Carmelo Anthony Thinks Selfish Reputation Began During ‘Linsanity’

Carmelo Anthony was in street clothes nursing a right groin injury when Jeremy Lin improbably blew up, and ‘Melo seems to believe that the Linsanity craze led to people calling him a selfish player. From USA Today: “What gives? Is he selfish? Or is he a team player? It creates a puzzling contradiction between what we think Anthony is on the basketball court and what his supporters think he is. The truth might be somewhere in between, but not necessarily the middle. Anthony understands the situation. ‘Now that I’m in the spotlight a lot more being in New York City, you’ve got multiple opinions,’ Anthony said. ‘You’ve got everybody saying something about this, about that. For me, just play ball. What I realized, first of all, is to keep my mouth shut and just play ball. At the end of the day, there’s no way you can go back and forth with everybody’s opinion. I realize that.’ But he pinpoints exactly when the ‘Anthony is selfish’ meme began. ‘Let’s be frank about it,’ he said. ‘When it comes to the Knicks, we’re talking about one particular point in time. We’re talking about the whole ‘Linsanity’ thing. That’s when it started. That’s when it started to escalate as far as people saying I was selfish.’ [...] Lin led the Knicks to an 8-1 record with Anthony out. Madison Square Garden was rocking, like it hadn’t been in years, and the Knicks were relevant. They moved into the top eight in the Eastern Conference and into playoff contention. Then Anthony returned, and so did the losing. The Knicks went 2-8, including six consecutive losses culminating in the dismissal of Mike D’Antoni. [...] ‘Lin came and we started winning games and then we started losing games, and they could only point to one thing, which is me, the leader of the team,’ Anthony said. ‘They’re not going to point to Amar’e. They’re not going to point to (guard) Iman Shumpert. They’re going to point to me. I accept that. It doesn’t bother me.’”

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Tags: Carmelo Anthony, Fans, Houston Rockets, Jeremy Lin, Linsanity, New York Knicks, Team USA

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http://cnbc.com JTaylor21

It’s not the fact that he’s selfish, is the fact that he has only gotten out of the 1st Round once in his 9yr career. Meanwhile, the two cats he’s compared to, have been to numerous Conference Championships series and the Finals.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

Not defending, not rebounding the way he could, not playing defense under D’Antoni and suddenly deciding to play harder on that end of the floor after D’Antoni resigned. The only season he got past the first round, it was because of Billups being the leader on the Nuggets that Melo never was. He fits so well on Team USA because his flaws are covered by guys like LeBron and Kobe defending the way they do. George Karl made numerous comments about him not learning how to win or wanting to win as much as just score the ball when he was in Denver. When they traded for AI in 06, Karl was hoping that Iverson would help Melo play to win. This didn’t start during Linsanity. It’s been going on for years. What also counts against him is LeBron, Wade, and Bosh all have championship rings now. He’s the only star of that group without any hardware at all in the NBA outside of All-Star appearances.
Flame Heart

What’s he talking about? The selfish talk began when he was traded to New York when Amar’e was leading his team into the playoffs. The knicks were robbed and they got worse with Melo. Stop blaming Lin and get out of the first round.
DJ

He had the nerve to call Lin’s contract ridiculous. What justifies the money that you make Mr. Anthony? Lets see, you made a few all star games yet the furthest you’ve been is too the WCF. You play no D and you shoot too much. Yes you are right, keep your mouth shout and play ball cause you have no right to talk about other people’s contract when you don’t deserve half the money you getting from NY.
http://www.michaelcho.com M Cho

Nah, he’s always been selfish. It’s always about Carmelo first, not the team. He sulked when things didn’t go his way in Denver, he held teams hostage during his trade dram & he refused to play team ball in NYC under D’Antoni. Dude is always about getting his, and f*ck everyone else.
Sin City

I want someone to answer this with 100% honesty. Could a healthy Wade make the finals with Melo’s Nuggets? 8th spot playing the #1 team in the West? Replace him with LeBron and then what? Melo is delusional when it comes to being selfish, but every playoff series he was in, it was him vs an entire team, minus the Billups squad. After the Heat Knicks, Wade and Bron said how bad they felt for Melo. He has zero help, so he has to be a one man army. They said that publically.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

With respect to Anthony, it was reported that he didn’t mean that Lin wasn’t deserving of that money. He meant that it was ridiculous that the Rockets offered a contract that was unexpected. Whether that’s true or not, no one knows. The only one who knows what he meant is Melo himself. If I’m Amar’e Stoudemire in the midst of all this, I’m wondering what happened to the team I had before Melo got there because they were doing alright.
deadeye wong

BooHoo Melo! I feel for the $20 Million dollar man. Time to Man-up, no more Lin to bash, or any other feeble excuses!
http://slamonline.com Nella

All true words so far. Love his talent, love his ability, but he’s never developed the way his potential would allow him to. He could have been an absolute beast in this league that re-defined the 3/4 hybrid , instead of being a talented but flawed scorer.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

Melo’s Nuggets weren’t a bad team. I could argue that they were better and deeper than the current Knicks team. An old Jason Kidd, old Marcus Camby, Felton, JR Smith, Shumpert, Melo, Amar’e, Tyson Chandler compared to Billups, Afflalo, JR Smith, Melo, Nene, Kenyon Martin, Al Harrington, Birdman. Even without Billups, Andre Miller was and is an above average point guard and leader. I never understood why Melo felt the need to get out of Denver so bad as if the team he had wasn’t good enough to compete. They would have been able to get out of the 1st Round if he had a willingness to do more than just score. Dwyane Wade won 40 plus games two seasons ago with Michael Beasley, Mario Chalmers, Udonis Haslem and an old Jermaine O’Neal. Put him on those Nuggets teams and they would have easily gotten past the 1st round. LeBron’s Cavs had much less talent than Melo’s Nuggets. He could have won a championship with those guys. For goodness sake, the man got to the Finals with Larry Hughes, Boobie Gibson, Drew Gooden, Donyell Marshall and Ilgauskas.
andrew woods

im not sure how far dwade could of carried the denver nuggets squad that melo was on, but if i was a betting man i would say that in 8 tries he would of made it out the first around at least a couple times. then switching to lebron, if he was on that nuggets team its almost for sure he would of made a couple wcf’s
Link

A healthy Wade or Lebron on that Denver team would of been way better than with Melo.
http://thahiphopcorner.com Kevin

Sin City GTFOH with that Melo was a one man army ish. He had a lot of talent on those teams in Denver, it’s not like he was playing with an Allen Iverson in Philly type supporting cast or KG in Minnesota type supporting cast. He had talented players around him, stop frontin
http://cnbc.com JTaylor21

He’s sexy though. Cute little chubby-faced thing! I’d love to marsh his melo!!
Lolanto

Haha, i think everyone who’s been watching the league knows he’s a selfish player, just nobody knew he was so funny. His selfishness didnt begin with Linsanity, he has always been a selfish player.

I knew he was a selfish guy when he played Dolan like a fool and forced a trade so he can come to new york and get a max contact before the new CBA. What kind of a player would force his hand and dismantle an already strong team with good chemistry just for his own goals? What kind of a player would not take less money to play for a team and win? All the unselfish winners I can think of took less money to build help build and create something, only a selfish player would tear shit apart if things didnt fit his ideas.

See how he sits on the ground and pouts when the refs don’t give him calls he feels he’s entitled to, while Tyson, Iman and everyone else is already back on the other side playing defense?

Remember that time he was so engaged with arguing with the matrix that he inbound the ball without looking and caused a turnover?

You migh argue that these are more signs of being a diva than a selfish player, but the bottom line is, this dude is not a winner, he’s a vin baker in te making.
http://cnbc.com JTaylor21

Yes. They would have been in at least 1 Final with LeBron and gotten out of the 1st Round every year and made a couple WCFs with Wade or LeBron. Everyone forgets just how deep and talented those Den squads were. He played with a still great AI at the latter part of his prime for a couple of seasons.
http://www.nba.com/knicks danpowers

only people who dont understand professional basketball would consider any nba scorer as “selfish” no matter weather its melo, bryant, iverson, durant, wilkins, jordan or whoever. when a player is able to score better than anybody else on the floor then his task is simply to put the ball into the basket. they are not the types of players who necessarily make the guys around them better but not everybody can be a jason kidd or hakeem olajuwon. even stars have to play their roles like any role player. and when your role is to (try to) put the ball into the basket then he has to shoot. if this looks and / or works good is mostly a matter of a working gameplan and also the 4 other guys out there. when that doesnt work it lets the scorer look bad and laypersons then talk about “selfish players”.
Sin City

I knew someone would fail in comprehension. Kevin, who else helped Melo in the playoffs last year? One hand Stat? Injured Shump? Lin?JR? Who helped him vs Celtics? Injured Billups, Stat out for that playoffs too. Iverson and Melo Nuggets went nowhere, but Billups and him was perfect. Listen, I agree with everybody about the dude selfish ways, but no way did I believe he deserves all the blame as if the Knicks was great.
Basketball_iQ

Melo isn’t crying, in fact, he accepts the blame & wears it bc he’s the leader… If I recall correctly, jr smith was the culprit on that lone denver team who shot waaaaaaaay too much & let kobe light him up…
Its all opinions & the fact is, the knicks aren’t good, I MEAN ENTIRELY, & the scheme?? Horrible…
clydesays

Melo must have tuned out all of the ‘selfish’ talk that has been dogging him since Denver. I doubt anyone that’s watched basketball over the last decade can deny Melo’s talent on offense. When he’s on, he’s almost unstoppable. It’s his refusal to make plays out of double & triple teams and his lack of effort on D. But hey, if you want to blame Lin for all that, go ahead. Incidently, Melo, Amare & Chandler’s contracts count for almost ALL of the Knicks cap space for the next 3 seasons.
http://slamonline.com nbk

if it didn’t bother him, he wouldn’t have mentioned it. and the “carmelo is selfish” is nothing new. And only in one place did it just start becoming a popular narrative when Linsanity started (New York). Other than that, the “carmelo is selfish” stuff started when he was what a rookie? And then really picked up steam when he forced his way out of Denver.
TrueBasketballfan

Almost everyteam Melo lost to in the first round made the NBA finals or wcf ya can’t compare the wade nd lebron lead teams to the Melo teams because not once was the the compition equal Melo played in the west which was 100 times stronger then the east Melo faced teams like LA spurs nd mavs lebron hardest comp was Boston nd he never beat em til he join the heat nd wade never did nothin in the playoffs till he had shaq nd bron
Sin City

The entire NY wanted D’antoni gone. It’s on the back of every newspaper in NY. It happens, and we’re looking good with Woody. People cry that Dolan should have fired him sooner. Summer time hits and after another first round exit, D’antoni was a victim and Melo is a coach killer. This is NY. He needs to shut up, focus on winning gold, and then focus on making your teammates better. I hate watching someone with that passing ability, have a pathetic career assist average. Durant too with the boards, but he wised up and had career highs in both. I love that.
peregrine

So he says to keep his mouth shut, then almost immediately after points blame at Linsanity for the selfish claims? The guy just can’t keep his mouth shut.
JL

Does he not know that he sounds selfish and self absorbed when he shifts responsibility instead of looking at why people think he’s selfish and when people blame him it doesn’t bother him. I understand that he can’t take every little detail in the media, but he has to improve himself to get better. Has he really gotten better that much over his career? He has only gotten more than 7 rebounds twice in his career in a year average, and his best shooting years were in his 3-5 years. His 3pt shooting has consistently been in the low to mid 30′s after that and never improved consistently. He can score efficiently by curbing the 3′s and posting up more, but chooses not to. He peaked out in his 5th year and has been worse ever since. Look at Lebron. For all the flak that he gets, he has improved his FG% consistently, kept his reb’s above 7 which is great for a SF, gets almost 1 block, and always more than 1.5 steals, TO’s a little high but still decent assist to turnover ratio. I don’t like his personality but you cannot hate on his game.

Melo, it’s time to man up and play some defense and take less 3′s. See what Lebron is doing? try to emulate that. No reason why they can’t have a similar game with his physical tools.
http://www.nba.com/knicks danpowers

@JL + peregrine and the rest of the retard fraction. what exactly didnt you understand about “thets WHEN it started” not “it was BECAUSE of linsanity” and “i accept that”. where and how are you able to find there that he puts the blaim on somebody else? it is true, most of that unqualified public “selfish talk” began during linsanity for whatever reason. knicks fans owe melo alot for getting dantoni out of ny so we wont let anything get to melo.
Eric

Funny how Melo is called a coach killer, not team player, lazy, holding teams hostage, etc. but no one mentions the fact that Lebron and Dwight Howard did or are doing the EXACT SAME THING. Melo is just under a much bigger microscope than those two.

Dwight Howard is currently holding the entire league hostage with his nonsense, had a coach fired (not resigned on his own like D’Antoni),
practically gives up playing on the court when his teammates don’t give him the ball enough (much like Lebron did in the Cavs finals series)…and the list goes on and on…
http://slamonline.com nbk

Eric, what Dwight is doing is very similar to what Melo did. LeBron though, why you think he did that is a mystery. Never did anything close. Honestly, i get that most of the world just blatantly doesn’t like the guy, but people need to learn how to separate their personal feelings from factual events.
http://www.slamonline.com Chinese Oppenheimer

Everyone knows nash never made a finals, and played zero defense right? Melo always ran into lakers, spurs, or mavs. No bucks, 6ers, or other scrub warmup teams for the first round.
http://slamonline.com Allenp

I don’t think you can be a superstar and “just” be a scorer. You have to have that extra dimension whether it be rebounding, or passing or defense.
And the truly, truly top tier superstars have several skills. LeBron, Kobe, Wade all can score, pass, defend and rebound with the best at their positions, or they could in their primes. Even Iverson in his prime could give you 33 and 8.
Melo scores like a beast. He’s a decent rebounder. He shouldn’t have been asked to play point forward, but he should have been able to be a more efficient scorer in Mike D’s offense. I compare him to Durant. Right now, Durant is showing signs that he’s focused on improving as a passer and rebounder, and until the Finals, he was doing that on the court. Melo needs to challenge himself in the same way.
ChipS

Except Melo didn’t change his mind every week like Dwight. It was Trade Me and was always Trade Me. AllenP, I agree. He shows signs that he is a good passer, just needs to trust teammates more.
http://slamonline.com nbk

Dwight never changed his mind. Stop believing everything you read and hear. Dwight always wanted to be traded to a team he wanted to go to. Orlando told him if he didn’t stay he would be traded to LA. Which would have been like Denver telling Melo that if he didn’t stay through the rest of that last season they would trade him to the Mavericks. Or some team he didn’t want to go to, where he wouldn’t be the face of the franchise.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

George Karl wasn’t good enough for Melo. Mike D’Antoni wasn’t either. Two coaches who have won quite a bit in the league. I don’t see how Mike Woodson will be good enough for him. George Karl is the best coach he’s played for. To the commenter who mentioned that scorers being seen as selfish as a false view, I’d say never put Jordan, Durant and Melo in the same sentence. Jordan was always willing to do the little things even while people said a league scoring leader couldn’t win a championship. When people said he couldn’t play defense, he improved to be a great defender. What has Melo improved on really? Also, to say that Melo’s only job is to score the ball because he’s the best scorer on the floor is completely ridiculous. Kevin Durant averaged more rebounds than LeBron did last season and is getting better on the defensive end of the floor. If George Karl couldn’t get him to become more well rounded, I find it hard to believe that Mike Woodson will. No comparison between Melo and LeBron. LeBron played his contract out and left as a free agent. Never got any coach fired. He made Mike Brown look better than he really was. Melo will at some point have to decide what he wants his career to look like. At this rate, he’ll be known as a pure scorer with no other contributions or achievements in the NBA. Even Iverson rebounded the ball and led the league in steals a few seasons. Melo is coming up on his 10th season. Every star player around him in the league is more well-rounded than he is. It may be unfair to compare his game to LeBron’s given that LeBron had a natural skillset that Melo never could or will have. But there are things that can and should be improved upon if the Knicks are going to go anywhere.
http://slamonline.com Allenp

I think you have too much faith in Dwight NBK.
I think he did waffle because he so desperately wanted to be liked. It was obvious when he was the only superstar stupid enough to make negative comments about LeBron’s decision instead of just politely declining comment. He wanted to be a “good guy” that’s the image he wants to project. It’s why he prevented his child’s mother from even mentioning his name on the Basketball Wives.
So, he wanted to leave because the team was being managed poorly, but then when the backlash became crazy and they made some wild promises about improving the squad, he waived his opt out clause. It’s was stupid. I don’t trust every story based on anonymous sources, but based on what I’ve seen from Dwight, I believe he was flip-flopping at times.
http://cnbc.com JTaylor21

There is no excuse for a cat with melo’s size and strength to not be around 7+ rpg and 48% shooting every season. Durant already in his 5th season, grabbed more rebounds than Melo has at any point in his career.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

@nbk I have read and heard about what the Magic have been doing to Dwight and I see now what you have been saying. I think it’s horrible how they have been screwing around with him since last year’s draft. Now if there’s a superstar player in the league without a team around him that can help him get anywhere, it’s Dwight.
http://www.starting5.com.au NM30

Na mello you’ve had that rep forever
http://www.twitter.com/_dfrance dfrance

Dwight could have opted out though couldn’t he? If he truly wanted to leave, why did he agree to stay. Yeah maybe they trade him, but he didn’t have to sign an extension with the new team right? Or do I have that all wrong.
Anyway, Lebron never held his team hostage. Played until the final game and then went into free agency which is what he said he was gonna do from jumpstreet.
Melo should take his own advice and keep his mouth shut. His foot always ends up in it.
http://Slamonline.com Black Mamba

You cannot compare the Dwight thing to the Melodrama. In Melos situation, he knew what he wanted, and he stuck with it. And Denver did all the right things and are a solid six or seventh seed. Dwight told the Magic that he wanted a trade. But he could never man up and signed that opt in clause. And the Magic are handling it all wrong. They are likely going to wind up with two years of drama in exchange for Dwight. Either Lakers or Rockets Dwight. Make your pick and spare us all this $hit.
ChipS

Haha, you tell me not to believe everything I read and then bring up hear say yourself. Stop believing everything you read. Your words, Your logic.
http://www.slamonline.com Chinese Oppenheimer

Melo needs to get rid of the “yes men” and co-signers and get some “no men” who will tell him what it is.
ByAnyMeansNecessary

Dwight was guilted into waiving that clause. He does want to be liked, but he didn’t waffle. From what I’ve heard, he has been wanting to be traded. He’s been consistent. The Magic have been very strategic about what information to leak out. When a guy is told that a player is not available on the trade market, and a few days later the guy gets traded, there’s something crazy going on. When GMs around the league who are clued into what’s going on say that they think the Magic really have no plans to trade Dwight at all, it should be clear that Dwight is being held hostage. Trade him to LA for Bynum. Trade him to Brooklyn for a package around Brook Lopez. Those deals were on the table and the Magic didn’t take them while all the while, saying that they want to trade him.
ChipS

Majority of athletes and people in general need to get rid of yes men. But that comes with the status of being in the spotlight. Doubt that it will change.
http://www.slamonline.com Slick Ric

I agree with Jtaylor, He should definitely be shooting better from the field especially when you consider the fact that he plays closer to the basket a lot more than durant does.
Heals

Regardless of how you feel bout him in a Knick Uni, there’s no American hoops fan alive that can’t get down with “International” Melo. Dude just looks like the game was designed for him…
http://slamonline.com Allenp

BY ANY MEANS

If you say you want to leave a team, why sign an agreement which binds you to that team for another year instead of just leaving?
See, some people say Dwight wants to stay if the team improves, other people say he wants to leave. The fact that this confusion exists is because he has changed his mind.
Man up like Bron, Wade and Bosh. Say you’re going to be a free agent and make a choice. Or, say you want to stay. Just pick one and stop holding your wet finger up into the wind.
pposse

who is dwight howard or anyone to say that they dont want to go to LA? If Dwight has no intentions on going to LA he needs to get new business advisors. Sure BK would be nice, but LA is nice too! imo Dwight only wants to go to one place and one place only..and thats BK. He needs to come out and just say it already.
pposse

and what is you talking about sin city?? the nuggets are a playoff team without Melo? Stick a finals MVP and or a 3 time regular season MVP/finals MVP and that nuggets team gets out of the first round all the time!
http://slamonline.com nbk

Allen, whether Dwight wants to be liked is not the question. It’s if he wanted to be traded. He did. That never changed. He didn’t want to go to LA (the most popular team in the world) be an unhappy second option and refuse to extend his contract, because then, even more than now, he would have really really been the bad guy. Could you imagine the backlash Dwight would have got from most of the basketball world if he costed the Lakers the second best center in the NBA for a one year rental?
.
Basically, whatever Dwight’s reason for staying at last years deadline was, (didn’t want to be the bad guy, didn’t want to be a second (or third in LA as Kobe told him) option, or just didn’t want to be in Shaq’s shadow) he never wavered. He always wanted to play in New Jersey/Brooklyn or Dallas. LA was on his list until Kobe made that phone call and told him he would be the third option. The Magic’s job as an organization is to do what’s best for them, and since they can’t get what they feel they deserve for Dwight, they might as well portray him as the problem. Which is exactly what they have done, and done well.
http://www.slamonline.com Redd

Wtf@ Carmelo not having enough to win? He lost to the fricking Clippers while they were a top 4 seed I believe. Camby was still doing his thing then too if I remember correctly. Stop it, plain and simple Melo cannot deliver.

Carmelo Anthony Thinks Selfish Reputation Began During ‘Linsanity’

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