Two Knicks Legends Named Top 20 Small Forwards

Despite their title, these New York Knicks star were anything but small.

Hoops Hype’s ranking of the top 20 small forwards of all-time featured two New Yorkers: Carmelo Anthony came in 12th while Bernard King posted up in 16th.

Despite his polarizing legacy in Manhattan, Anthony has more than likely clinched a Hall of Fame bid through an accomplished 19-year career that currently places him 10th on the NBA’s all-time scoring list. Of his final tally, 10,186 points came in New York, making him one of only seven Knicks to reach five digits.

Such abilities were lauded in the Hoops Hype staff’s accompanying analysis and they helped make up for his lack of championship hardware the names ahead of him obtained.

“Anthony … liked to bully smaller defenders and hit them with turnaround fadeaways, putting up a historic amount of points thanks to his well-rounded ways of scoring,” Hoops Hype said. “There were times in his prime when it felt like once Anthony would get it going, he was impossible to defend. The numbers reflect that, too – after all, ranking Top 10 ever in scoring is almost hard to fathom.”

“It’s unfortunate Anthony wasn’t able to have more team success in his career, which would have helped him move up this list.”

Four spots below Anthony was King, who earned his Springfield ticket in 2013. Though he spent five seasons in New York, some of his finest hours came in a blue and orange uniform. In 1984, he became just the fourth player in NBA history to put consecutive 50-point games and he later bested that with a 60-point showing on Christmas Day against the New Jersey Nets.

A devastating knee injury abruptly stopped King’s Manhattan mastery but that hasn’t stopped him from carrying a warm legacy among Knicks fans and more.

“King blew out his knee the year he earned the second 1st Team All-NBA of his career, missing the entire following season and never regained his explosiveness after that,” Hoops Hype said. “Even so, King, the NBA’s leading scorer in 1984-85, was one of the smoothest high-scoring wings of his era.”

Current Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James led the rankings while Larry Bird and another active star, Phoenix’s Kevin Durant, rounded out the top three.

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