Since the beginning of the year, millions of New Yorkers have been blacked out from watching their beloved Knicks due to a contract dispute between the Knicks’ television network, MSG, and Time Warner Cable. Many of these fans have blamed the greed of Knicks owner James Dolan for the impasse. However, new information has come to light that is sure to change public opinion.
“In early January I became engaged in a series of negotiations of an entirely different nature,” Dolan has revealed. “A month is long time to spend in a boardroom, particularly when sitting across the table from Satan himself.”
The results of those negotiations are now drawing rave reviews from the Garden faithful in the form of out-of-nowhere rookie sensation Jeremy Lin.
“Undrafted, twice-cut, Chinese-American, Christian, couch-surfing, Harvard-graduates don’t just fall out of the sky,” said an indignant Dolan. “Yao Tebow, as I like to call him, came at a price. My eternal soul, to be specific.”
In Lin’s first four games playing significant minutes, the Knicks are 4-0, with Lin averaging better than 28 points and 8 assists; the best numbers by any rookie since LeBron James.
“The Knicks were this insanely top-heavy team that was limping along with an 8-15 record,” said a source with knowledge of the negotiations. “Desperate times call for desperate measures, and let’s face it, he was probably going to hell anyway.”
While the specifics of the contact remain unknown, it’s thought to closely resemble a deal Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni made early in his tenure with the Phoenix Suns.
“How do you think I turned an undersized Canadian into a 2-time MVP?” D’Antoni asked with a laugh. “I’ll be damned if Dolan didn’t somehow manage to finagle perhaps the most marketable person on Earth, on the world’s most famous franchise, in the city where marketing was invented! Actually I’ll be damned no matter what. That was part of the Nash deal.”
Remarkably, sources claim negotiations were slow to get started due to the initial reluctance of Satan to associate with Dolan.
“No question I’ve broken bread with more than my share of, shall we say, unsavory characters,” said Satan. “Call it an occupational hazard, I suppose. When you run an operation such as the Underworld, you learn to spot mistakes before they happen. The last thing I need as the Prince of Darkness is to spend the rest of eternity wondering how I got hoodwinked by Jim Dolan.”
Eventually Satan was swayed to the negotiating table for what would seem the unlikeliest of reasons.
“Honestly I felt like they deserved a break,” said Satan. “From a guy who knows a little something about torture, no one should have to endure what Knicks fans have been through these past 10 years. Give me a break, I’m the devil, not Isiah Thomas.”
