Melo Mysteries: Answering the Internet's Biggest Carmelo Anthony Questions
September 15, 2017
Carmelo Anthony has had enough of the blatant disrespect he is constantly inundated with by the mainstream sports media AKA the MSSM AKA the Fake (basketball) News. The man is a 10-time All-Star, a future Hall of Famer and the most badass player to ever show off a picture of himself and Jesus standing in a puddle of blood on a 2005 episode of MTV Cribs.
But no matter how much he accomplishes, my colleagues in the NBA Hot-Take Industrial Complex can't seem to resist the chance to take him down a peg or two...or 64! That's right, he was ranked just 64th overall by ESPN's NBA panel. Meanwhile, rookie Lonzo Ball was ranked 63rd without playing a single regular-season game.
Everyone loves to take aim at Melo. He's been the locus of more regrettable shots than a tripled-teamed Carmelo Antho...I'm so sorry. Sometimes even I can't help myself.
Everywhere I look, it seems like the MSSM is asking the same questions over and over again. When are you leaving the Knicks? Why aren't you leaving the Knicks? Why are you wearing that hoodie during practice? Are you a Jedi Master or a Sith Lord?
Personally, I'm tired of letting my colleagues in the Fake (basketball) News control the narrative of an athlete's destiny. This is why I am turning to the greatest collection of fan-sourced NBA questions on the internet: the Yahoo search engine. Along with my colleague Grant Hughes, we will be answering the best, most-asked questions by Yahoo users—which you can find by typing in his name and reading the autocomplete results.
Question 1: Where does Carmelo Anthony...live?
Matt Lieb: As you can see from the screenshot above, this is the very first question that pops up when you type in "Where does Carmelo…" and I think that's very telling. The fans don't want to know why he ranks 64th on some list. They want to know where Anthony lives, and I'm going to answer that question once and for all.
Answer: New York City. He lives there now. He'll live there forever. Period. We should all stop speculating about where Melo might end up and start accepting the fact he will be a New York Knick forever and ever.
It reminds me of the time I got Herpes simplex 1 (the mouth kind) from drunk kissing an older woman in Bakersfield, California. I was in denial for months and it almost drove me mad. "Oh it's just an ingrown hair on my lip," I would tell myself every time a new cold sore appeared. It wasn't until I finally accepted my Herpes that I was able to adapt and live a normal life. And you know what? It's not that bad. It could be worse. It could be Herpes simplex 2.
Grant Hughes: Matt, as someone familiar with the challenge of managing symptoms associated with any variant of the Herpes simplex virus, surely you understand what it means to go through life not knowing what tomorrow will bring.
In this way, you're actually a lot like Melo—a man who has no choice but to face terrifying uncertainty when he wakes up every morning. Vicious trade rumors and hatchet-job rankings by experts are not unlike festering sores. Will new ones appear overnight? What new horrors shall arise at dawn?
So where must Carmelo Anthony live? Where must he take refuge from chronic and incurable criticism?
The moment. Anthony lives in the moment.
It's the only way. He has learned to appreciate every second for what it is, knowing that, like an itchy and painful outbreak of oral ulcers, so much is out of his control.
Question 2: Why does Carmelo Anthony...wear a sleeve?
GH: I'm following your lead and hitting the top result because, as I've emphasized to several disinterested journalism award panels, this exercise is about answering the most pressing questions.
That said, this is an embarrassing question. Because how is the answer not obvious?
A stat to consider: Anthony has averaged more shot attempts per minute than any active player in the NBA. So, Yahoo queriers, do you think maybe 14 years and 19,072 field-goal attempts might take a bit of a toll on the old right elbow joint? Might wear on the tendons a little?
The sleeve is clearly a valuable piece of preventative medical equipment...that...covers...Anthony's...non-shooting arm.
Oh boy. This...this has not gone as expected.
Upon further research, it appears Anthony now wears two sleeves—one on each arm. And in this photo, I'm seeing a minimum of four. Six if you include leg sleeves (not pictured). Eight if you count socks which, if you think about it, are really just sleeves for your feet.
I guess the answer isn't as obvious as I thought.
Listen, I'm sorry. But I don't feel like I'm to blame for this because why is anyone asking about sleeves anyway? Why not the hoodie? Are we really going to blow right past the fact that Melo's the only human alive who plays basketball with a hoodie on because we'd rather focus on sleeves instead?
The sleeves are red herrings, people. We have to ignore them and sort out the hood thing, which NOBODY IS ASKING ABOUT!!!
Is this a Magneto situation? Is he trying to keep Professor X's thoughts out of his head? Is it a cutting-edge hair-regrowth system? A means of preventing heat escape from the top of the head? Does this suggest Melo is a reptile? Are we dealing with a real-life lizard person?
This is the actual question we have to answer. No more sleeve talk. Not with the possibility of a lizard person walking among us.
ML: Although I completely agree that this "sleeve" question is a distraction from the fact Melo is most likely a reptilian-human hybrid, I think the Yahoo users and our readers deserve to have this question answered. And the answer is quite surprising: Melo wears two sleeves to cover up some pretty embarrassing tattoos he acquired while he was a Denver Nugget.
On his left arm, he has a random amalgamation of tattoos that includes a bulldog with trading cards; a Warner Brothers logo; an InfoWars logo; the phrase "no struggle, no progress"; the phrase "jet fuel can't melt steel beams"; a Calvin-urinating-upon-a-LeBron James logo; the Cracked Magazine mascot, Sylvester P. Smythe, dunking on the Mad Magazine mascot, Alfred E. Neuman; and a stussy.
On his right arm, he has a series of tattoos that are as follows:
Denver Nuggets 2005 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2006 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2007 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2008 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2009 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2010 NBA CHAMPIONS
Denver Nuggets 2011 N...
New York Knicks 2011 NBA CHAMPIONS
New York Knicks 2013 Eastern Conference SEMIFINALIST!
Question 3: Can Carmelo Anthony...speak Spanish?
ML: Of all of the questions that could possibly spring up from typing in "Can Carmelo Anthony...", I must admit that I did not expect "speak Spanish" to be the very first result. But I will soldier on and answer the people's question, however strange it might be to me—a high falutin' member of the sports-media class who uses fancy phrases like "high falutin'."
I'll admit that I didn't know the answer off the top of my head. I had to do some Yahoo'ing to find the answer, so naturally I went to Google. And in my research I found new information on Melo that surprised me. Carmelo Anthony is part Puerto Rican! Who knew? Not me! And here he is speaking Spanish!
Answer: No, no puede.
GH: Did you know that one of the points of the Bermuda Triangle sits smack on top of Puerto Rico, where Anthony owns a second-tier professional soccer team?
Did you also know that former Knicks president Phil Jackson's entire coaching identity is defined by the triangle offense, a scheme he demanded the Knicks impose—one that hampered Anthony and partially contributed to his fractured relationship with the organization?
It all connects. Jackson capitalized on Anthony's heritage, planting seeds in his mind, nudging him toward Puerto Rico, which is only the most famous non-basketball triangle in the world.
Jackson wanted Anthony to be thinking about triangle-related things at all times. He sought to inundate his star player with three-sided thoughts.
Can Melo speak Spanish? Not really, but that's nothing to worry about. More concerning: the lingering whisper of Jackson, the Zen Master, still controlling the thoughts and actions of players.
Triangulo!
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