NEW YORK - Larry Brown made a few things clear at his first public appearance as coach of the New York Knicks:

Isiah Thomas will still have final say on personnel moves, Herb Williams will be the coach in case of emergency, and patience will be a necessary commodity for everyone.

"It's going to be ugly early, I can promise you that. That's been my M.O., but it's going to get better," Brown promised Thursday after being introduced as the 22nd head coach in franchise history.

The Knicks are coming off a 33-win season in which they missed the playoffs for the third time in four years, and Thomas has placed the team in a long-term rebuilding mode that will make it difficult for Brown to perform his trademark quick turnaround.

Brown said he would emphasize defense, rebounding and unselfishness from the first day of training camp, and predicted he'll drive Thomas "crazy" with his requests for personnel changes as his tenure unfolds.

"The commitment they made to me, I don't take that lightly," Brown said, predicting this will be the last stop of his coaching career. "I'm not here to retire."

Thomas will retain final say on personnel moves, but Brown will wield all the influence regarding who plays, how much they play, and whether those players will remain in New York long-term.

"You're not always blessed with a roster that's what you really wanted," Brown said, explaining that he will make his feelings known to management. "I'm going to tell them what I think and how we can get better, and the end result is that we have the same goals."

The Knicks pulled out all the stops for Brown's introduction, flashing "Welcome Back, Larry" on the marquee outside the arena, putting together a clip of Brown's career highlights - even finding footage of him sinking a two-handed set shot - and serving cheesecake and New York-style overstuffed sandwiches to a crowd of media members that numbered in the hundreds.

Brown's wife and children sat in the front row near Williams, who will join Brown's staff as an assistant coach and who Brown said would run the team in the event his health problems force him to miss any time.

Brown's contract was believed to be for four years with a salary of at least $8 million annually. Had Brown turned down the job, the Knicks would have given it to Williams after he guided the team over the final 43 games last season.

"My greatest hope is that we're going to be good for a long time, and he (Williams) is going to be the next coach of the New York Knicks," Brown said.

His face tanned after more than a week of playing golf near his summer home, his appearance perfect in a dark suit, light blue shirt and gray tie, Brown called himself "a young 64" as he soaked up the spotlight, waxed nostalgic and tried to keep expectations in line with reality.

The Knicks' roster is overstocked with undersized power forwards and trigger-happy shooting guards, and the team's one star - point guard Stephon Marbury - will be asked to change from the shoot-first, pass-second scorer he's been for nine NBA seasons into the type of playmaker and offensive initiator Chauncey Billups became in Detroit.

The adjustments made by Billups helped the Pistons reach the NBA Finals the past two seasons, and the degree of acceptance that Marbury shows will go a long way toward determining whether he'll be a long-term part of the Knicks' pursuit of ending the franchise's 32-year championship drought.

"I don't think by any means, from talking to Isiah, that this is a finished product," Brown said. "This is a work in progress."

The Knicks will be Brown's eighth NBA coaching job in a career (not including college jobs at Kansas and UCLA) that has taken him to Detroit, Philadelphia, Indiana, Los Angeles, San Antonio, New Jersey and Denver.

This chapter will be different, however, because of the fondness Brown has felt for the Knicks since he was growing up in Brooklyn and Long Beach, N.Y.

Brown recalled taking the train to Manhattan and stopping afterward at bars where the players would congregate after games, remembering how odd it was to see opposing players fraternize.

He also recalled the admiration he felt for former Knicks coaches Joe Lapchick and Red Holzman, saying the first thing he often did when he came into the Garden with opposing teams was to look up to the rafters to see a banner with the number "613," representing the number of Holzman's career coaching victories.

Brown's affinity for New York basketball is part of his love of the game, a feeling nurtured through the competitiveness he learned on the city's asphalt courts.

"I grew up on a playground where if you lost, you went to the back of the line and wouldn't play for a while," Brown said. "And if you took a bad shot, one of the bigger guys would crack you,"

Brown will try to transfer that passion to his newest team, and the players who don't buy into his program will be the ones exiled to a life somewhere other than at Madison Square Garden.

The Knicks' hierarchy is fed up with the mediocrity and malaise that has enveloped the franchise for nearly a half-decade. The hiring of Brown sent a message to their fans that the man guiding the team harbors the same yearning for success as the die-hards clad in orange and blue sitting in the stands.