LeBron James insists he doesn't have any inside information about if Carmelo Anthony might really leave the New York Knicks when he becomes a free agent this summer, but admits he can understand what he might be thinking.
"You do something for your whole life, you want to be good at it, you want to work at it, you don't want it to be easy," James told the New York Post before his Miami Heat trounced Anthony's Knicks 106-91 Saturday night. said. "But you want to give yourself an opportunity to win."
The two-time defending NBA champion and four-time league MVP later added "just like the rest of us, you want to win. That's the No. 1 thing."
James' assessment seem to imply what many have already concluded--- if winning is as important to the high-scoring Anthony as he now insists it is his days at Madison Square Garden might be numbered.
Since coming to New York in February of 2011, Anthony and the Knicks have won only one playoff series and if the season ended today the team wouldn't make the playoffs.
All season long, it's been left to Anthony to carry the Knicks, as he ranks behind only Kevin Durant in scoring, averaging 27.2 points per game, to go along with nine rebounds. He recently set The Garden all-time scoring record with 62 points against the Bobcats.
James, who bolted his hometown Cavs to join Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in Miami, sympathizes with his NBA pal, just not enough to grant him any slack once the opening-tip was in play. In ending the Knicks four-game winning streak, James scored 30 points and grabbed eight rebounds to go with seven assists.
According to The Post, less than two days before he had shown up nearly two hours before practice to put himself through a rigorous workout after the Heat were thumped by Kevin Durant and the Thunder. The move was viewed by many as James sending a message to his overly-laxed teammates.
"As the leader of the team, you have to do things that are out of your comfort zone at times," James said. "It was trying to get my mind right."
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