MEMPHIS — We know what the 81 games coming to us at Yankee Stadium are going to be like, an 81-chapter farewell to Derek Jeter (plus whatever October action the Yankees can muster). In some ways, this will be similar to the feelings the farewell tour the old stadium across the street engendered six years ago.
You want to get one last look.
You want to stir the memory bank one more time.
You want to get one last snapshot of Jeter in pinstripes, one for the mind’s eye and one for forever. The internal roiling will be extreme and it will be understood: Jeter played a lot of years in New York, won a lot of games here, played at an extraordinary level. As the days dwindle down to a precious few, it will be important to appreciate every game he has left.
There is no way to properly transfer those feelings to the ones that might well be prevalent in these last 30 games of the Knicks season, including the last 11 games at the Garden, even if they’re similar. Carmelo Anthony hasn’t played nearly as long as Jeter, hasn’t won nearly as much, hasn’t carved nearly the footprint Jeter has.
And yet it is also a real — a very real — possibility this might be the start of his own farewell tour. We won’t know that for certain until July, of course, and it does seem the narrative around that decision changes from week to week: He’s certain to take the extra money the Knicks can pay him … no, winning means more to him than an extra $33 million … no, playing in New York matters most to him … no, winning does, and the Knicks better show a forward-thinking plan … no, he’d not only be willing to stay in New York but offer a hometown discount if it means getting better players around him …
There’s no way of knowing how this plays out because it’s almost certain Anthony himself doesn’t have the slightest idea how this will play out, not yet. And it is inherently difficult to muster a lot of enthusiasm for a farewell tour when farewell doesn’t mean easing into retirement but fleeing to a different city — and, presumably, a far more agreeable basketball situation.
Still, facts are facts. Reality is reality.
And this really might be the final 30 games of the Melo Era with the Knicks. It has been a relentlessly flawed, repeatedly frustrating time, a time that’s zenith might well have been the first 23 games of last year and that’s picture, for all time, will be Melo meeting Roy Hibbert high above the rim last spring, Hibbert redirecting a would-be Melo slam that might have bought the Knicks a Game 7.
In so many ways that moment — Anthony freed up on the baseline, soaring to the basket, ready to put an exclamation point on the game and providing a forever image for his time as a Knick — was the last moment it felt good, purely good, to be a Knicks fan. Then Hibbert made the block, the Pacers ended the Knicks’ season, the summer yielded a reformulated roster and the first 3 ½ months of this season yielded one agony after another.
It may well be you’re even ready to bid Anthony farewell. And, in fairness, it may well be the only way to truly rebuild and reformat the Knicks is to let that happen. (Me? I don’t think so. But that has as much to do with a lack of confidence in Knicks decision-makers as a belief in the Knicks’ best player).
“We have to play every game like it could be our last game,” Anthony said Tuesday morning at FedEx Forum, where the Knicks were tuning up for a game against the Grizzlies. “Like it’s win or go home.”
For now, there is a still a season to rescue, but they are one more losing streak away from turning the remainder of the season into a mail room, and if that happens the only reason to come to the Garden would be to see if Anthony can hang 62 on someone again. Or just to see him, period: It may well be that Jeter’s aren’t the only days dwindling down to a precious few.