New York, NY (SportsNetwork.com) – After days of intense speculation concerning his future, Carmelo Anthony broke his silence on Sunday, announcing that he will indeed re-sign with the New York Knicks.<\/p>\n
Anthony declared his return in a letter posted to the 2012-13 NBA scoring champion’s official website. The Knicks then confirmed his decision by issuing a press release shortly after the statement came out.<\/p>\n
“A few years ago I dreamed of coming back to New York City, the place of my birth, and on February 23, 2011 that became a reality,” wrote Anthony. “[The Knicks] organization has supported me and in return, I want to stay and build here with this city and my team. At this pivotal juncture in my career, I owed it to myself and my family to explore all of the options available to me. Through it all, my heart never wavered.<\/p>\n
“During this journey I met with some quality organizations who have amazing talent and leadership. I thank them for their consideration, belief in my talent, and opportunity to imagine the possibilities.<\/p>\n
“I will always remember this chapter in my life. In the end, I am a New York Knick at heart.”<\/p>\n
The New York Daily News, citing a close friend of Anthony with knowledge of his plans, reported Wednesday that the seven-time All-Star had agreed to re-up with the Knicks for a full maximum contract that will pay him $129 million over five years.<\/p>\n
Sources also told the Daily News that Anthony turned down a four-year max offer from the Los Angeles Lakers, with the Chicago Bulls also known to have been pursuit of the coveted free agent.<\/p>\n
Anthony, who averaged 27.4 points, a career-best 8.1 rebounds and 3.1 assists while finishing second to league MVP Kevin Durant in the 2013-14 scoring race, also stated his support in new Knicks president Phil Jackson’s efforts to rebuild the struggling franchise back into a championship contender.<\/p>\n
“After three months of questions around Carmelo Anthony’s return to the New York Knicks, we are now happy to know that we have the cornerstone of what we envision as a ‘team of excellence.'” said Jackson in a statement. “[General manager] Steve Mills and I have assured Carmelo through our conversations, that we have the vision and the determination to build this team and he has clearly bought into our message.”<\/p>\n
After reaching the Eastern Conference semifinals in 2012-13, New York slumped to a 37-45 record this past season that triggered the dismissal of head coach Mike Woodson. Jackson hired recently retired point guard Derek Fisher to take over the position.<\/p>\n
In three-plus seasons since joining the Knicks in a 2011 trade with the Denver Nuggets, Anthony has averaged 26.5 points, 7.1 rebounds and 3.1 assists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
New York, NY (SportsNetwork.com) – After days of intense speculation concerning his future, Carmelo Anthony broke his silence on Sunday, announcing that he will indeed re-sign with the New York Knicks. Anthony declared his return in a letter posted to the 2012-13 NBA scoring champion’s official website. The Knicks then confirmed his decision by issuing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[70,59,69],"class_list":["post-20837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nba","tag-knicks","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-knicks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20837"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20839,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837\/revisions\/20839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}