Author: Brian Cronin

From Ian Begley:

New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony said Thursday on ESPN Radio that it’s “very likely” he will shut it down after the All-Star Game.

Anthony maintained that he plans to play in Sunday’s game at Madison Square Garden, “even if it’s just a few minutes” — but could be done playing after that.

“It’s very likely. It’s very likely. Now I’ve got to start thinking about the future,” Anthony told Marc Stein, Marc Kestecher and P.J. Carlesimo in an interview on ESPN Radio. “This season is this season. So I really want to just sit down with my team and sit down with the proper people to just kind of plan this thing out and see exactly what I have to do to get done and just to fix it.”

While this seemed to be a near certainty, it is good to see Melo confirm it. Good, now he can hopefully be recovered to be at 100% for next season. And, of course, that should help the Knicks in their quest to finish with the worst record in the league, as Melo is their second-best player after Jason Smith.

The Knicks are going to find themselves hard-pressed to lose tonight against a reeling Orlando Magic team, even with Carmelo Anthony out (and possibly out for the season).

In much bigger news than Tankathon 2015, former Knick Sixth Man of the Year Anthony Mason suffered a massive heart attack today and after four surgeries, it does not look good. Our best hopes to the former Knick star.

This is going to be a tough game for the Knicks to lose, but hopefully they can pull it out with Philly and Minnesota both playing very losable games tonight.

Hassan Whiteside is luckily healthy enough to play.

And, of course, most importantly, so is Andrea Bargnani.

Let’s go! Knicks?

You really have to wonder if Steve Kerr will be able to keep a straight face tonight when he sees what he could have been the coach of if he had honored his verbal agreement with Phil Jackson (I don’t think enough is made, by the way, about him breaking a verbal agreement to coach the Knicks. That’s not cool).

We will get a chance to see a guy tonight that the Knicks might actually have an outside chance of getting this offseason, Draymond Green.

Maybe the Knicks will surprise us and win this one!

Let’s go Knicks!

On the one hand, we should likely be rooting for as many losses as this team can get, to best assure the worst record in the league.

On the other hand, wouldn’t it be fun to help the Nets not even make the playoffs? As bad as the Knicks’ future is, the Nets is that much worse, since they don’t own their own first round pick until…man, I don’t even know when (will we need a new rule, call it the Billy King Rule, where you can’t do first round pick swaps in consecutive years?).

So I’m going to root for a Knick victory tonight.

Let’s go Knicks!

From ESPN:

Amar’e Stoudemire is pondering his future and whether to ask the New York Knicks for a buyout, he said.

“It’s not an easy decision to make,” Stoudemire told Yahoo! Sports. “Over time, we will see how things pan out. You give yourself a break during the All-Star break. You think about it with your family. … That will give me a good solid week on how to weigh out the rest of the season.”

The Knicks have had internal discussions about a possible buyout but have yet to approach Stoudemire about it, sources told ESPN.com’s Ian Begley earlier this week.

“I haven’t talked with Phil [Jackson] or [GM] Steve Mills yet about the future,” Stoudemire said Wednesday. “I’m sure we’ll have a conversation soon about it.”

“It’s a decision I have to make with my family to figure out the best scenario for the near future,” Amar’e Stoudemire said of his plan to use the upcoming All-Star break to decide whether to ask the Knicks for a buyout.
Stoudemire has recently talked to close friends about the possibility of accepting a buyout from the Knicks but the decision wouldn’t be made without “deep thought” from Stoudemire, sources told Begley, because of Stoudemire’s loyalty to Knicks owner James Dolan.

Buying STAT out would be a good sign that perhaps Bargs’ time with this team is not much longer, as well. I’d love to see some more D-Leaguers given a chance.

Tonight is a very important game in Tankathon 2015, as Danny Ainge has historically demonstrated an inordinate ability to have the Celtics tank really well. The Knicks are still seven behind the Celtics but the Celtics are 3-7 in their last 10 as opposed to the Knicks’ 5-5 and they are sinking fast. If the Knicks can pull off a loss tonight, that would be big in the tanking department.

Let’s go! Knicks?

Things are starting to get interesting in the great tankathon of 2015.

Last night, the Knicks continued their strong recent play (the only game in the last five that they lost they played without their second-best player after Langston Galloway, Carmelo Anthony*) with a victory over the Kevin Durant-less Oklahoma City Thunder. Tonight they go to Indiana to play against a Pacers team only 6.5 games ahead of them in the standings. The other two contenders for the worst-record “crown,” Philly and Minny, also won, so the Knicks begin today a half-game behind Minny and tied with Philly. It’s going to be a tight race to the bottom!

The Knicks will be with Carmelo Anthony tonight, as the theory is, I presume, that if you’re going to have knee surgery, you might as well destroy the knee entirely before the surgery or else you’re not getting the most out of the surgery, right?

The Knicks will also be with two other players for the rest of the season, as they are inking both Lou Amundson and Lance Thomas for the rest of the season (it doesn’t appear that they gave them non-guaranteed deals for next season, though, which is odd, as that would seem to be a no-brainer. Perhaps we’ll find out that they did later on. The contract specifics are still iffy).

Boy, these 10-day contracts sure have worked out, right? It’s almost as if they should try to get rid of more useless players on their roster and try out more 10-day contract guys.

Let’s go! Knicks!

*That’s a joke, ah say, that’s a joke, son.

Tonight we will all get to see a superstar point guard play.

Oh, and Russell Westbrook will also be in action tonight.

The newly-signed Langston Galloway has himself a tough matchup tonight. Let’s see if he can keep his strong play up. He’ll actually open the game as the off guard, as Jose Calderon has returned to hopefully pump up his trade value (come on, teams, you know you want Jose!).

Melo also returns to the lineup. He’ll be the starting three tonight, with Jason “Stretch” Smith and Lou Amundson forming the rest of the Knicks’ starting frontcourt.

Let’s go! Knicks!

The Knicks have agreed to a two-year contract with point guard Langston Galloway.

Ian Begley has the details at ESPN:

The Knicks have agreed to a contract with point guard Langston Galloway for the remainder of this season and the 2015-16 season, league sources told ESPNNewYork.com.

Galloway’s second 10-day contract with the Knicks expired earlier Tuesday, so he had been free to sign with any team.

His contract for the 2015-16 season contains a partial guarantee, according to league sources. Galloway has impressed the Knicks’ coaches since being signed to his first 10-day contract Jan. 7.

The stumbling block as to this deal getting done was that Phil Jackson didn’t want to commit any of his upcoming cap space unless he had to. A cap hold is $500,000. A fully guaranteed second-year contract is $800,000. So that’s just $300,000, but I guess Jackson believed that $300,000 might turn out to be very valuable. So my guess is that the partial guarantee for next season is $500,000.

I saw someone note that the Knicks are in danger now of losing Galloway after next season, but I don’t think that’s much of a worry. The Knicks will have a lot of cap space, so if Galloway somehow develops into a star (which seems unlikely), they’ll be able to keep him. I don’t see Galloway getting even a MLE offer next season. Galloway is a bright spot on this team, but he’s more of a back-of-the-team player on a better team. Still worth a roster spot, of course, but I wouldn’t worry too much about losing him in two years. I’d be irked about losing him this year over $300,000, but that’s about it. And there, Jackson called Galloway’s bluff (that Galloway would just try to sign somewhere else) and got the deal he wanted. So good for Phil there.

Along those lines, though, many of us were presuming that the Knicks would pick up Quincy Acy’s relatively cheap qualifying offer for next season ($1,181,348), but I would imagine that the odds are better than not that Acy does not get an offer now. Jackson seems to be valuing cap space over pretty much anyone not named Melo on this roster (it is also why Prigioni will likely be traded this season, as well) so I suspect Acy’s days with the Knicks will be over after this season.