The Knicks Need To Give Carmelo Anthony Number 15
I have long been a believer that Carmelo Anthony would never fulfilling his potential unless he grew the cornrows back. It’s just one of those things. You didn’t see Michael Jordan grow hair once he shaved his head on his ascent to becoming the GOAT. LeBron and his headband have a relationship like Forrest Gump and Jenny. And I thought maybe Melo just needed the cornrows in order to get his mojo working again. But then I watched Melo again be the alpha male for Team USA yesterday and drop 31 points to down Australia and I realized it’s not a cornrows thing. Olympic Melo hasn’t had cornrows since 2008 and Olympic Melo is the most dominant model of Melo.
Everyone knows that if you look good, you feel good. And if you feel good, you play good. Having the right jersey number is part of that. NFL running backs need fast numbers. Baseball pitchers need a number with double digits. And basketball players need to have a number that flows. There’s a reason Michael Jordan went back to number 23 after the Bulls lost to the Magic while he was wearing 45.
Melo led Syracuse to a national championship as a freshman wearing number 15. He gave LeBron a run for Rookie of the Year and made the playoffs every season with the Nuggets while wearing number 15. Sure Denver only made it out of the first round once, but that was with trash teams against a powerful Western Conference. And the one time the Nuggets made it past the first round was to the Western Conference Finals where they played the eventual NBA Champion Lakers pretty tough (at least in the beginning of the series). If memory serves me right, I think Trevor Ariza made a couple of game saving steals to give the Lakers some close wins before L.A. closed out the series strong. And Olympic Melo has worn number 15 since 2008. The one time he didn’t wear number 15 was when he wore number 8 in 2004 and was a bench player averaging 7 minutes a game. Now he’s the leading scorer in Team USA history, with most of those points coming while wearing number 15. Olympic Melo is the daddy long dick of international basketball and one of the most teflon athletes I’ve ever seen. You could make a case that it’s really Number 15 Melo that is the big bad motherfucker.
Now with the Knicks, while wearing number 7, it’s the complete opposite. The Knicks had the worst record in franchise history two years ago and haven’t made the playoffs the last three seasons despite being in the bum ass Eastern Conference. I don’t give a flying fuck that the Knicks retired the number 15 TWICE. Dick Mcguire (RIP) and Earl Monroe will understand if you take number 15 down from the rafters for a few more seasons of Melo. The Zen Master is Mr. Knick. The only other person in Knicks history that could pull this move with no problem is Red Holzman if he was still alive. And just like with starting quarterbacks, everyone knows if you have two retired number 15s, you have no retired number 15s.
So do the right thing Zen Master and #StayMe15