NY Daily News: As he stole a pass and broke toward the basket, Nate Robinson could hear Larry Brown reminding him to "play the right way." The simple move would have been an easy layup, but the NBA's reigning slam dunk champion had other ideas.
With the crowd inside the Cox Pavilion anxiously waiting for something spectacular, Robinson bounced the ball, caught it and dunked it all in one motion. When asked later if he would have chosen style over substance with Brown on the bench, Robinson smiled and said, "I knew that was coming. That's just who I am. Honestly, I think I would. This is summer league. But in (a regular-season) game, I would never do that."
Robinson's new coach, however, is encouraging the 5-9 guard to show his creative side in the fall and not only during exhibition games. Isiah Thomas said basketball is show business and that players like Robinson have a "responsibility" to entertain. Somewhere, Brown is shaking his head.
"Just because you're having fun and you're enjoying what you're doing does not mean you're out of control," Thomas, the Knicks' president/coach, said yesterday. "Heck, if I was 5-5 or whatever he is and I could bounce it on the floor and dunk it, I'd try it, too. It's a pretty unique thing that he can do that. I'm glad he did it, and I hope he gets the opportunity to do it again."
Whether more freedom for Robinson is a good thing remains to be seen. In his first summer league game last week, he earned a technical for trash-talking with Cleveland rookie Daniel Gibson. That was the same type of behavior that irked Brown and some Knick teammates last season.
As a rookie Robinson became a pet project for Brown, who saw talent and room for improvement. In a preseason game against the Nets, Robinson tried to toss the ball off the backboard and dunk it, only to have Richard Jefferson come from behind and block it.
Robinson once got into a fight at practice with 7-1 center Jerome James and had a nasty screaming match with Malik Rose in the shower following a game. Brown would often say that Robinson thought of himself more as a highlight film than a basketball player.
While Brown's methods cost him his own job, there is no denying that he's had an impact on a Knick who will play an important role this season. NBA coaches noticed Robinson's maturation, with several saying he went from being out of control to, according to Indiana's Rick Carlisle, "a player we couldn't guard."
Somehow, Thomas has to find playing time for his most explosive guard. The Knicks will have Steve Francis for an entire season, a healthy Stephon Marbury, plus Jamal Crawford and Quentin Richardson.
"It's in God's hands," Robinson said. "However my minutes come they're the minutes I was supposed to get. Things happen for a reason."
On the eve of Knicks' final game in April, Robinson drove into Manhattan with Crawford and found himself on the famed courts of West 4th Street playing pickup basketball.
"Isiah told me, never change who I am," Robinson said. "That's the first thing he told me. I've been me since I was born. I'm going to do whatever it takes for me to get wherever I need to be."
