KNICK VICTORY MAY BE CARMELO’S LAST
Win could be Melo’s last
IF THIS is it for Carmelo Anthony, his Knicks career ended on the bench in flip flops while his team failed to execute its tank strategy.
There was also some miscommunication — what else is new with the Knicks? — and a cloud of confusion over Anthony’s future.
“I would love to be back. But there’s some things I would love to see different,” said Anthony, who was, once again, all over the place with his comments about his future. “Kind of just the mentality, just a winning mentality and wanting to win and being committed to that.” Despite the organization’s clear desire to lose the final game and Jeff Hornacek saying a day earlier his star would likely rest, Anthony was in the starting lineup Wednesday in a 114-113 victory. Anthony said his plan was to always play in the final game, but found himself benched in the fourth quarter as the crowd chanted, “We Want Melo.”
Hornacek said he never considered reinserting Anthony before Maurice N’dour hit the game-winner for New York (31-51), but would have if the player had asked. Anthony said he wanted to get on the court for what could’ve been his final minutes with the Knicks.
“It felt good (to hear the crowd chanting for me),” Anthony said. “It’s been a while. It’s been a while to sit there and hear that. But it felt good. I did want to play. Jeff took me out and sat me down.”
Afterwards, Anthony made the classy move of signing autographs for fans and handing out souvenirs, including the sneakers he removed from his feet with 20 seconds remaining. He then hinted at the disconnect between himself and Phil Jackson and the direction of the franchise.
“I’m sure that they know how I feel as far as wanting to win and, like I told you before, I’ve seen kind of the shift and the direction that we started playing, kind of after All-Star break, I saw that,” Anthony said. “And I accepted that. And I tried to follow suit with that. I tried to just do the right thing, just get through it. But I’ve seen that writing on the wall a long time ago.” Anthony said Wednesday he prepared himself to leave the Knicks before the trade deadline, but he was never presented a proposal. The Knicks are looking to unload Anthony, who owns a no-trade clause.
“If it’s something, a direction that you want to go in, I’ll respect that,” Anthony said. “If it’s something that you want to continue to build on I respect that, too. But just communicate with me, just be up front with me, just communicate with me and I’m open.”
Communication hasn’t been good between Anthony and Jackson, who’ve traded subliminal messages on social media.
“Well when you talking about people speaking indirectly, it’s kind of hard to trust that anyway,” Anthony said. “If somebody was talking bad about you indirectly at your job, what would you do? You would feel a certain way. You would want that person to come straightforward with you. And I feel the same way. I’m always open – I’m a very honest person. I know the business and I know the game and I know how it works. So if it’s something that you want to get across, a message that you want to get across, I’ve always been open.”
The next step for Anthony and Jackson is their exit meeting on Thursday.
“It’s nothing I’m looking forward to hearing. At this point it’s all on me,” he said. “I have a lot of thinking and reflecting to do. It’s all on me at this point. I’m pretty sure the organization has an idea, a thought of what they want to do, how they want to do it. But at this point it’s all on me.”
NO TANKS: With their final (unwelcomed?) victory, the Knicks tied with the Timberwolves for the sixth worst record in the league. The NBA will hold a drawing next week to break the tie.
At No. 6, the Knicks would have a 6.3 percent chance of winning the lottery. At No. 7, the chance drops to 3.5 percent.