In fact, Berman has been on the Knicks beat for 20 years and he’s never seen the fan base like this. “The fans are beat up, to the point that I’ve noticed in recent months that a super-negative story is going to be ripped on Twitter by a lot of the Knicks fans,” Berman said. “I know with Twitter it’s tough to gauge if that’s the general thinking of the public, but they are so desperate for a winning team and a positive story that they’ll criticize a writer for going too negative. I’ve never experienced that – never – on this beat until very recently, and that just shows that Knicks fans are so beaten down that they just can’t read constant negativity. If there’s any little glimmer of hope, that’s what they want to read.”