Carmelo Anthony is finally setting the record straight on his rocky years with the New York Knicks, and he’s not holding back. Appearing on 7PM in Brooklyn, the 10-time All-Star unloaded on former Knicks president Phil Jackson, calling him out for poor leadership, lack of communication, and hypocrisy during their disastrous partnership in New York.
“When you dealing with power and people who want power, and people who only dealt with power their whole life, who only know how to deal with power their whole life, if anything starts to challenge that power and bring awareness to that power, you disagree with it. You don’t f**k with it. You shy away.”
“As a man, if I was that much of a hindrance to you, why didn’t you have a conversation with me when I was there? Instead of bringing me in the office, showing me Michael Jordan clips of the triangle, and telling me what not to do in a triangle because he did it wrong. This is s**t that he told me.”
“Instead of doing that, let’s just have a real man conversation. “Melo, listen. I want to go in a different direction.” We weren’t good. It’s not no shot at my teammates, but like they know it too. We had a poorly structured team, rosters those years, and you was at the helm of that. Nobody told you. You had this vision of wanting to play in a certain type of system, which is the triangle, which I love. I love the triangle offense.”
“At the time, it didn’t fit the style of the NBA. We was a laughingstock of the NBA for being in the triangle, and I had to fight that, and I had to take those bullets, not you, Phil Jackson. While I’m taking those bullets, you are in the stands tweeting about Melo breaking the triangle. This is the s**t that I had to deal with.”
“I never spoke on him. I never spoke about him. I had probably three conversations with the man that whole tenure, really. We didn’t have a relationship. So if I was that much of a hindrance to you, you should have came to me and said it, instead of telling me to bear with you.’Rock with me, stay with me, I got you, bear with me, we gonna fix this, we gonna do it up.'”
“Okay, cool. I don’t want that job. I don’t want anything. Just tell me who I’m playing with, tell me who’s on the court with me, and that’s it.”
During Jackson’s three-year tenure as team president, the Knicks went just 80–166, cycling through coaches, struggling with mismatched rosters, and clinging to a system that no longer fit the league. Anthony, meanwhile, was often made the scapegoat for the team’s failings. Jackson, for his part, recently revisited the topic in his new book Masters of the Game, claiming that his fractured relationship with Carmelo was the reason he left New York.
Anthony’s response on the 7PM in Brooklyn made clear that he sees things differently. For him, Jackson’s downfall wasn’t about a single player; it was about ego, communication, and an unwillingness to adapt.
The Knicks were 196–216 overall during Melo’s tenure, but just 80–166 under Jackson’s watch. For Anthony, that speaks volumes.
