No Land Grab

While the Knicks' owner, James Dolan, has presided over the deconstruction of a once-proud franchise, Bruce Ratner has delivered on his promise not to gut the Nets as they assume lame-duck status in New Jersey, on their way to a planned relocation to Brooklyn.

"We will have a good team but talk is talk and doing is doing," Ratner told me last summer in the face of a full-frontal news media assault after the bean-counting decision to trade Kenyon Martin to Denver, about 20 minutes after he purchased the team.

One year later, thanks mostly to Thorn's continued wizardry as the Nets' chief executive and the truly brainless trading of Vince Carter by Toronto to New Jersey, how's Ratner doing? Unavailable to pat himself on the back yesterday as he maintains a low profile to focus on the bidding for the Atlantic Avenue rail yards - where he intends to build his basketball arena and a zillion new apartments - Ratner let his basketball people do the talking.

"I've got nothing but good things to say about him," Thorn said in a telephone interview. "He's a really good guy, he's accessible and he's allowed us to do just about everything we've had to put together what looks like, on paper, a pretty good team."

A year ago, Martin's departure marked the official breakup of a two-time finalist, Jason Kidd was determined to follow Martin's lead and even Thorn was said to be exploring his options.

"Our star player wasn't real positive about the future of the team, Alonzo Mourning wasn't a very positive influence on Jason or anyone," Thorn said. "It just didn't look very good."

Then came the Carter steal, the recovery of Kidd from knee surgery, the accelerated development of the rookie center, Nenad Krstic, the late-season run to qualify for the last playoff position in the Eastern Conference and, most recently, the apparent recruitment of Shareef Abdur-Rahim to be the starting power forward.

Whether Abdur-Rahim, who is not the athlete Martin is but is more skilled and statistically accomplished, is an upgrade at the position is debatable, but that's not the most pertinent question. This is: a year ago, would Thorn have traded Martin - who, separated from Kidd, was no maximum-salary player last season in Denver - and a broken-down Kerry Kittles for Carter, Abdur-Rahim and the Los Angeles Clippers' first-round draft pick next June that is not lottery protected?

"That one has some possibilities," Thorn said.

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