Carmelo Anthony Injury: Knicks Star Reveals He's Playing with Injured Shoulder

New York Knicks superstar Carmelo Anthony revealed after the team's victory over Milwaukee Bucks on Friday night that he's been playing through a shoulder injury for nearly a month.

Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News passed along comments about the ailment from the 32-year-old forward, who said the issue stems from suffering a bruise on his shooting shoulder Dec. 11. Ever since, it's required constant attention and can often flare up during games:

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It's bad. You know what it is, it's an adjustment that you have to make on the fly. Like some days it feels good, some days it's tight. Throughout the course of the game, certain shots, certain moves, you feel like the strength isn't there. So it's just a matter of figuring out how to play through it. What's working? What's not?

It feels good during the game. And then you irritate it. And then you kind of have to work backwards again to get it back stronger. But I'm constant around-the-clock treatment.

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Anthony's comments come after back-to-back strong performances against the Bucks. He scored 30 points with 11 rebounds and seven assists Wednesday. He backed that up by tallying 26 points, 10 assists and six rebounds in Friday's rematch.

The nine-time All-Star selection and 2012-13 NBA scoring champion has endured some shooting woes since suffering the injury, though. He shot 40.6 percent from the field in December and checks in at 40 percent through three January games. That's well below his 45.2 career mark.

Meanwhile, the Knicks have faded following a solid start to the campaign. They are 3-7 over their past 10 games, which has dropped them out of the top eight in the Eastern Conference.

Anthony told the New York Daily News a break is the only thing that could help him fully recover, but New York can't afford to play without one of their key assets at this stage.

"The only thing that's going to help (the shoulder) is rest," he said. "But we're playing every other day. It's a tough month."

Anthony added he hasn't even considered requesting games off to see whether he could get closer to full strength, noting: "They're going to have to tell me to take a couple off. Cause I'm not doing it." It's unclear whether that's a route the Knicks would take if his shooting struggles continue.

Unfortunately for New York, the schedule doesn't provide any relief. The team doesn't get more than two days in a row without a game again until the All-Star break in the middle of February. That's six more weeks of trying to fight through the pain for its leading scorer.