Jonathan Abrams has a funny piece in Wednesday’s New York Times about the excessive grunting & howling that happens during most Association contests (œanytime anybody goes to a hoop, they yell or scream”), with an increasingly vocal percentage of players trying to draw fouls.  Though the trend is more noticeable than bothersome, I would submit there’s at least one member of the New York Knicks making far too much noise in the locker room — G Quentin Richardson, as quoted in this morning’s Boston Globe after last night’s loss to the Celtics :

“I think a few of those guys know they can™t just say anything to us,” said Richardson. “I™m just real curious to see what those guys will be saying if we weren™t in a basketball league, and didn™t have referees. I mean it wouldn™t be the same story. I mean they are the world champions and rah-rah-rah, but the tough part I don™t factor. I come from a neighborhood where you can say what you want to say, but ’til you do something, it don™t mean nothing. Some of those guys are happy to get a ring, but you ain™t been in the league long enough to talk to people like that. I don™t have a lot of respect for that. Like I said, I™d be curious to hear what they have to say in a different setting, I™d be very curious to see that.

If Q wasn’t in a basketball league, precisely in what setting would he have a beef with Leon Powe or Rajon Rondo?  The queue at Home Depot? A late night screening of “Bolt”?  Much as I’d like to see the Knicks capable of holding their own in a rivarly with the Celtics, but Boston already did something, while making portions of the last regular season look pretty easy in the process.