By Nina Mandell
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — The Knicks are close to signing Suns’ star Amar’e Stoudemire to a max contract worth $100 million, multiple sources reported Saturday.
The team believes the signing could increase its chances of luring LeBron James, or other top players like Heat star Dwyane Wade or Raptors free agent Chris Bosh.
The Knicks have been aggressively marketing to get a top player for the past two years. While their first choice is James, having other elite players on squad is believed to greatly increase their rebuilding chances.
But signing Stoudemire would be a gamble.
Stoudemire is the second top free agent the Knicks have gone after as part of their pitch to James. Their first choice - Atlanta’s Joe Johnson - was signed by the Hawks earlier this week.
But Stoudemire’s signing, if it doesn’t succeed in luring James, could be a disaster despite his 23.1 points and 8.9 rebounds a game for the Suns last season.
Sources told the New York Post that Phoenix wasn’t enthusiastic about signing him to a max contract because he had microfracture knee surgery last year. In fact, sources said, the Knicks were the only team willing to offer him an uninsured max contract.
Stoudemire tweeted Saturday that he'd was in New York, and was looking forward to seeing the play Rock of Ages. He didn't mention why he was in the city.
Meanwhile, James spent his holiday weekend meeting with the Chicago Bulls and his current team, the Cleveland Cavaliers.
And, a day after telling reporters he was in a “New York state of mind,” Wade refused to bow to the Bulls’ pressure to sign before Saturday's meeting with James, Yahoo! Sports reported.
According to the report, the two are very interested in playing together, but haven’t struck a deal or found the right situation yet.
The Knicks also denied another Yahoo! Report that they were out of the James race.
"That’s not how the presentation felt to me when I was in it," Knicks president Donnie Walsh told the Post. "No one connected with [LeBron’s] camp said that."
