Video: Knicks Owner James Dolan Threatens To Ban Fan For Heckling Him
March 11, 2019, 8:56 a.m.
'You know what? Enjoy watching them on TV.'
Despite some hopeful rumors last month that he was courting offers to sell the team, James Dolan still remains the owner of the Knicks. And he probably always will, even when he's busy singing the blues in hell. Long-suffering fans have mostly accepted this, as we do all sorts of Knicks-induced misery. Sometimes, we might even use humor to vent a little—but Dolan is way too thin-skinned for that. Because during Saturday afternoon's Knicks/Kings game, he threatened to ban a fan for lightly heckling him.
As you can see in TMZ's video below, the fan shouted "sell the team" as Dolan made his way out the tunnel at MSG from his courtside seat. Pretty innocuous stuff! But Dolan couldn't let it go, and instead confronted the unidentified man: "You want to not come to any more games?" he says. He said that what the man shouted at him was "rude," and added, "You know what? Enjoy watching them on TV."
Witnesses told TMZ that the fan "was held while 2 cops and security came over to ID and question him before asking him to leave." It's unclear whether he was permanently banned or not.
The Madison Square Garden Company said in a statement: "Our policy is and will continue to be that if you are disrespectful to anyone in our venues, we will ask you not to return." State Senator Brad Hoylman was not charmed by this exchange:
Madison Square Garden gets over $40M/year in property tax breaks. If James Dolan wants to treat it as his private stadium & ban fans for merely suggesting he sell a team, then perhaps Albany should take his lead—and redirect those public dollars to Penn Station’s MTA facilities. https://t.co/yw46xPUvWt
— Senator Brad Hoylman (@bradhoylman) March 11, 2019
(Hey, the city could always evict MSG!)
Of course, Dolan has threatened, confronted or banned other fans and Knicks-related personnel for being rude to him in the past as well. Just two years ago, something close to this exact scenario played out when fan Mike Hamersky yelled at Dolan that he should sell the team, and Dolan cursed him out. "I did call him an asshole," Dolan told Deadspin at the time, "because he is an asshole."
He's held grudges against beat reporters for years, he's held grudges against entire radio stations, he's allegedly retaliated against a reporter who criticized him. Then there was the time he called security on Charles Oakley for being involved in a fight with security (Oak is still mad about that) and banned him for life; there was also the time he "respectfully" told a 73-year-old fan to go fuck himself because he sent him a MEAN email.
After that last incident, Dolan vowed to respond to more emails from fans. Dolan's email, according to Deadspin, is [email protected]. We encourage you to respectfully write him, and tell him how you really feel about his fedora blues band JD and the Straight Shot.
