I remember the days when other teams were afraid to come to the Garden to play against the New York Knicks. Those days of Anthony Mason and Charles Oakley’s choking defence are all gone. Now, the failing team is fighting itself as it embarks on a journey that might end up being the worse season in Knicks history.
The New York Knicks were en route to their fifth straight loss last week against Brooklyn when a frustrated Tim Hardaway Jr. screamed angrily, “Get the rebound!”
Certain his second-year teammate was speaking to him, Carmelo Anthony approached Hardaway on the way down the court and used an expletive to ask Hardaway who in the world he thought he was talking to.
Anthony, according to sources, used another expletive in telling Hardaway he was going to beat him up when they got into the locker room after the game.
While the two players never wound up fighting, the episode was emblematic of the volatile state of the Knicks. Off to their worst start in franchise history at 4-19, the Knicks are a team full of discord, defiance and doubt, according to sources with knowledge of the situation.
“Nobody’s taken a swing at anybody, but there’s a lot of arguing and cursing each other out after games,” one source said.
Just hours after small forward and free agent Carmelo Anthony met with the Los Angeles Lakers, the New York Knicks had their own meeting with the player and offered him the most any team could – a five year contract worth $129 million, according to ESPN Sports.
If Melo accepts the offer, he would be one of the highest paid players in the NBA. The meeting ended with no word from Carmelo on whether he would accept the offer.
The Lakers are offering Carmelo $98 million for a 4 year contract, the highest offer they are allowed to make.
Accepting the Knicks offer would equal roughly $25.8-million a year for the NBA star, compared to around $24.2-million from the Lakers. With a little over $1 million a year difference, Melo’s decision on where to play rests more on the potential of winning a championship than the finances.
The New York Knicks aren’t doing too good right now. In a recent interview on ESPN, the Knicks head coach Mike Woodson made a statement that caught the ear of the NBA gods.
The Knicks Coach was talking about the foul calls or lack of calls where his star player Carmelo Anthony is concerned, and this statement cost him $25,000
Absolutely. And I’m not going to shy away from that either. I think Melo gets hit more than ever.”
…
“I’ve been at this thing 30 years and sometimes I’m starting to wonder what’s a foul and what’s not a foul.”
…
“The offense normally has the advantage when you’re making plays at the rim…Melo draws a lot of contact but he comes up empty a lot of times as well.”
New York Knicks fans, brace yourself. Take a deep breath and exhale slowly. Then make sure you’re sitting down before reading any further.
In a long-form piece for The New York Observer, Rafi Kohan relayed the following quote, spoken by none other than Carmelo Anthony:
I want to be a free agent. I think everybody in the NBA dreams to be a free agent at least one time in their career. It’s like you have an evaluation period, you know. It’s like if I’m in the gym and I have all the coaches, all the owners, all the GMs come into the gym and just evaluate everything I do. So yes, I want that experience.
‘Melo’s impending foray into free agency has been the subject of much discussion throughout the offseason.
Will he decide to stay in New York for the foreseeable future? Will he opt out and hit the open market? Could he—gasp—join the Los Angeles Lakers, putting on a purple-and-gold jersey that would incite plenty of boos?
It’s sure to be a hot-button issue throughout the 2013-14 campaign, even as the Knicks keep pace in the Eastern Conference and remain a legitimate part of the title chase. Especially now that the world knows where Anthony stands on the issue.
But what does this actually mean? Should we start spewing out doom and gloom for the Knicks?
…next year that is. Yes, the 2013-2014 NBA season for the Los Angeles Lakers seems more like a throw away season. The Lakers have lost their “next in line” player in Dwight Howard, have an aging Gasol, Kobe, and Nash, and have no cap space to sign any big name player this free agency. Heck, looking at the Lakers roster right now any person would laugh at it. This of course is all part of the Lakers plan for the 2014 free agency period.
Probably the Lakers biggest free agent signing, Center Chris Kaman
After this coming season, the Lakers will have around $40 million in cap space and only two players under contract, Steve Nash ($9.7 million) and Robert Sacre ($915,243). The Lakers can even waive Nash since he’ll be in his final season and stretch his money owed and only take a $3.2 million dollar salary cap hit in 2014-2015. Kobe Bryant will be the only big question mark considering he seems to want to play another three to four seasons, so let’s just pencil him in for around $10-15 million.
Lebron can become a free agent after 2014 and the Lakers are gearing up for a run at him
Let me read off some big names who will be free agents in 2014: Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony, Danny Granger, Loul Deng, Dirk Nowitzki and Dwayne Wade. The list continues if you want to add in the Restricted Free Agents which focus around up and coming stars like Kyrie Irving, John Wall, Eric Beldsoe, and Paul George; all of them though aren’t leaving their respected teams no matter what. The 2014 free agent class is massive in terms of star power to say the least and a team like the Lakers plan to take full advantage of it.
Teammates? It’s not as far fetched as you’d think
Let’s get this out of the way, Lebron James will not be taking his talents to L.A, that’s a total pipe dream. The same can be said for any of the young restricted free agents, especially Kyrie and Paul George. The only possible star the Lakers can land would be Carmelo Anthony. In his current tenure in New York, Melo hasn’t had incredible playoff success and coming to a town like L.A where he will be the man and be paired up with another super star is an intriguing offer to say the least. Plus, the Lakers can offer Melo a huge contract of four years and around $100 million dollars. It shall be a very interesting off season to say the least and the 2015 free agent class promises to be the same with players like Kevin Love, Rajon Rondo, and LeMarcus Aldridge becoming free agents. God I love the NBA.
I had some other things to do. So I was only able to see the last 5 minutes of today’s regulation game. But based on those last 5 minutes, I can definitely tell that the entire game would go down as a must see classic.
Boston refused to be swept.
With 5 minutes left in regulation, the Knicks were down by 2 points with Boston leading. That regulation quickly evaporated with both teams tied at 84 to start the overtime. With 5 minutes added to the game clock, Paul Pierce of Boston began the scoring, followed by Felton of the Knicks to tie it up again at 86. A basket by Boston’s Kevin Garnett brought the score to 88 Boston 86 New York, only to be tied again when Carmelo Anthony made two free throws.
And then Jason Terry came into the game for Boston and right off the bench, hit a three pointer to bring the score to 91 Boston, 88 New York. A quick basket by New York tied up the score again, but Jason Terry wasn’t having it. He scored another jumper and in the next Boston possession, Terry got fouled, went to the basket and made both free throws.
Score at that point was 95 Boston, 90 New York.
With seconds remaining on the overtime clock, Garnet rebounded under the Knicks basket and passed out to Terry again, who then made an easy lay-up to officially seal the win for Boston.
Overtime clock runs out with Boston winning the game 97-90.
After the game, Terry said that God told him to “keep fighting. You guys ain’t dead yet.” He also warned the Knicks that the series is nowhere near ending, saying “these are the moments I live for. And it’s a long series.”
For Boston, Paul Pierce led the way with 27 points in 43 minutes of play, followed by J. Green with 26. Kevin Garnett and Jason Terry both had 9 points.
Carmelo Anthony led the Knicks with 32 points in 38 minutes. Felton was next with 23 followed by Shumpert with 12. Knicks now lead the series 3 games to 1. The series now heads back to New York for game 5 on Wednesday, May 1st.
The Maurice Podoloff Trophy is given to the Most Valuable Player each year in the entire NBA. This year the clear favorite to win his fourth MVP award if Miami Heat Forward Lebron James. I will not sit here and say Lebron James is not an amazing basketball player, but I do not believe he deserves the award this year. Yes, he led the Miami Heat to a franchise record 27 win streak, yes he is the most dominant player right now, and yes he is a full-fledged superstar, but he is on a team built to achieve above and beyond the known limits. He is a very important corner-stone to the team, but not the most valuable player in the league.
2008 NBA MVP Kobe Bryant
No matter what arena you see him play, no matter what team he is playing against, Kobe Bryant will always hear “M-V-P! M-V-P!” chants. Oddly enough Kobe has only won one NBA MVP award back in 2008. This year he easily deserves to be a front-runner in the MVP conversation. The horribly underachieving Lakers have been willed on by Kobe alone and even though he is now out with a season ending Achilles tear, he has gotten them into the 8th seed of the playoffs.
Clippers Guard Chris Paul
Chris Paul (a.k.a CP3) has made the Clippers the team in Los-Angeles now and for years to come. He will become the corner-stone of the new dominant west coast force that are the Clippers. Chris Paul is long due for a MVP award and after watching him this year lead the Clippers to their first division title in decades, hitting the 50 win mark for the first time since 1976, and taking the Clippers on a dominant and undefeated month of December.
New York Knick Forward Carmelo Anthony
Carmelo Anthony is poised to win his first NBA Scoring Title after this season just nudging out Oklahoma City’s Kevin Durant. Over the month of April Carmelo has averaged nearly 29 points per game and lead his Knicks on a 13 game win streak that ended in Chicago. Anthony has always been an elite scorer but this season in New York he is proving to be a real MVP candidate. Over this season the Knicks were written off as “too old” but they have secured a second placed seed in the Eastern Conference and will match up against Boston in the first round (a real good game by the way). While Carmelo’s stats are no where as nice as James or other players, his Knicks are only 6-7 without him. I would easily give him the MVP Award this year since Melo is long overdue and has clearly proven his worth.
Spurs Guard Tony Parker
Ah, Tony Parker, he was once the “dark horse” MVP candidate throughout this season. In 65 games this season, Parked has averaged 20.4 points, 7.6 assists, while shooting 52.4%, and 35.3% from beyond the arc. He has once again lead the San Antonio Spurs to a 58-23 record while securing the second place seed in the Western Conference. Earlier this season some people would’ve penciled in Parker as the favorite to win the MVP as he was and the Spurs were just on a roll. Sadly in the month of April he has dropped off due to injuries and has only played four games. No matter what though, Tony Parker is still the dark horse candidate to win MVP.
Once again, I am not putting down Lebron James and his amazing talent and ability to play the game of basketball. He is the most dominant force in basketball right now and will be for a couple more years. James though, does not deserve another MVP award as he is clearly not the most valuable player for the team compared to others. Sadly though, a fourth trophy is inevitable.
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