Phil Jackson didn’t get a meeting with Kevin Durant out in the Hamptons? No problem. Carmelo Anthony was in KD’s ear all along!
MORE: 25 best NBA stars to switch teams in their prime
Dwyane Wade went to Chicago? What’s the big deal? He came oh-so close to being a Knick!
You think Golden State has the only super team in the NBA? Just wait ‘til 2017, when Anthony, Wade, Chris Paul and LeBron James join forces in New York!
Golden State won 73 games a year ago? Dig this: The Knicks could run the table this coming season!
“I think we have a chance to win every game, and in the league, that is rare,” Derrick Rose, the Knicks’ new point guard, told Slam Magazine.
As you can detect, nobody’s slowing their roll around the Garden when it comes to the Knicks. They’re officially out of control. They’re trying to talk their way to an NBA title and good luck with that. But it certainly has made for an entertaining off-season, at a time when it’s sorely needed. It’s been three long seasons since the Knicks made the playoffs.
DEVENEY: A commissioner with a conscience
Talk is cheap, except in New York, where the Knicks again are all the rage.
“I know it’s early, the offseason,’’ Anthony said. “The excitement is coming to the city. The New York Knicks are starting to be talked about again.’’
Especially by the Knicks.
Anthony got the ball rolling out in Las Vegas during Team USA workouts when he revealed that he had been in constant conversation with Durant a few days before he started his meetings in Hamptons with the Warriors and the five other teams that lost out in the Durant sweepstakes.
“We talked,’’ Anthony said. “Me and him talked. We were in constant communication. We were together. And he made his decision.’’
GENTILLE: WNBA sending mixed messages
At least Durant listened to Anthony. Durant didn’t grant Jackson an audience, continuing Phil’s streak of failing to get a sit-down with any of the top free agents ever since he arrived in New York 28 months ago to build a championship team. Three summers in town and Phil’s only big free-agent soirees came with DeAndre Jordan, who was never coming to New York, and Greg Monroe – and the Knicks should be ecstatic Monroe picked the Bucks over a roster spot in New York.
In New York, the Knicks aren’t very good when it comes to winning championships. But they’re the Bill Russell-Celtics when it comes to winning press conferences and the off-season. Anthony, as good a carnival barker as there is, divulged that they were right in the thick of it for Wade before he accepted a two-year, $47 million deal from Chicago.
“There was a chance, definitely a chance,’’ Anthony said. “We would’ve had to pull a rabbit out of a hat in the 25th hour, though. There was a chance. If it was two days earlier, we probably would’ve had Dwyane Wade.”
For the record, the Knicks would have blown almost all of their remaining cap room on Wade, maybe not the greatest idea in the world. At least they filled out their team with a solid starter in Courtney Lee and Brandon Jennings, who might be pressed into extensive minutes if something bad happens to Rose. By the way, word of his workouts in Los Angeles make it seem as if he’ll be an MVP-caliber player again. That’s only adding to the craziness surrounding Jeff Hornacek’s first Knicks team.
STEELE: N.C. learned NBA isn't afraid to flex its muscle
Jackson’s 2015 free-agent “haul’’ was limited to mainly backups or borderline starters, including Robin Lopez, Arron Afflalo and Derrick Williams. This summer, he took some risks with Rose and Joakim Noah and at least they’re starting-quality players.
But they’re big names who have seen better days and that’s the depressing part for fans of a team that has won only one playoff series since 2000. It’s also business as usual around the Garden, no matter if it’s Scott Layden, Isiah Thomas, Donnie Walsh, Glen Grunwald or Phil Jackson making the basketball decisions. Put the big names up on the marquee and hope they can be what they once were. So Antonio McDyess led to Stephen Marbury who led to Steve Francis who led to Amar’e Stoudemire who have led to Rose and Noah. They might not be the players they were out in Chicago, but they and Anthony will guarantee sellouts and bring the celebs out to the Garden in droves.
That’s no way to build a title contender for a franchise that hasn’t come close to replacing Patrick Ewing, who last put on the blue and orange in 2000. LeBron James twice has changed teams since 2010 as a free agent and the Knicks never had a shot either time. They once ran all the way out to Los Angeles to have a meeting with Kobe Bryant when he was a free agent and presented him with a chance to sign for the mid-level exception. The spin coming out of the Garden was that at least he gave them a meeting.
Not so with LaMarcus Aldridge, who heard that Jackson wanted him to play center and wisely cancelled. Not so with Durant, who enjoys coming to New York City to visit, but not to try to help the NBA team win its first title since 1973. Next summer? Hey, did you hear, they’ve got a shot to land the entire Banana Boat crew in one massive haul! LeBron has said he’d like to get together before his career is over and play with Anthony, Wade and Paul, and Anthony picked up on that dream.
“A Super team?” Anthony said. “I don’t know. You never know what can happen these days. Everything is different these days. I just want to get through this season first. I want to start this season and enjoy the new Knicks that are on the team. This is a new era for us. I think it’s going to be exciting for us.’’
Exciting? Just wait ‘til they go 82-0…
