

Ain't it great?

[cy]

Truly, the Knicks are up Starbury creek without so much as a Pat Cummings paddle. Thanks BC. I must have been averting my eyes from Isiah's genius.
Mark, I never thought of the Clippers as anything but crappy. They never really became truly high-rent dysfunction, cheapo Sterling dealing everyone away before their real paydays came.
And JR, both those teams you mention made the World Series. Reggie vs. Billy, Billy vs. George -- they sure could bicker, and they were somewhat dysfunctional, but they did manage to play together and win when it counted.
I'm surprised no one has mentioned national teams, which are always good for this kind of thing -- think the USA at the WBC, Canada at Turin, the US NBAers at Athens.

[Mark Freedman]

While the Clips don't compete with the Knicks for incompetence and dysfunctionality while having to much raw talent, it's fair to say the Clips were dysfunctional in their own right. I think the Knicks resemble Enron. That's my assessment.

[Milos Jaukovic]

I think the Raptors of 2002 under Kevin O'Neill certainly qualify. You had the psychotic O'Neill as coach, the utterly incompetent Rob Babcock as GM, a whiney superstar in Vince Carter, a whiney veteran in Antonio Davis, and some superstar talent with the likes of Mengkee Bateer. Then Babcock remedies the situation by trading Davis for an equally whiney but more expensive Jalen Rose. Season ends with O'Neill trashing a hotel room.
The 1990 Maple Leafs are on my list too. Purely because of the Al Iafrate, Gary Leeman wife swap fiasco all overseen by the brilliantly insane Harold Ballard. The Leafs (in 89 & 90) drafted Scott Pearson, Scott Thornton, Drake Berehowsky and Felix Potvin ahead of of Bill Guerin, Adam Foote, Nicklas Lidstrom, Sergei Fedorov or Martin Brodeur.

[Illan Kramer]

How about the US Olympic Hockey Team in 1998 at Nagano? Not only were they eliminated well before the medal rounds, but afterwards, they acted like a bunch of big babies and trashed their Olympic Village rooms. Yes, a bunch of millionaires trashed the rooms of the Olympic Village presumably because the other countries in the tournament didn't roll over and give them the medal they felt they deserved.