Trouble is brewing in New York around the current state of the New York Knicks, both on and off the court. Following an unfortunate incident involving former Knick Charles Oakley causing a stop in a game this week, the Knicks fired off with a lousy PR statement and have now fired the security chief at Madison Square Garden.
Knicks owner James Dolan fired Frank Benedetto on Friday according to a report from DNAinfo New York. The Knicks offered no statement on the firing of the now former senior vice president for security at Madison Square Garden other than to say “We don’t comment on employees that have left the company,” regardless of how they left the team. They were a bit more elaborate about the incident involving Oakley the other night.
— NY_KnicksPR (@NY_KnicksPR) February 9, 2017
— NY_KnicksPR (@NY_KnicksPR) February 9, 2017
Who exactly is Benedetto? Prior to taking on the lead role in charge of the security at Madison Square Garden, he was a former United States Secret Service member serving during the terms of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He has also overseen security for the 2012 NATO Summit in Chicago and multiple marathon events in the city of Chicago.
Despite all that, letting Oakley get a little too out of control in the stands at a game ended up being the last straw as far as Knicks owner James Dolan was concerned.
On the surface, this seems like another swing and a miss from the Knicks in terms of public image is concerned, because who fires a guy with that kind of security background just days after a former player had an angry outburst? This just feels odd but then again, this is the New York Knicks.
