Knicks’ Williams Is Far From Home and Trouble

When the Knicks’ president, Donnie Walsh, informed Shawne Williams that his N.B.A. lifespan had been granted an extension with the Knicks, he offered one strong caveat.

“I told him, ‘It’s a different ballgame now,’ ” said Walsh, who kept Williams over the sentimental favorite Patrick Ewing Jr. for the last roster spot before the season. “ ‘If anything negative comes up, you’re out of here.’ ”
Williams, a 6-foot-9 forward, is one of the few substitutes Coach Mike D’Antoni regularly calls upon. After making 10 of his first 12 attempts from 3-point range this season, Williams is again settling into the ups and downs of the N.B.A.

Ted Anderson, Williams’s coach at Hamilton High in Memphis, said of Williams, “He’s got nine lives.”

“Really, I had to iron out a lot of wrinkles in my life,” the 24-year-old Williams said recently. “I sat back — even though I wanted a team to call me after the Nets — I knew I wasn’t in great shape” to go to a team.

“I changed a lot of things,” Williams said, adding. “Mostly, the biggest thing with me, it was never me. It was just the crowd who I ran with and the people who I had around me. But I wouldn’t say it was a bad choosing of the people, it was just the people I grew up with all my life and I just had to separate myself from that if I wanted better things.”

When asked if the responsibility fell on his shoulders, Williams said: “Most definitely. Nobody made me do some of the stuff I did, hang with the people I hanged with.”