Carmelo Anthony still has a job to do.
Although the All-Star forward is done for the season after undergoing a successful knee debridement, the New York Knicks still want him hanging around, readying himself to be the emotional leader they need, the same one he’s never been.
From Newsday‘s Barbara Barker:
Carmelo is still home on crutches, but Fisher says he'll be hanging with the team once he can move a little more. #Knicks
— Barbara Barker (@meanbarb) March 2, 2015
Fisher on Melo: "We need to have him around just to continue to establish the type of leadership he'll need to continue to step into."
— Barbara Barker (@meanbarb) March 2, 2015
Derek Fisher has a point.
For as much as Anthony has grown on the court–and he has grown—he’s still a silent leader, an “I’ll show you” kind of a guy, not an “I’ll tell you” type of mentor. J.R. Smith even noted that difference between Melo and LeBron James upon being traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Not that this is anything new. Anthony’s off-court stoicism is well documented, and it’s part of the reason why those veteran role players were so pivotal to the Knicks’ 2012-13 push. The team had the locker-room voices it needed to succeed, to weather the bad times, to contextualize and ground the good ones.
The Knicks don’t have that anymore. Not even close.
Besides Melo, only Cleanthony Early, Tim Hardaway Jr. and Jose Calderon are under guaranteed contract beyond this season. Calderon is the closest thing to a veteran voice the Knicks have, and he’s not enough. They can certainly go look to poach one or two or more in free agency, but nothing is definitive there, either.
What the Knicks have is Anthony, a 12-year veteran who really needs to take ownership of his team mentally. Never mind the numbers. He’ll get those, provided he’s healthy. The Knicks need something more. They need a steadying presence, a calming voice, an authority figure who doubles as the liaison been players and coaches and can mentor the young guns.
That, again, has never been Anthony’s style, the above video being an accurate representation of how he’s perceived in the public eye, leadership-wise. Perhaps that’s why his playoff teams have generally flamed out by the second round. Or maybe he’s just never been asked or expected to do what the Knicks are demanding of him now.
Whatever the case, his injury on the sidelines is a golden opportunity to hone his leadership skills, to be that central locker-room figure who can act as the emotional focal point of a championship culture.
Phil Jackson and Fisher can only do so much. There’s no guarantee they get Anthony someone he can defer to.
Until time—or, in this case, free agency—proves otherwise, he needs to be that leader of men, that ubiquitous source of volume, that behind-the-scenes asset he has never been nor seemingly tried to be before.
