New York Knicks: Carmelo Anthony must stand behind Charles Oakley
The New York Knicks are in the midst of a rebuild and they have no idea that it’s happening. There are too many issues to name when it comes to the 2016-17 team but, the truth of the matter is that a stand needs to be taken by someone.
Phil Jackson wants to trade Carmelo Anthony, Anthony has stated he has no desire to leave. Derrick Rose has been inconsistent, Kristaps Porzingis is trying to find his position and Joakim Noah is just as lost as Hugo. Now, there are issues that go well beyond the disappointment of the Madison Square Garden floor.
[Mark]Just this past week, Knicks legend, Charles Oakley got himself involved with a member of the MSG Security team and was arrested. There are conflicting reports as to what happened but in the end owner James Dolan has gone on record as saying that Oakley is banned from the Garden for life, well, sort of.
“I’ll talk about [the ban] in a little bit, but it’s not necessarily a lifetime ban,” he said, per Tim Bontemps of the Washington Post. “We need to keep the Garden safe for anybody who goes there.”
Whether Oakley and Dolan gets along is not the issue here. Oakley is a hot head and so is Dolan but their love for the Knicks is true and runs deep. But, since Dolan has banned Oakley there has been an outcry of sorts within the league from current to ex players in support of Oak. The Knicks are drowning in the shallow end of the pool and if Anthony wants to make his presence felt as the leader of this team and prove to Jackson that the Knicks are his, this is the perfect time.
The city of New York has Oakley’s back, the NBA players and coaches has Oak’s back but Anthony has stayed quiet until Friday.
What happened is just an accumulation of incident on top of incident on top of everything that’s going on, that’s surrounding the New York Knicks organization right now. It’s just kind of this cloud over us right now that we have to figure out a way to get out of it. I think you have to be in it, you have to be going through it, in order to understand it. From the outside looking in, it looks bad. And it’s even worse when you’re getting through it.
It was a statement but it wasn’t the one fans need to hear. The Knicks have shown no sympathy when they have attacked Anthony, it’s his time to have that LeBron James vs Charles Barkley moment. Until he’s traded or leaves, Anthony is the face of the franchise and the city. He’s going through what Oakley is dealing with now. Jackson and Dolan are trying to ban Anthony from the Garden by trying to push him out. But, unlike Oakley, they can’t do it unless Carmelo lets them. He has the power and if he really wants to put the pressure on the Knicks front office, he has to come out in full support of Oakley.
The city is already there, what they’re waiting for is Anthony to choose his side. Jackson is now the enemy, Dolan has always been the hated one, but Melo, he’s the one on the podium that everyone is willing to follow. All he has to do is say, “Dolan is wrong in his treatment of past and current Knicks legends”, drop the mic and walk off. The damage will be done, the stage set and a line drawn in the sand.
The Knicks and New York belong to Anthony, now it’s his time to prove it.
Mark has been covering Sports and Entertainment for the past six years. His work has been featured on Bleacher Report, ESPN, Fox Sports, Teen Vogue, and many other websites.
