Hour 1: Craig and McMonigle Recap the Historic Knicks Championship Parade

**Chris McMonigle** (0:07)
How long you got? How long you got?

**Craig Carton** (0:11)
It's The Cartoon Show with Big Mac.

**Chris McMonigle** (0:14)
Yes, sir. Woo-hoo!

**Craig Carton** (0:16)
Number to join as always, 888-808-1019 on a gorgeous, beautiful, perfect Thursday afternoon in New York City and one of the great days, one of the most memorable days, one of the days we will tell our grandchildren about. Let me tell you the story about the day that New York City shut down to honor the greatest team the New York Knicks franchise has had in over 50 years, has happened and will continue to be enjoyed, not just for today, but for years and years and years. And what a privilege it was to be on the streets of Manhattan downtown as Big Mac and I met here at Hudson Street and walked over to the parade and we saw dogs dressed like New York Knicks fans and Knicks jerseys and we saw anorexic ballerinas on stilts rocking Knicks jerseys and we saw 10,000 cops watching people sell counterfeit Knicks goods on Worth Street. What a great day to be alive. Good afternoon Big Mac, how are you?

**Chris McMonigle** (1:25)
I'm doing great Craig. Yeah, that was fun. We didn't get anywhere near the parade.

**Craig Carton** (1:28)
We got a block away.

**Chris McMonigle** (1:30)
But that was really like to me again, not seeing the parade, I saw it on TV obviously. But we were, I don't know, three blocks away, one block down, two blocks over.

**Craig Carton** (1:39)
We were one block away. We're in parallel one block.

**Chris McMonigle** (1:41)
Yeah, parallel one block.

**Craig Carton** (1:42)
Yep.

**Chris McMonigle** (1:42)
You couldn't walk the streets. It was a party. Blocks were like, obviously streets are cornered off. Everyone's walking in the middle of the street. You mentioned people selling fake merchandise in the middle of the street.
It was an enormous party walking the streets of Manhattan, 10 blocks away, up from 10 blocks away to a block away. We were walking in the middle of the street. Everything was shut off. Everyone was in Nick's stuff. Everyone's chanting, let's go, Nick's right in the middle of the... So it was more than just the parade. It felt like all of downtown Manhattan was one big block party celebrating the next championship. It was fun to be around even though we didn't get too close. It was awesome.

**Craig Carton** (2:15)
Yeah, it was interesting because, look, I've been to the Giants parade. I was at the Yankees parade in 2009
And maybe because the expectation of so many more people going to this particular parade versus those parades, which is not a knock at all, just the reality of not having a championship in 53 years and not having a parade in 73, not having a parade in 1970, is that it felt like they really constricted the flow to the parade route more than ever before. So I made the point to you many times as we were walking south on Worth Street, down past like Spring and Prince and Reed and White Street, which is all part of Tribeca as you go towards the financial district, West Fideye in Lower Manhattan, there had to be half a million people on those streets as well. You know, doing what you and I were doing, couldn't get to the actual parade route, didn't want to be in like sardines either, and just enjoy the overall atmosphere, which again, I was at the Giants Parade, I'm not a Giants fan. I was at the Yankee parade, I was not a Yankees fan. I am a diehard Knick fan, they're my favorite team. And being in a city and on streets that I lived on for 10 years of my life, that's where I lived. I lived on a street called Lispinard Street, which is a two block long street, which basically is Kanaun Broadway. So for me, it was like being back home again. I've not lived there since 2018
So the better part of eight years now, I've not lived in that part of Manhattan. And it was a bit of a flashback for me, but seeing everybody out there, white people, black people, Chinese people, Polish people, German people, a lot of World Cup flair there as well. And then getting to end our day today at one of my favorite restaurants in New York, Adore Lay, which is a great Italian restaurant slash pizza place on Hudson Street, about eight blocks from where we sit right now, was just to me like a perfect cap or two. What is a perfect day? It didn't rain, it drizzled a teeny, teeny bit, but it was just like, I don't know what my expectation was. And yes, we were not on the exact parade route. We were one block away parallel to Broadway is where Big Mac and I spent the majority of the early afternoon and late morning hours. And I know it's going to be cliche, and I don't want to be a cliche guy today, but everybody just got along.