Madison Square Garden, Manhattan--A somber Allan Houston, flanked by his wife, Janet, announced that he'd succumbed to his long battle with his wussiness, and that he planned to retire after the season ended.

Houston, the shooting guard in whom the Knicks invested so much wasted money, said he owed it "to my future" to put an end to one of the most tortured sagas in sports history. Behind him stood the team's General Manager, Isiah Thomas, who postured as sober, and next to Thomas, the team's owner, James Dolan XIV, who was genuinely drunk.

Thomas called Houston "a warrior," noting that he'd persisted through such chronic conditions as malignant hypochondria, and was still coming to terms with a recently diagnosed case of "gingivitis."

Houston has insisted that his dentist instructed him to retire months ago, "to rest my gums," but the dentist, Harvey Baum, DMD, called that assertion "lunatic."

"His gums are fine, just like his knee," Baum said.

Dolan, whose renowned stupidity is surpassed--as Walt Frazier, the team's television color-man has said--only by his "vapidity, acidity and humidity," stepping to the microphone said, "Uh..uh..this is...um...a...uh," at which point Thomas snatched his mike and escorted him to a folding chair, instructing him to sit and shut-up.

"You wanna keep going, you wanna keep having your teammates' backs," Houston said, tearing-up. "But, you know... the gum disease has progressed. I gotta look out for myself... my family. I wanna have my gums when my kids grow up."

Thomas, draping an understanding arm around Houston's shoulder, clarified, "Allan's locker will be cleared out April 20th [the team's final game], after which he will be banned for life from access to the Garden, team officials, and players. But we will miss him greatly, and thank him for what he's given to this organization."

Houston, smiling, thanked Thomas for his "kind words," and reiterated his faith in, and love for, Jesus Christ.