It’s no secret that Carmelo Anthony wants to remain a New York Knicks player. But it’s also common knowledge that he wants to compete for NBA championships and that this season is turning him off more and more with every loss and bad game that comes by from remaining on the team via a contract extension.
The Knicks lost 108-110 to the Dallas Mavericks at home, which means they are now six games behind the 8th spot in the Eastern conference. Anthony scored 44 points in that game and while playing an NBA-high 39.1 minutes a night he’s averaging 28.2 points per game with 8.6 rebounds per game. He might not be the world’s best defender (or even an average one at that) but compared to the rest of his teammates or his head coach, he’s fulfilling his part of the deal.
Anthony can opt out of his deal at the end of this season, or stay and make $23.3 million next year before hitting free agency. Before this season began, everyone assumed it would simply make sense for Anthony to opt out so he can get a long term deal for a lot of money. Now, he can opt out and simply look to play somewhere else.
But it’s not that simple. Anthony has his demands and expectations, which is to play for a title contender. Teams also need a lot of cap space in order to sign him. That combination simply doesn’t really add up – not in 2014. There has been talk of the Chicago Bulls, and rumors suggest Anthony would love to play for Tom Thibodeau. However, he doesn’t really fit the Knicks’ style, and the Bulls need to make a lot of changes in order to make his contract work, even if he’s willing to take a paycut if it brings him closer to an NBA title.
There’s always 2015, with a lot of teams, especially the Lakers and the Knicks, seeing that season as the stepping stone to their next big thing. A lot of money clears up for the Knicks in 2015, but that means Anthony needs to endure a 2014-2015 season that just might be as bad as this one. The Lakers can sign him right now, but with him, Kobe Bryant and Steve Nash (unless he retires) there’s not much room for anyone else, and the chances of winning aren’t that great.
According to this, Anthony is finding it harder and harder to stomach the losses and the overall awful ability on the floor from the Knicks. The management built an expensive team to win a championship, but it peaked last season with a game 6 loss in the conference semifinals, and now Anthony needs to wait for the contract of Tyson Chandler, Amare Stoudemire and Andrea Bargnani to run out so a new team can be built around him.
Anthony looks at his draft class teammates: Bosh, Wade and LeBron, and sees their NBA titles. Can he do the same? Not quite sure, but Anthony is paid and will be treated like a #1 player for the next few years, even though it’s quite clear that it’s impossible to build a team around him and still hope for an NBA championship to be a realistic goal.